FastPass+ Chaos at MK today

[BrerJon]

Lol that's just false. An attraction that could handle 1,000 guests per hour before Fastpass+ can now handle EXACTLY 1,000 guests per hour after the implementation of Fastpass+. The parks' ride capacities have not been altered in any way, shape, or form.

But the access to the attractions has changed, due to forcing people to go on attractions they previously would have skipped. Take 'Living With The Land', to use an example I noticed on my last trip. In the old system, it was always a walk-on, max 5 minute wait, 10 minutes for the attraction, in and out in 15 minutes. Now, the standby line might be 25 minutes, so that's more than twice as long out of your day to get the attraction ticked off the list.

Those additional small attraction waits add up, and even if Fastpass+ lines are a little shorter than old Fastpass lines, it's the rides that didn't need it in the first place that make it much harder to do a comprehensive touring plan than it used to be.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

But the access to the attractions has changed, due to forcing people to go on attractions they previously would have skipped.

Wut? I must have missed the compulsive you-must-ride-Nemo part of the FP+ tutorial.

Take 'Living With The Land', to use an example I noticed on my last trip. In the old system, it was always a walk-on, max 5 minute wait, 10 minutes for the attraction, in and out in 15 minutes. Now, the standby line might be 25 minutes, so that's more than twice as long out of your day to get the attraction ticked off the list.

More people enjoying the attraction than they otherwise would have is a bad thing? Something in my gut tells me that more people enjoying an attraction is a good thing.

Those additional small attraction waits add up, and even if Fastpass+ lines are a little shorter than old Fastpass lines, it's the rides that didn't need it in the first place that make it much harder to do a comprehensive touring plan than it used to be.

Three points.

1. The math doesn't work. If park attendance is constant X and ride capacity is constant Y, a longer line at one attraction must be offset with a shorter line somewhere else.

2. Even if I conceded your point that standby lines are longer (which I don't), how is that worse than the "old way"?

Old way: Walk to Test Track to get a Fastpass. Walk to Soarin' to get a Fastpass. Ride Living With the Land. Walk back to Test Track to use Fastpass. Walk back to Soarin' to use Fastpass.
New way: Ride Test Track standby. Ride Soarin' with pre-selected Fastpass. Ride Living With the Land with pre-selected Fastpass.

Call me crazy, but I'd rather wait 60 minutes (10 minutes if I go to Test Track at rope drop) in an air conditioned themed queue than I would spending the exact same amount of time crisscrossing back and forth across Future World in 90 degrees and 100% humidity.

3. At the end of the day, what you're saying is that you knew how to exploit the old system at the expense of less informed guests and you dislike this system for its equalizing effect on "expert" and "non-expert" Disneygoers.

 

[BrerJon]

Old way: Walk to Test Track to get a Fastpass. Walk to Soarin' to get a Fastpass. Ride Living With the Land. Walk back to Test Track to use Fastpass. Walk back to Soarin' to use Fastpass.
New way: Ride Test Track standby. Ride Soarin' with pre-selected Fastpass. Ride Living With the Land with pre-selected Fastpass.

You're assuming that there will be any Fastpasses left for Soarin' or Test Track in the morning of the visit. I don't plan in advance what park I'm going to be at, so in the old system I would go at rope drop, get the Fastpasses I wanted, then spend the rest of the day enjoying the park. Now, even if there's a Fastpass available at rope drop for that day it's likely to be much later in the day when I might not even want to be in the same park.

 

[BrerJon]

3. At the end of the day, what you're saying is that you knew how to exploit the old system at the expense of less informed guests and you dislike this system for its equalizing effect on "expert" and "non-expert" Disneygoers.

I get that you like it, and I'm glad I'm in the minority - all I'm saying is Disney is going to be getting a lot less of my dollars in the future because of it, and the fact they make such a big thing of pointing out how many people love it and how stupid anyone who complains about it is and they don't care if I don't spend money there, only makes me even more determined to withhold my custom in the future.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

You're assuming that there will be any Fastpasses left for Soarin' or Test Track in the morning of the visit. I don't plan in advance what park I'm going to be at, so in the old system I would go at rope drop, get the Fastpasses I wanted, then spend the rest of the day enjoying the park.

You still have that option.

Now, even if there's a Fastpass available at rope drop for that day it's likely to be much later in the day when I might not even want to be in the same park.

