Lightning Lane at Walt Disney World

twilight mitsuk

twilight mitsuk

Well-Known Member
Purduevian said:
Large backups can happen for a few reasons:
  1. Reduction in ride capacity (for technical reason).
  2. Previous down time at the attraction. Doesn't look like this happened today to TOT
  3. A similar attraction nearby had a down time and everyone is using the ME at this new attraction (RNRC still down for refurb?)
  4. An event nearby caused a surge of LL guests to all come to an attraction after (usually this happens at MK after a parade).
I'm going to assume #1 for TOT as it's one of the few rides that can operate at 50% capacity easily. It looks bad, but I bet the person in the back of the line was in the preshow in less than 20 mins
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5. Rnrc closed for refurbishment
 
co10064

co10064

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
Fido Chuckwagon said:
Yes, first thing in the morning perhaps and late at night when crowds are low, on a select few attractions that don’t need the capacity at those times...
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I know this selected quote was not the point of your post, but I would like to push back on your "select few attractions that don't need the capacity" statement.

If there is any wait for an attraction... even if that wait is only 10-20 minutes, it by definition does not have enough capacity for its demand.

Space Mountain, for example, sees true waits of 15-30 minutes first thing in the morning on even the slowest of days. On busy days, the attraction may open with a true 60 minute wait. If Disney ran both sides, wait times would theoretically be cut in half.

If the wait times were truly zero at park open or close, I would have no qualms with them running reduced capacity. But I have never found that to be the case.
 
RSoxNo1

RSoxNo1

Well-Known Member
Purduevian said:
I've often wondered if changing the configuration of the boats into rows (similar to Pirates/Small world seating style) would be feasible/worth it. The bottle neck right now seems to be that only 2 people can load or unload into a boat at a time. Instead of 2 people moving you could probably get like 8 or 9 rows going at once.

Another idea I had to "fix" JC capacity would be do both Load and Unload at both locations. This would require that the boats be able to pass each other, and also a change to the queue
View attachment 769790
Its always interesting to me that JC/Pan sells out so quickly on G+, when I don't think most people would actually put them in their top 2 favorite MK attractions, it's all just low capacity with 0 height restrictions.

Side note, just found your podcast last week and I've really enjoyed the past 2 episodes!
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It wasn't always the case that Jungle Cruise was the highest demand attraction. This is a Genie+ specific problem. This did not exist under Fastpass or Fastpass+. The systems themselves aren't fundamentally different enough for that to be the issue. They changed something at the attraction.
 
F

Fido Chuckwagon

Well-Known Member
RSoxNo1 said:
It wasn't always the case that Jungle Cruise was the highest demand attraction. This is a Genie+ specific problem. This did not exist under Fastpass or Fastpass+. The systems themselves aren't fundamentally different enough for that to be the issue. They changed something at the attraction.
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It’s popularity/wait times started surging before G+ was ever implemented.
 
MickeyLuv'r

MickeyLuv'r

Well-Known Member
Fido Chuckwagon said:
Not really. They don’t really **need** to juice wait times, they are busy all the time. The marginal savings they might accomplish by staffing less intentionally are definitely outweighed by the negative effect that would have on GSAT scores.
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I slightly disagree. Humans are HIGHLY social, and that is part of what drives theme parks like WDW. We WANT to be where everyone else is. Nobody wants to be isolated loser in an unpopular place.

Just look at how people line up. They herd. Given a choice between 2 queues, where one is full and one is empty, most people will mindlessly follow the herd.

This is also how they drive on the highway. Given a choice of 4 lanes, they clump together in herds. Most drivers do NOT drive evenly spaced, nor do they maintain an even speed. They adjust their speed to stay in a herd.

It is also how children behave on school playgrounds. They clump. As soon as one is alone, they are terrified/miserable and often rush to join another group.

If a theme park's highly marketed new ride has no wait, that is when people get antsy and nervous.

Though we struggle to admit it, what we WANT is to be in the SUPER POPULAR place.

And it is thrilling to be part of a very large stadium crowd.
 
cjkeating

cjkeating

Well-Known Member
From my recent trips to the MK and observations of Jungle Cruise I think everything about loading/unloading is slow.

People get on and off slowly, the CM dispatch the boat with a delay, disabled guests boarding at offload causes backups. It all just feels really inefficient and I am sure processes could be tightened up.
 
UNCgolf

UNCgolf

Well-Known Member
LittleBuford said:
The same was said of FastPass+. Selfish as it is of me to admit, I have no desire to wait in regular lines if I can avoid it, and I have used both systems with great success (I preferred it when it was free).
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I think the article is making a slightly different point.

I don't know if it's actually accurate (I haven't been to Disney since Genie+ was implemented), but it's arguing that Lightning Lane has become the de facto standby line, as people with Lightning Lanes still often have to wait 30+ minutes in line. Essentially, you're paying for the right to wait in what would have previously been the normal line, and people who don't buy it are shunted to a new, even worse line.

