Here's my idea for expanded system. I think the solution isn't to have a monorail go everywhere necessarily but to use monorail to get you from one area of the resort to the other stopping at major destinations. Then for hotels and smaller destinations transportation circulates within that area, reducing the long bus routes and duplicated bus routes.
Does it have to be elevated...no, but not doing so will cause problems at every location where the train would cross car traffic lanes. We have all seen how people turn their brains off the second they get on property. How long do you think it would take before someone tried to beat the monorail at a crossing resulting in an entire family getting killed? Elevated track is the best and safest way to incorporate it into the existing system without hampering what is already there.
What will dictate that is the maximum angle a monorail can ascend and descend. If this angle is too low it can take quite a bit of distance to become high enough to clear traffic. The minimum recommended height for an overpass is around 17'. Even at a 4 degree grade it would take 242 feet for the track to make it from ground level to 17', then you have the length of the overpass plus another 242 to get back down to grade again. That leaves you with about a 500-550' overpass for every road you cross. Depending on your route and how often you cross car lanes a grade level track simply might not be practical or possible. Your next choices are taking the car traffic over or under a grade level track but you run into the same problem....your run out of space due to maximum grade requirements.
Like most things it all comes down to money. At the end of the day when you let go of ideology, dreams, etc Disney wants the most economically viable form of transportation for their guests. Right now that form of transportation is buses. There is no question that they are as unmagical as they come, but they work on the existing infrastructure, they are incredibly flexible and they cost vastly less than a monorail. If anyone can come up with a viable plan to where a monorail expansion will cost less than the current bus system, Disney will build it in a second.
In spite of what some my say, Disney is a very smart company. If they thought for one second that a monorail would be cheaper than the bus fleet it would have been completed decades ago. I will guarantee you that they have done numerous cost studies figuring in every relevant factor of construction, operation and maintenance and the buses win every time.
True, but the guests that say this would not be willing (able) to pay the premium price of a resort on a monorail; and there would HAVE to be one because, as stated previously, the monorail simply will in no way pay for itself.
And what happens when a train breaks down or there is a power outage, both an all to common occurrence? Now instead of 50 people stuck waiting on another bus for 20-30 minutes you have 200-300 stuck until the problem is fixed or the tug is brought out. All the while an entire line of the monorail system is shut down for who knows how long.