Exactly the opposite. Before, Fastpasses were distributed in chronological order. The longer you waited to get one, the later in the day the available Fastpasses would get. Now, available same-day Fastpass windows are sprinkled throughout a day.

 

[BrerJon]

You still have that option.
Exactly the opposite. Before, Fastpasses were distributed in chronological order. The longer you waited to get one, the later in the day the available Fastpasses would get. Now, available same-day Fastpass windows are sprinkled throughout a day.

All I know is I waited ten minutes at a kiosk in MK after it opened to get a Fastpass for the Mine Train and the Cast Member laughed at me for even trying - they didn't have anything all day. In the old system I'd have ran over there and got one for the next half hour.

Sure, other guests get a shorter line now instead, good for them. I'm getting to experience more of Sea World and Universal and spending money there instead of at Disney, so everybody wins.

 

[Tom Morrow]

I don't know why people still push the "Fastpass doesn't actually increase standby wait times because it evens out/offsets crowds" argument despite the fact that we have now seen legit proof that it does. Attractions that were already popular Fastpass attractions have seen no significant change in their standby wait times, while attractions that previously did not have Fastpass (Pirates) or were a secondary Fastpass selection (IE Tower of Terror Fastpasses generally being a secondary choice to Rock 'n' Roller Coaster) have seen significant increases.

Fastpass does artificially inflate the standby queues to a longer wait time than if that attraction did not have Fastpass. How much it inflates the queue depends on how many Fastpass users are returning. When the attractions frequently have to take 10-20:1 ratio of Fastpass:Standby , then the Fastpass line IS THE NORMAL LINE, except now you had to reserve waiting in it in advance!

("When everyone has a Fastpass... no one does!")

Lol that's just false. An attraction that could handle 1,000 guests per hour before Fastpass+ can now handle EXACTLY 1,000 guests per hour after the implementation of Fastpass+. The parks' ride capacities have not been altered in any way, shape, or form.

But with no Fastpass, all 1,000 riders per hour would come from the standby (only) line. With Fastpass implemented, less than 200 of them per hour would.

So let's say an attraction has an hourly capacity of 1,000 riders per hour, and the queue holds approximately 1,000 people. With ONLY ONE queue, when you queue up in this situation as guest number 1,001, you will wait approximately 1 hour. With 80% or more of the ride's capacity being devoted to a second queue, those 1,000 people in the standby queue ahead of you will ride before you... and also everyone with a Fastpass, resulting in significantly more people riding before you than would ever be physically possible with just one queue.

Fastpass was created as a crowd management system to let guests spend more time in the shops and restaurants spending money. The goal of Fastpass Plus seems to be to ensure the seats are filled at all times.

Of course the reason Fastpass remains as a "positive" in the eyes of the public is because it gives the perception that you are skipping the "normal" line, you are the exception getting the benefit. In reality, whenever there is high demand, you are scheduling to enter the "regular" queue. While it is definitely nice to know you have a guaranteed short wait for an attraction, and locking that in before you even get to the park is also nice, the real offset is inflated wait times all around, and you are doing more work to ride the same amount of attractions as you would have been able to ride if Fastpass didn't exist at all.

Edit: before, this only punished guests who did not bother to obtain any Fastpasses. Even a "spur of the moment" day visitor could obtain some decent Fastpasses, provided they didn't arrive at the end of the day. With advanced reservations taking up almost all of the inventory, it punishes anyone who didn't or was unable to book in advance.

And that's why, on top of the glitches, the new system sucks. Because while the original Fastpass system was still manipulative crowd management, it was at least somewhat fair by being first-come, first serve. With Fastpass+ its very clear that the endgame goal was to further manipulate your time in the parks as much as possible, reward resort guests and advance ticket purchases, thereby locking people in before their visit even begins.

 

[wdisney9000]

Any perceived benefit that MM+ offers is cancelled out by the fact that the system is prone to so many problems that could happen in so many different ways. I love MDE and the ability to choose and change FP+ selections which is something we couldnt do in the past. But in the past, we never had problems opening our room door several times in one trip which turned into 5-10 minutes at the front desk each time. In the past, we never had problems when park hopping and a mickey head turning blue then having to go through the same routine and questioning every time we hop to another park. In the past, we never had a FP error for a person in our group resulting in a trip to GR and waiting in line 10-15 minutes. In the past, our FP's and ADR's couldnt be erased from the system resulting in a long phone call to Guest Services.

