Lightning Lane at Walt Disney World

[GhostHost1000]

Yes, they will drop the least popular of the 11, to fit in the extra ride. So the demand for Space Mountain doesn't change. You opened a new attraction and there's still a long line of people waiting for the highest in demand rides. So how do you manage the demand for the most popular attractions?

Do you really think the addition of TRON all of a sudden made people stop doing another ride in the park?

Do you understand more places for people to go and things for them to do is enabling more spreading out of the crowds?

 

[el_super]

Do you really think the addition of TRON all of a sudden made people stop doing another ride in the park?

Isn't that what you are trying to argue? How else would there be any reduction in wait times unless people went on fewer attractions?

It shouldn't be hard to see the real world outcome of added capacity since they've done it time and time again and there has been no effective change in wait times.

 

[Cariad]

Quick question. With this new system, once you have used your three do you pay for any extra you want? Because if that is the case I would only use the three during peak hours when lines will be long, but so might many others meaning longer waits even for lightning lane lines.
Also is the Magical lenses still going to be available as I really do love that feature and without it I'm not bothered about the new LL

 

[ConfettiCupcake]

Quick question. With this new system, once you have used your three do you pay for any extra you want? Because if that is the case I would only use the three during peak hours when lines will be long, but so might many others meaning longer waits even for lightning lane lines.
Also is the Magical lenses still going to be available as I really do love that feature and without it I'm not bothered about the new LL

You pay once for the multi pass, and can use it on as many attractions as you can book, like Genie+. You can book a new attraction once you tap into your next one, and you can hold up to 3 at once.

Seems like it will operate closer to FP+ than G+, where the earlier you book your return times the more you can get throughout the day, where Genie let you stack and keep booking with the 2 hour rule.

 

[GhostHost1000]

Isn't that what you are trying to argue? How else would there be any reduction in wait times unless people went on fewer attractions?

It shouldn't be hard to see the real world outcome of added capacity since they've done it time and time again and there has been no effective change in wait times.

reduction in wait times because there is more for people to do... and are more spread out... across an individual park or multiple parks

I guess Disney shouldn't build anything new with your logic.

 

[Cariad]

You pay once for the multi pass, and can use it on as many attractions as you can book, like Genie+. You can book a new attraction once you tap into your next one, and you can hold up to 3 at once.

Seems like it will operate closer to FP+ than G+, where the earlier you book your return times the more you can get throughout the day, where Genie let you stack and keep booking with the 2 hour rule.

So I use my 3 up by 11am as I often did with FP+ and can book another at no extra cost? I presume you can only use it one time for each ride which is fair enough.

 

[ConfettiCupcake]

So I use my 3 up by 11am as I often did with FP+ and can book another at no extra cost? I presume you can only use it one time for each ride which is fair enough.

No extra cost, yes. And yes no repeats.

You actually don’t need to use all 3 like FP though. Just 1, and you can book your 4th, and so on.

 

[GhostHost1000]

So I use my 3 up by 11am as I often did with FP+ and can book another at no extra cost? I presume you can only use it one time for each ride which is fair enough.

You can use 1 and book another. You don’t have to wait until all 3 are used.

No re-bookings

 

[JAB]

I’m not sure I understand the idea that “you’ll only be able to get one Tier 1 ride” with the new system - it should be exactly the same day of availability for additional Tier 1 as G+. Thought exercise: assuming that everyone buying G+ used it exclusively to get what is a Tier 1 ride at 7am. The availability for a second Tier 1 ride at 9am or after using the first LL would be exactly the same availability as what would be available to book with the new system day of after using one of the 3 pre-books.

The lack of re-rides should I think make a big difference with availability (as well as not everyone purchasing) compared to FP+ day of availability. Though admittedly countered by taking the ILL rides out of the pool.

But the day of availability would be the same as with G+. What would be less available is day of spots for Tier 2 (“lesser”) rides which should be easy to get regardless. And everyone purchasing would have two of them regardless.

As you pointed out, the day-of availability of the most popular T1 LL should effectively be the same under LL-MP. However, the secondary T1 LL availability could suffer because I have a feeling the "Country Bears Effect" might come into play.

One of the many interesting things in the Defunctland FP+ video was that Country Bears had long waits when it first opened because it was designated as an E-ticket and uninformed guests just assumed that meant it was one of the best attractions. Once they changed it to a lower ticket level, the lines went away.

I think a similar thing may happen here with the LL tiers. The most popular ride will be unavailable by park open just as it often would be under G+. However, the availability of the remaining T1 LL could be affected. Most of the people using this won't necessarily be "power users" that know all the ins and outs. When those guests are making their pre-selections, once the most popular T1 runs out, the Country Bears Effect kicks in and the uninformed guests will select a T1 ride that they might not have selected day-of with G+ just because they assume T1 means "best rides," or because they incorrectly assume you have to choose a T1 LL.

This would mean that the day-of availability of the secondary T1 rides would be negatively impacted vs. G+

 

[ConfettiCupcake]

As you pointed out, the day-of availability of the most popular T1 LL should effectively be the same under LL-MP. However, the secondary T1 LL availability could suffer because I have a feeling the "Country Bears Effect" might come into play.

One of the many interesting things in the Defunctland FP+ video was that Country Bears had long waits when it first opened because it was designated as an E-ticket and uninformed guests just assumed that meant it was one of the best attractions. Once they changed it to a lower ticket level, the lines went away.

