Lightning Lane at Walt Disney World

Marriedatdisney

Active Member
Quite a lot of vitriol on the thread….. but I keep coming back to the incredibly poor consumer experience of the whole thing. It’s one thing to decide there is a larger market (demand) than you can supply, and raising prices. Let’s be honest, Apple has been doing this for decades. The margin on their iPhones etc is insane vs other offerings.

But everything they just rolled out is overly complicated, horribly branded and seemingly designed to off the maximum number of people! Pay at the gate, pay again for an app. Pay again for headliners. Button mash when you wake up… button mash all day at the park…. “Genie+“? Copying their streaming name? What’s the plus for? Why not just genie? “Lightening lane”? Is this a play on Lightening McQeen? Don’t like it? Don’t do any of it. But don’t plan on riding the rides you saw on the TV ad….or on the billboard coming into the park. Enjoy being in the molasses line.

I honestly think they laid off all the imagineers and let the accountants and finance team design the whole thing. There isn’t an ounce of UX in any of it.

Instead, eliminate annual passes and just raise the gate price by 30% and cut max capacity by 15%. Say you are permanently reducing overcrowding. Then add a paid fast pass for another 50-75% of gate price and reduce park capacity by 50% of headcount buying the fasasses…. If you are going to cash grab, just be up front about it. But add value. Would people understand paying more for less crowding? Yes, I think so. Unhappy about a higher price? Probably but it’s at least a value. Will some be ticked off as they watch people stroll by in the fast pass lane? Yes, but the pricing and value are clear and transparent. Those that paid for the fast pass get value and those that don’t are getting shorter standby lines.

Yes, the parks would be pricing more people out of the ability to go. But if and when they do go, it’s a better experience than wall to wall. And disney could always set these prices higher and lower based on seasons.

Lastly, design better. Design rides that can be duplicated to serve more riders. Why aren’t the dark rides built to scale out so more riders can ride? They added another track to toy story mania years after opening. Why not design rides that can be expanded. The R&D is paid for, just add capacity. You have the room.

I’m long time disney person….fortunate enough to be able to afford any of this. But this is sucking the enjoyment of going to parks dry. It was already running low after the constant crowding and over-engineering of experience, this just magnified It all. They won’t, but they should pull this all back and hire some creative people to start over.
 

wdwmagic

Administrator
Moderator
Premium Member
Original Poster
I'm in interested on what the push back will be like when say Rise has missing effects, and a family of four has just paid $80 for Lightning Lane access. They get off, and then express that they aren't happy to have paid $80 and have missing effects. Obviously Disney doesn't guarantee show quality, but that still doesn't stop then subsequent guest recovery that will be needed.
 

RSoxNo1

Well-Known Member
To be clear: I’m taking a guess.

the things they’ve added have not been great hourly throughput rides…

some are awful…dinky, Navi and alien swirling nonsense…

I think FOP is the “heavy hitter”…and Pirates and mansion still laugh at it/steal its lunch money

midway Mania was also decent - after the expansion…but that young lad is going on 13 years old.
FoP and Na'vi were underbuilt capacity wise. If the FoP ride system is used again I would anticipate different spacing on the seats to allow for more and/or a 5th and 6th theater. I think there's a way it can be retrofitted onto the current attraction but certainly no guarantee they'd even consider it.

Na'vi may benefit from a longer load/unload area that would allow for 1 additional boat at each.

The 3rd track for Midway Mania probably got it in the 1600-1800 range. They just dramatically underbuild things now, it's frustrating.
 

Kman

Well-Known Member
I don't know if someone has expressed this in the last 66 paged so please excuse me if it was. We always thought Disney was not cheap/expensive but we always felt we got value for what we paid and have visited many, many times based on that. COVID has and continues to prevent us from visiting from Canada but now I am starting to reconsider future vacations at our beloved WDW. It is becoming nearly impossible to rationalize the cost. We can afford these continuous upchatges but I am struggling to see the value.

Once COVID is settled we will have to re-evaluate.

I imagine I am not alone
 

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
Just those that will ride
There’s some travel agent webcast tonight…I've heard

as usual…management didn’t get ahead of the info and loads of bad information from “certified vacation planners” 🙄 hit the street…wish I could have prop bet that…

one of the missing pieces I hope is known today is what are the buying restrictions?

If they are gonna insist on LOS or party commitments…the asteroid may hit ☄️
 
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larryz

I'm Just A Tourist!
Premium Member
I'm in interested on what the push back will be like when say Rise has missing effects, and a family of four has just paid $80 for Lightning Lane access. They get off, and then express that they aren't happy to have paid $80 and have missing effects. Obviously Disney doesn't guarantee show quality, but that still doesn't stop then subsequent guest recovery that will be needed.
I'd like to think they thought this out and will automatically refund/discount the credit for a malfunctioning Tier 1 ride.

But this is Disney we're talking about. Stitch will, without doubt, eat that code before it can be uploaded.
 