We have had many days that the system worked flawlessly but at no point did we turn to each other in excitement over how much more enhanced our vacation was because of it. It was nice, and MDE is helpful which made things more convenient. But that convenience was meaningless after one or more of the problems mentioned above happened on the same day. If it hasnt happened to you yet, it will.

I cant emphasize enough that MM+ in no way ruins your vacation, I just dont think the 'enhancements' are as good as some people pretend they are. Especially considering how much real enhancement all that money could have actually produced in the form of attraction capacity. And simply because one is critical of it, does not mean they hate WDW.

 

[Nubs70]

FP+ serves the purpose of load leveling. It is designed to force customer demand to underutilized attractions. While the cumulative customer wait time for top tier attractions is reduced, the cumulative wait time still exists and is transferred to attractions that formerly had little to no wait times.

 

[wdisney9000]

FP+ serves the purpose of load leveling. It is designed to force customer demand to underutilized attractions. While the cumulative customer wait time for top tier attractions is reduced, the cumulative wait time still exists and is transferred to attractions that formerly had little to no wait times.

That is an extremely accurate description of its purpose, yet its exactly what Disney does not want its customers to know, which is why they advertises it as 'enhancements'.

 

[Bairstow]

To those who say that FastPassPlus is increasing queues across the board, keep in mind that WDW attendance has also been going up. Since the net number of attractions has not really increased, wait times were going to go up anyway from the post-recession period.

Lol that's just false. An attraction that could handle 1,000 guests per hour before Fastpass+ can now handle EXACTLY 1,000 guests per hour after the implementation of Fastpass+. The parks' ride capacities have not been altered in any way, shape, or form.

Theoretically true, but I believe there may be exceptions.
At the Haunted Mansion, for example, having the attraction meet its maximum potential hourly capacity depends on the CMs at load being able to continually and quickly able to fill the preshow rooms so that the second omnimover queue never runs dry, leaving a gap in the vehicles. Since the addition of Fastpass and the stupid graveyard area, cast members are now frequently unable to manage the preshow flow, and thus ride capacity suffers.

Granted, this particular problem is not directly linked to FastPassPlus specifically so much as it is the use of FastPass generally in a situation where it is neither warranted or suited, but this policy is a hallmark of the implementation changes.

 

[Tom Morrow]

To those who say that FastPassPlus is increasing queues across the board, keep in mind that WDW attendance has also been going up. Since the net number of attractions has not really increased, wait times were going to go up anyway from the post-recession period.

True, but the increase in wait times was seen almost overnight once FP+ was added to attractions that didn't previously have it.

FP+ serves the purpose of load leveling. It is designed to force customer demand to underutilized attractions. While the cumulative customer wait time for top tier attractions is reduced, the cumulative wait time still exists and is transferred to attractions that formerly had little to no wait times.

Attractions like Pirates, Mansion, and SSE previously had minimal wait times most of the time, but that wasn't because people weren't riding them, but because they have a very high capacity.

 

[BrerJon]

While it is definitely nice to know you have a guaranteed short wait for an attraction, and locking that in before you even get to the park is also nice, the real offset is inflated wait times all around, and you are doing more work to ride the same amount of attractions as you would have been able to ride if Fastpass didn't exist at all.

Careful, Mickey and his goons don't like that kind of talk, the gang from Celebration Place are coming down hard on anyone trying to bad mouth the amazing billion dollar system they've built. We'll have none of your fancy schmancy 'facts' round here thank you.

 

[erasure fan1]

3. At the end of the day, what you're saying is that you knew how to exploit the old system at the expense of less informed guests and you dislike this system for its equalizing effect on "expert" and "non-expert" Disneygoers.

I have to say, while not my only complaint, that is definitely on my list for sure. Of course that is not near the top of my list of problems though. I have a hard time embracing something that requires so much work for a theme park vacation. The fact that I am going over plans of how we will tour the parks and what our ride strategy will be 5 MONTHS in advance kinda makes me nauseous. That might be right in your wheelhouse, but I say no thanks. With the old system, I only had to plan the night before.