I think a similar thing may happen here with the LL tiers. The most popular ride will be unavailable by park open just as it often would be under G+. However, the availability of the remaining T1 LL could be affected. Most of the people using this won't necessarily be "power users" that know all the ins and outs. When those guests are making their pre-selections, once the most popular T1 runs out, the Country Bears Effect kicks in and the uninformed guests will select a T1 ride that they might not have selected day-of with G+ just because they assume T1 means "best rides," or because they incorrectly assume you have to choose a T1 LL.

This would mean that the day-of availability of the secondary T1 rides would be negatively impacted vs. G+

If my admittedly hazy memory of FP+ availability is correct, being a less desirable tier 1 attraction actually preserved availability for later in the booking window/later in the day. It’s those desirable tier 2’s I think may pose a bigger issue, although hopefully this is controlled a little better than with FP+ since the way I understand it people won’t need to book tier 2s they have no intention of actually riding just to earn another tier 1.

 

[Dranth]

Yes, they will drop the least popular of the 11, to fit in the extra ride. So the demand for Space Mountain doesn't change. You opened a new attraction and there's still a long line of people waiting for the highest in demand rides. So how do you manage the demand for the most popular attractions?

That assumes you aren't talking about all the half day parks Disney is known to pump out.

Also, in many cases, if another attraction is added that will keep some people in the park longer while some will choose to drop one to ride the new one. The ONLY way an additional attraction makes it worse is if it entices more people who were not going to come otherwise that the newcomers outpace the additional capacity. Even that falls off over time.

Overall attendance going up for a decade with nearly no additions makes a much bigger difference than adding a new attraction.

 

[GhostHost1000]

some things I'm curious to find out what will work best:

- booking 3 early and continuing to use/book again
- booking 3 later and rope dropping all you can early when there are less crowds
- modifying 2 tier 2s to tier 1s at 7am the day of

also curious on:
- what tier 1s if any will be left the day of and throughout the day
- what availability will be like throughout the day as people are able to book another as soon as they use 1
- what the pricing will be if any changes

 

[CaptainAmerica]

Then what's the point of giving the 7 day jump for people staying on-site and a 3 day jump for people staying off the site if we can make modifications on the day of at 7 AM? I thought the whole point to this change was to allow people to preplan so they didn't have to do it the day of.

So the people who want to get some benefit out of pre-planning can do so, but the people who want to min/max, micromanage, and optimize can also do so.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

That's not true. Sdd was available until about 11am when I was there last week. Frozen had availability until about the same time. I couldn't tell you about Remy because I had that at 7am.

…I’ll help you out here

It was DEAD when you were there…making line skips kinda like playing slots at the casino

 

[Disstevefan1]

Then what's the point of giving the 7 day jump for people staying on-site and a 3 day jump for people staying off the site if we can make modifications on the day of at 7 AM? I thought the whole point to this change was to allow people to preplan so they didn't have to do it the day of.

The way I see it, the 7 day jump gives a perk to folks staying on site.

 

[SamusAranX]

you do understand that more attractions mean more lines for people to be in or choose to FP/LL right? (thus spreading out the crowd). People don't ride the same new, hot, in-demand thing back-to-back all day long

I’ll save you time, he doesn’t understand.

 

[JAB]

If my admittedly hazy memory of FP+ availability is correct, being a less desirable tier 1 attraction actually preserved availability for later in the booking window/later in the day. It’s those desirable tier 2’s I think may pose a bigger issue, although hopefully this is controlled a little better than with FP+ since the way I understand it people won’t need to book tier 2s they have no intention of actually riding just to earn another tier 1.

You may be right; I'm still dusting the cobwebs off of my old FP+ planning knowledge. The psychology of attraction tiers just seemed like it might give a reason their could be lower T1 availability day-of. I'm really curious to see what happens when the actual usage data starts rolling in. That's when the real strategy fun begins.

 

[JAB]

some things I'm curious to find out what will work best:

- booking 3 early and continuing to use/book again
- booking 3 later and rope dropping all you can early when there are less crowds
- modifying 2 tier 2s to tier 1s at 7am the day of

also curious on:
- what tier 1s if any will be left the day of and throughout the day
- what availability will be like throughout the day as people are able to book another as soon as they use 1
- what the pricing will be if any changes

That was the FP+ dilemma as well. Book too early, and you waste selections on walk-ons; book too late, and you lose out on availability.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

you do understand that more attractions mean more lines for people to be in or choose to FP/LL right? (thus spreading out the crowd). People don't ride the same new, hot, in-demand thing back-to-back all day long

…no way you’re gonna penetrate the Klingon’s shields, Sulu

 

[Chip Chipperson]

Isn't that what you are trying to argue? How else would there be any reduction in wait times unless people went on fewer attractions?

It shouldn't be hard to see the real world outcome of added capacity since they've done it time and time again and there has been no effective change in wait times.

Your time in the park on any given day is finite, though. There will be people who are willing to wait 2 hours to ride something new - so that's 2 hours where they aren't in line for something else. Even if all of the people waiting 2 hours will also want to ride something like Space Mountain, the wait means that others have a shorter wait as long as the wait time for the new ride stays long. This is especially true if they are adding multiple new rides to a single park and 1 isn't a headliner. Unless the new ride/land is popular enough that it draws in more new guests than it adds in capacity there will be some positive moving of the needle for wait times, even if it isn't drastic.

The issue comes when there are VQs for something new like Tron or GotG because it eliminates the need to commit to the full wait (although there is still some time commitment required for the VQ, just not nearly as much).