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
I don't know if someone has expressed this in the last 66 paged so please excuse me if it was. We always thought Disney was not cheap/expensive but we always felt we got value for what we paid and have visited many, many times based on that. COVID has and continues to prevent us from visiting from Canada but now I am starting to reconsider future vacations at our beloved WDW. It is becoming nearly impossible to rationalize the cost. We can afford these continuous upchatges but I am struggling to see the value.

Once COVID is settled we will have to re-evaluate.

I imagine I am not alone
…thank you
 

GimpYancIent

Well-Known Member
That’s a suggestion…but not always the answer it’s made out to be.

a company that peddles consumer product…and that’s all Disney is - no tangible services provided…can’t treat their customers like a city to be “conquered” forever. They all can’t fall forever.
Customers / Guests = Monetary resource = Something of value to be mined or harvested. Oh yea leave Them W A Smile so they can replenish themselves and continue to be a resource.
 

brettf22

Premium Member
…If I can wake up at 7am and book my most prioritized Lightning Pass with Genie + for as early as possible in the day, like 10am for instance with a window of 10-11 am...based in an earlier poster right at 10:01 an after ride check in you can can book another LP. If that LP is for a ride you really want but the earliest availability is 5pm...DO I HAVE to wait until 5:01 pm to book another or can I book one at 11:30 (90 minutes after the 2nd LP selection). And then again at 1pm and 2:30 etc.

That's the part that is blurry.
While I haven’t seen any official word, good sources have indicated the “when can I next my next pass” part will work like MaxPass, which is the *shorter* of:
- when you check in for your pass ride, *or*
- 90 minutes after you *made* the pass reservation

This would mean if you can only get a late LL pass, you don’t have to wait until your window time to get another. You only have to wait 90 minutes from the time you made the pass reservation.

Obviously this is a HUGE difference. If it is run like MaxPass, it could be pretty good (except for the whole “but the most popular rides aren’t included” part). It was a good system at DL, but that’s a different environment and customer base. It will be interesting to see if it works as well at WDW.

One more unknown. If the rules are like MaxPass (max 90 mins between pass selections), how are the going to handle your second pass when you got up at 7am to make your first pass reservation? Can’t possibly be 8:30. Maybe park opening? Maybe after you use your first pass, regardless of how late it is? Who knows.
 

KrzyKtty

Well-Known Member
So if I understand this correctly, an average day at Disney with Genie+ might now look like this:

- Wake up at 7am and scramble to find a good FastPass at around 10:00-ish

- Agonize about whether or not to buy a Lightening Pass Lane and if you will regret it later if you do / don't

- Rope drop

- Do your Rope Drop ride, maybe 1-2 more, eat, do your first FastPass ride

- For the rest of the day, try to line up your next FP in the manner you would have when you had used up your 3 free FPs in the free days

- For the rest of the day, either scream DOH!! as you see the ride you paid Lightening Lane prices for that morning is available with Genie+ or, alternately, scream DOH!! as your realize you're never going to get a FP for that ride on Genie+ that day, and now the Lightening Passes are long since sold out.

As I said before, I don't hate it as much as I thought I would - it's mostly doing the refresh strategy all day with a $15 charge. Plus a daily morning Lightening Lane "should I shouldn't I" conundrum. I think it's mostly the principle that I find a mood and magic killer at the moment. It's kinda like if your date suggests hey, maybe they could actually pay you for a goodnight kiss and a few 'extras'... once you cross that threshold, no going back to the same place you were before emotionally. With Disney, maybe I'll get over it in a few years, maybe not, I'll wait and see.
I could be wrong but I do not think that you were going to have the time slots for your lightning lane pass to select from like we used to on fast pass plus. I think it is going to work a little bit more like the old-fashioned paper system, or the max pass system. Where essentially if you try to log on at 7:00 a.m. and the fast passes are going at a moderate pace, your first fast pass might be around 8:00 or 9:00 a.m. for the first ride and so on and so forth. The only way you'd be able to secure a 10:00 a.m. fast pass is if the fast passes for that particular ride we're going quick enough where all the earlier time slots were early reserved. At least that's how it tends to work with the previous max pass system. Fast passes were basically first come first serve from the very first time slot to the very last at the end of the day.
 

TalkingHead

Well-Known Member
The AP value just took a major hit, probably by design. Local APs don’t like waiting in long standby lines, and now you’re telling them to pay every time they go if they want to avoid those lines? Also pretty incredible that they’d charge CMs for this when they use comp admission. Should do wonders for cast morale.
 

larryz

I'm Just A Tourist!
Premium Member
Obviously this is a HUGE difference. If it is run like MaxPass, it could be pretty good (except for the whole “but the most popular rides aren’t included” part). It was a good system at DL, but that’s a different environment and customer base. It will be interesting to see if it works as well at WDW.
I blame Universal for not including Harry Potterville in their FotL pass early on. The sharp pencil boys at Disney were obviously taking notes.
 

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