Lightning Lane at Walt Disney World

[UK Disney]

They don’t *have* to do everything. I’d bet that most international guests aren’t exactly LL power users. Even back in the free fastpass days a lot of international guests had no idea that fastpass was even a thing and they just waited in standby lines. They are probably betting that their average first time international visitor won’t even notice this.

You may be right for first-time visitors, but this could be a deal breaker for many of us who have used Genie or FP in the past.

 

[Dranth]

7am was part of it.

But a big red flag for us was booking a $15k vacation and have no guarantees we would get to ride the headliners. With FP+ we knew we had all the headliners booked 60 days before we left home.

Statements like this are exactly why I think people didn't understand or even try to use G+.

More people had more chances and a better overall chance at the headliners with G+ than FP+, not less.

They did need to change the 7am thing but that could have done that without reverting back to 3 selections with tiers.

 

[Saskdw]

I don't see this moving the needle much at all.

Yay if I stay on site I can pay an extra $800 for my family to book rides early.

They must think it will move the needle if they are doing it.

I think this is the first of a few changes.

 

[DCBaker]

Sorry, I’m not accepting Disney Tourist Blog as a legit source for this.

Others, including this site have said otherwise.

That said it is possible it’s true. The “enchanted extras” like tours etc need either a vpn or to be booked by phone.

It would be awful if it is true.

Their information came from Disney. Scott Gustin says the same:

 

[wdwmagic]

Sorry, I’m not accepting Disney Tourist Blog as a legit source for this.

Others, including this site have said otherwise.

That said it is possible it’s true. The “enchanted extras” like tours etc need either a vpn or to be booked by phone.

It would be awful if it is true.

I have spoken to WDW Comms team and I will have a news item about this shortly.

 

[Jrb1979]

They must think it will move the needle if they are doing it.

I think this is the first of a few changes.

They thought free dining was going to move the needle too and from what's been said it hasn't.

@PREMiERdrum said it's looking to be one of their worst Independence Day weekends occupancy wise in years.

IMO discounts, bringing back FP+ isn't what's needed. The parks need new attractions if they want to see people come.

 

[Saskdw]

Their information came from Disney. Scott Gustin says the same:

I don't think Canada is included as international guests. I'm guessing this won't be an issues for Canadians.

 

[Saskdw]

Statements like this are exactly why I think people didn't understand or even try to use G+.

More people had more chances and a better overall chance at the headliners with G+ than FP+, not less.

They did need to change the 7am thing but that could have done that without reverting back to 3 selections with tiers.

We weren't willing to book a vacation based on "a chance". We chose to spend our money elsewhere.

We go for 2 full weeks and rarely spend more than 4 hours a day in the parks. G+ was not a usefull tool for us.

 

[UK Disney]

I have spoken to WDW Comms team and I will have a news item about this shortly.

Good news hopefully, fingers crossed.

 

[Saskdw]

They thought free dining was going to move the needle too and from what's been said it hasn't.

@PREMiERdrum said it's looking to be one of their worst Independence Day weekends occupancy wise in years.

IMO discounts, bringing back FP+ isn't what's needed. The parks need new attractions if they want to see people come.

That is because they are offering free QS dining. They need to go back to the full free dining for Moderate resort guests.

There isn't enough value in QS dining. Especially for those staying a week or two.

 

[RSoxNo1]

That’s exactly how FP+ worked if I’m remembering correct. APs with no resort stay got 30 days and no length of stay vs the resort guests with 60 days plus ticket length/length of stay. 30 days for sure, I’m hazy if there was some sort of length of stay but I don’t think there was.

I believe you're correct but by changing it to 3 days out, you're likely guaranteeing that the person will be having to do the 7 am thing on vacation.

 

[ConfettiCupcake]

I believe you're correct but by changing it to 3 days out, you're likely guaranteeing that the person will be having to do the 7 am thing on vacation.

I’m not sure how much they mind inconveniencing APs who aren’t giving them resort stay money.

 

[JD80]

A few years ago they changed the formula for multi-day ticket discounts.

Did some quick math.

 

[RSoxNo1]

Disney was pressured into giving up the park reservation system, which was a huge benefit to them as they could see exactly where people were going to be ahead of time.