I cant emphasize enough that MM+ in no way ruins your vacation, I just dont think the 'enhancements' are as good as some people pretend they are. Especially considering how much real enhancement all that money could have actually produced in the form of attraction capacity. And simply because one is critical of it, does not mean they hate WDW.

Yes, yes and yes. If Disney really gave a rats bum about making anyones trip "more enjoyable" they would have spent the money on rides and attractions. If you want to ease congestion and spread people around, give people more to do than just shop, and thats all MM+ was meant to do.

 

[doctornick]

Lol that's just false. An attraction that could handle 1,000 guests per hour before Fastpass+ can now handle EXACTLY 1,000 guests per hour after the implementation of Fastpass+. The parks' ride capacities have not been altered in any way, shape, or form.

Yes. For everyone who complains that FP+ means they can't do as many rides, that means that other guests are doing more rides than they would have done due to FP+.

Capacity of the rides hasn't changed, so if you are waiting longer for a ride than previously, it is only because other guests are getting on quicker than previously. FP+ has basically resulted in a lot more people who are using/benefiting from FP+, at a detriment to many more experienced guests who used the old system more efficiently.

That doesn't mean the system is good or bad or whatever and I agree that it has its flaws. But it's impossible for everyone to have longer waits as a result of FP+ -- it is basically a redistributer of wait times.

 

[ford91exploder]

True, but the increase in wait times was seen almost overnight once FP+ was added to attractions that didn't previously have it.


Attractions like Pirates, Mansion, and SSE previously had minimal wait times most of the time, but that wasn't because people weren't riding them, but because they have a very high capacity.

And the addition of FP queues broke the design and effectively lowered capacity.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

I have to say, while not my only complaint, that is definitely on my list for sure. Of course that is not near the top of my list of problems though. I have a hard time embracing something that requires so much work for a theme park vacation. The fact that I am going over plans of how we will tour the parks and what our ride strategy will be 5 MONTHS in advance kinda makes me nauseous. That might be right in your wheelhouse, but I say no thanks. With the old system, I only had to plan the night before.


Yes, yes and yes. If Disney really gave a rats bum about making anyones trip "more enjoyable" they would have spent the money on rides and attractions. If you want to ease congestion and spread people around, give people more to do than just shop, and thats all MM+ was meant to do.

You've obviously never used FP+ I take it?

1. It's 60 days for resort guests and 30 days for others. Not FIVE MONTHS.

2. Unless it's a very busy time of year, there are plenty of Fastpasses available the day before or day of. The perception that you MUST book them 60 days in advance is a ghost story spread by those who hate the system and want to see it fail.

3. Look around this forum. There are people planning their "ride strategy" YEARS in advance. I saw a guy yesterday planning out his 2018 trip. People who want to show up and "wing it" are few and far between.

4. You can actually eliminate much of your "strategizing" all together because your day no longer needs to include crisscrossing the park to retrieve paper Fastpasses.

 

[bhg469]

You've obviously never used FP+ I take it?

1. It's 60 days for resort guests and 30 days for others. Not FIVE MONTHS.

2. Unless it's a very busy time of year, there are plenty of Fastpasses available the day before or day of. The perception that you MUST book them 60 days in advance is a ghost story spread by those who hate the system and want to see it fail.

3. Look around this forum. There are people planning their "ride strategy" YEARS in advance. I saw a guy yesterday planning out his 2018 trip. People who want to show up and "wing it" are few and far between.

4. You can actually eliminate much of your "strategizing" all together because your day no longer needs to include crisscrossing the park to retrieve paper Fastpasses.

There are lots of reservations for the day of, just not for attractions I wanted to be a part of.. park hopping was not even an option when I used it and I'm not sure it allows for it now.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

There are lots of reservations for the day of, just not for attractions I wanted to be a part of.. park hopping was not even an option when I used it and I'm not sure it allows for it now.

Yeah but be realistic. If I'm park hopping to Epcot at 3:00 in the afternoon, there's no way I'm getting a Fastpasses for Test Track or Soarin' under either system.

 

[kucarachi]

Last time we were there, i thought we had found a slight loophole but it didn't work every time. We had changed a fast pass within a close time to it expiring (on our phones) and found that some of our party's original fastpass didn't expire and they got the new one as well. It had no rhyme or reason and it seemed to only work at the magic kingdom.