That didn't seem to be the case with FP+ (plus it wasn't an extra cost).
 
F

Fido Chuckwagon

Well-Known Member
UNCgolf said:
as people with Lightning Lanes still often have to wait 30+ minutes in line.
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This just isn’t accurate at all. I’ve been to WDW 14 times (each time for about a week) since Genie+ was introduced. I think the longest LL I’ve ever waited in was 25 minutes, twice, and both of those were because the ride went down. People are not “often” waiting in 30 minute plus LL lines. Many of my trips were during the busiest times of year (Christmas, Easter, Columbus Day weekend, Presidents Day Weekend, etc.)
 
LittleBuford

LittleBuford

Well-Known Member
UNCgolf said:
I think the article is making a slightly different point.

I don't know if it's actually accurate (I haven't been to Disney since Genie+ was implemented), but it's arguing that Lightning Lane has become the de facto standby line, as people with Lightning Lanes still often have to wait 30+ minutes in line. Essentially, you're paying for the right to wait in what would have previously been the normal line, and people who don't buy it are shunted to a new, even worse line.

That didn't seem to be the case with FP+ (plus it wasn't an extra cost).
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That wasn’t my experience at all in December. In my case, Lightning Lane worked as FastPass used to, which is to say that it got me onto things much quicker than if I hadn’t used it.
 
D

DisneyDave54321

Member
The article says s not accurate at all. I was actually in that Pan line. And though it seemed long, the actual wait to get in was like 15 minutes. This happened a ton this week. Many LLs were out of the attraction queue but moved pretty quickly. I think there is something wrong with the system and it needs to be fixed but this is just false. In no way were any of the standby faster
 
JD80

JD80

Well-Known Member
UNCgolf said:
I think the article is making a slightly different point.

I don't know if it's actually accurate (I haven't been to Disney since Genie+ was implemented), but it's arguing that Lightning Lane has become the de facto standby line, as people with Lightning Lanes still often have to wait 30+ minutes in line. Essentially, you're paying for the right to wait in what would have previously been the normal line, and people who don't buy it are shunted to a new, even worse line.

That didn't seem to be the case with FP+ (plus it wasn't an extra cost).
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It's a very poorly written article in my opinion. I'd also try to get to WDW and give G+ a shot for yourself.

G+ is functionally superior to FP+ for getting on rides if that's all you care about in my opinion. The downsides are basically it cost money and the project manager feel of the service (and the 7AM wakeup call). But if touring and riding attractions is your key focus, it's a pretty good tool.

Also, You could tell the article was written by researching social media and not actual facts with it's opening statement:

Disney routinely hikes prices far past the rate of inflation despite well-documented maintenance and investment woes and yet still delivers an overcrowded park experience.
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This hasn't been true in a few years but opening your article that way sets an adversarial tone which is what the author wants because it spends the whole time going after Disney. Click bait and rage is cheap and easy.
 
nickys

nickys

Premium Member
JD80 said:
It's a very poorly written article in my opinion. I'd also try to get to WDW and give G+ a shot for yourself.

G+ is functionally superior to FP+ for getting on rides if that's all you care about in my opinion. The downsides are basically it cost money and the project manager feel of the service (and the 7AM wakeup call). But if touring and riding attractions is your key focus, it's a pretty good tool.

Also, You could tell the article was written by researching social media and not actual facts with it's opening statement:



This hasn't been true in a few years but opening your article that way sets an adversarial tone which is what the author wants because it spends the whole time going after Disney. Click bait and rage is cheap and easy.
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What isn’t true?
Price hikes
Maintenance issues

Both those are true. Lack of investment is also true, despite Guardians and Tron. It needs far more.
 
Jrb1979

Jrb1979

Well-Known Member
DisneyDave54321 said:
The article says s not accurate at all. I was actually in that Pan line. And though it seemed long, the actual wait to get in was like 15 minutes. This happened a ton this week. Many LLs were out of the attraction queue but moved pretty quickly. I think there is something wrong with the system and it needs to be fixed but this is just false. In no way were any of the standby faster
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The article didn't say that. What it said was LL queues are the new standby and standby is still standby but much worse.

What needs to be done is lower the ratio of LL to standby. There is no reason standby should be a crawl except for when a ride breaks down
 
Disstevefan1

Disstevefan1

Well-Known Member
Fido Chuckwagon said:
This just isn’t accurate at all. I’ve been to WDW 14 times (each time for about a week) since Genie+ was introduced. I think the longest LL I’ve ever waited in was 25 minutes, twice, and both of those were because the ride went down. People are not “often” waiting in 30 minute plus LL lines. Many of my trips were during the busiest times of year (Christmas, Easter, Columbus Day weekend, Presidents Day Weekend, etc.)
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What’s your average wait time in ILL?

Also to others, what’s your average wait time in ILL?

Folks are paying big bucks to ride a ride once, it would be interesting to know the wait times.
 

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