Disney has found a new way of having the reservation system, without people realizing they are using a reservation system!

The new system is great for Disney. It gives them so much more data on upcoming park days for staffing etc. The same data they lost when they scrapped the reservations.

I mean that's all Fastpass+ was. Next Gen didn't give them enough useful data so they basically forced the solicitation of information.

 

[Splash4eva]

I think they’re hoping the fees smooth out some of logjam they had with “free” fastpass+

They have no idea. The ability of management to mishandle parks is becoming comical

Its actually impressive how much they have mangled these parks at times…
And i think people willing to pay will pay any price. So im really curious where this starts out at

 

[RSoxNo1]

The people who stay on property and get the 7 day advantage will be the people who are most happy with this. So Disney chose to prioritize them over locals with APs, day visitors and people staying off site. Probably makes sense for them from a business prospective. Universal gives Express Pass to anyone staying at a deluxe resort. At least Disney extended the benefit to all levels of resorts. Doesn’t help those not staying at a Disney resort but imagine if the 7 day advance reservation was only for Disney deluxe resorts. People would riot.

They don't make much money off most of them compared to vacationers spending a week or two in their resorts.

I’m not sure how much they mind inconveniencing APs who aren’t giving them resort stay money.

Unfavorable attendance mix.

My preferred system was still MaxPass at DL, no 7am, no prebooking, just the same system as paper FP but on the app. The 7am thing is the worst of all systems though, I don't want to be up that early on holiday/vacation!

Agreed. Disneyland's system is still the cleanest. That being said, as much as I hate advanced bookings there are things here that I do like. Multiple rolling Lightning Lanes are a good thing. The problem(s) are that they haven't built the parks up enough to justify 3 advanced bookings. The tiers are 100% an admission of that. If they had said one advanced booking, one day of booking, both rolling with the 120 minute rule still in place, that would be ideal.

Edit: I was 100% wrong. 3 is still too many. Advanced bookings are awful. This is the worst version of any line skipping they've had.

 

[Dranth]

We weren't willing to book a vacation based on "a chance". We chose to spend our money elsewhere.

We go for 2 full weeks and rarely spend more than 4 hours a day in the parks. G+ was not a usefull tool for us.

I get that a lot of people felt that way, but it seems based on a misconception of how G+ worked because in reality it wasn't uncommon to get EVERY headliner in a day. With this you will get one as you have no opportunity to grab a second until you use the first, which in your case will be later in the day when all the inventory is gone.

If that suits your touring style and you are happy with one a day because you can spread them out over a longer vacation great, but it is leaps and bounds worse for the overwhelming number of visitors (at least based on the information we currently have).

 

[nicb88]

Well, this website has confirmed no international preselecting. That is a true shame and will remove a lot of value in buying LL for international guests.

It’s been coming for a while though, they’ve slowly been restricting international function as time has gone by, such as in app dining reservations (can still do this on the website for now) and the ability to pre-order a magic band.

 

[billem]

Thank you so much! That alone makes this new system an upgrade. Of course, it wasn’t exactly difficult to come up with something better than what we have been dealing with.

It remains to be seen (as far as I know) what "picking a time" means. My recollection of the time picking for FP+ was "here are 3 random times from various parts of the day" and it wasn't very helpful. If they instead give you options for each hour of the day (9-10, 10-11, 11-12, etc) where you truly get to pick the time of day, then I will find it slightly less objectionable that I have to try to figure out what the lines are going to be like for attraction X 7-14 days in advance. One very nice thing about Genie+ is that you can plainly see what LL's are going quickly vs going slowly and adjust your plans accordingly. When you pick it a week ahead of time, you have no context for what park conditions will be (excepting, of course, we know that certain rides will be slammed and have significant downtime during the day).

 

[JD80]

They thought free dining was going to move the needle too and from what's been said it hasn't.

@PREMiERdrum said it's looking to be one of their worst Independence Day weekends occupancy wise in years.

IMO discounts, bringing back FP+ isn't what's needed. The parks need new attractions if they want to see people come.

If you've got a large family, Free Dining is fine. But when families are considering the offer, the cost of hotels and tickets vs. the last time they booked free dining is so much higher.

I'd bet that Free Dining got people to call TAs or investigate pricing on their own but maybe not pull the trigger.