Lightning Lane at Walt Disney World

[Saskdw]

This is why I think 7 am switch scramble may be moot, and it’s the refreshing and drop times after the parks open that may be the best bet. You’re right, availability was generally crap when you got close enough to the day but was workable if you knew how to mess with it during the day.

I think it will depend on the time of year.

On the average day how full would the Disney resorts be? Say it's 50%.

What portion of those people are willing to pay for the Multi pass? 1/2?

Using those numbers there should be lots of inventory for the power users.

If the resorts are full....which seems like a stretch for the next few years....then it's a different story.

 

[ToTBellHop]

I think it will depend on the time of year.

On the average day how full would the Disney resorts be? Say it's 50%.

What portion of those people are willing to pay for the Multi pass? 1/2?

Using those numbers there should be lots of inventory for the power users.

If the resorts are full....which seems like a stretch for the next few years....then it's a different story.

If the resorts were ever half empty, WDW would be auctioned off.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

I feel like AK will be the easiest 3 to select, but also have the least 4th pick value, Navi, EE, and the Safaris are no brainers for us… after that I don’t think we’ll need it for anything else though.

EP will be a hard sell for us, other than Frozen I don’t think we’d need it for anything. It would probably be useful at HS but we’re skipping that park next vacation (not enough to do) so will worry about that in a couple years.

Even MK doesn’t have a ton of 4th pick necessity for us.

One of the benefits of being regular visitors (mostly at DL) is there’s not many must do rides for us, and most of them are ILL so it kind of makes Mulitpass unnecessary.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

I think it will depend on the time of year.

On the average day how full would the Disney resorts be? Say it's 50%.

What portion of those people are willing to pay for the Multi pass? 1/2?

Using those numbers there should be lots of inventory for the power users.

If the resorts are full....which seems like a stretch for the next few years....then it's a different story.

If the hotels are at 50%…wait times at rides will be a moot point

 

[GhostHost1000]

If the resorts were ever half empty, WDW would be auctioned off.

I'll start the bidding at $5

 

[DCLcruiser]

Based on current G+ use and the new park tiers, here's an initial guess as to the most valuable LLMPs you could book in advance:

Magic Kingdom

• First Tier: Tiana's Bayou Adventure, Jungle Cruise, or Peter Pan's Flight
• Second Tier: Haunted Mansion and Buzz Lightyear
• We'd recommend the LLSP for 7DMT. In 2023, it was down around 1 day per week at rope drop. Buying the LLSP means you don't have to risk your valuable rope-drop time there, and simplifies your touring strategy. It would also allow you to rope-drop another First Tier attraction.

EPCOT

• First Tier: Remy or Frozen (and rope-drop the other)
• Second Tier: Mission: Space (orange) and Spaceship Earth. If not riding M:S, Living with the Land or The Seas with Nemo and Friends

Hollywood Studios

• First Tier: Slinky Dog Dash (decent rope-drop might be RnRC or Railway)
• Second Tier: Tower of Terror, Toy Story Mania!

Animal Kingdom (not tiered)

• Na'Vi River Journey, Expedition Everest, Kilimanjaro Safaris

Sounds like nothing has changed besides TBA. These are the literal top picks for the past how many years? Decades?

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Sounds like nothing has changed besides TBA. These are the literal top picks for the past how many years? Decades?

Might be the results of now decades of lack of reinvestment?

 

[James Alucobond]

Sounds like nothing has changed besides TBA. These are the literal top picks for the past how many years? Decades?

When all of the new things are ILL or VQ, the valuable multipass things will obviously follow this trend.

 

[ConfettiCupcake]

I’m so interested in how this is going to work and how much impact both ILL and cost in general have compared to FP+ days.

If memory serves those tier 2 standby times ballooned at Epcot when FP+ came into play. At least in this current version from what we know so far theoretically people should only be booking what they actually want to use.

 

[GhostHost1000]

Might be the results of now decades of lack of reinvestment?

are you saying knocking down half of Epcot....building an adult planter near half working lights purchased from Kmart's going out of business sale and Communicore Hall's middle school cafeteria wasn't a great reinvestment strategy?

 

[Dranth]

The only way this system doesn't fall apart is if they limit sales enough so that the power users don't ruin it for most guests like they did for FP+. Anyone think they will actually do that?

Had troubles getting a second or third T1 on G+? Just wait till you get to compete for the same number of overall slots but now people can hold three T1s at a time instead of one. They just tripled the amount of capacity eaten up by VQ at any one time and somehow that isn't going to be a problem?

Disney could of course increase the LL capacity to help counteract this but that is just going to make standby even worse.

 

[Saskdw]

Might be the results of now decades of lack of reinvestment?

Thus the reason for all out panic mode now.

It would take them at least 5 years to build Epic Universe and Universal is doing it in two years.
Almost overnight Universal has gone from a minor irritation for them to a serious problem.
And they have no quick way to fix it. We're going to see them throw a bunch of xxxx against the wall and see if anything sticks!!

 

[GhostHost1000]

The only way this system doesn't fall apart is if they limit sales enough so that the power users don't ruin it for most guests like they did for FP+. Anyone think they will actually do that?

Had troubles getting a second or third T1 on G+? Just wait till you get to compete for the same number of overall slots but now people can hold three T1s at a time instead of one. They just tripled the amount of capacity eaten up by VQ at any one time and somehow that isn't going to be a problem?

Disney could of course increase the LL capacity to help counteract this but that is just going to make standby even worse.

this is a paid system though unlike FP+ which everyone used... it will be in theory limited already more by that


...and just wait until the price increases

 

[ToTBellHop]

The only way this system doesn't fall apart is if they limit sales enough so that the power users don't ruin it for most guests like they did for FP+. Anyone think they will actually do that?

Had troubles getting a second or third T1 on G+? Just wait till you get to compete for the same number of overall slots but now people can hold three T1s at a time instead of one. They just tripled the amount of capacity eaten up by VQ at any one time and somehow that isn't going to be a problem?

Disney could of course increase the LL capacity to help counteract this but that is just going to make standby even worse.

I think you have to assume you will get your initial 3 and then several Tier 2s before submitting your credit card info. If that feels worthwhile, then you'll be happy. Anyone thinking they will end up scoring all of the MK Tier 1s will end up angry. We will still need to wait in line. Express Pass lets you skip every line but it also costs hundreds of dollars for a family to use for a day.

I think their internal metrics suggest that between the reduction in DAS and the fact that LL costs money, it will be more successful than FP+ was. I would imagine they are correct long-term but I will be curious to see how things look in a year or two if people learn to game this and game DAS again...

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

...and just wait until the price increases

The beauty of it is:

1. If it’s popular…they have to do it
2. If it’s NOT popular…they have to do it.

They’re drowning in their own blue ocean

 

[Dranth]

this is a paid system though unlike FP+ which everyone used... it will be in theory limited already more by that


...and just wait until the price increases

G+ was paid and it didn't stop people from complaining about how they couldn't get certain rides, how is taking 3x as much inventory out of circulation going to help that?

Also, given the reactions I am seeing by the FP+ was great, rose colored glasses brigade, a LOT more people look like they are going to buy this.

 

[Dranth]

I think you have to assume you will get your initial 3 and then several Tier 2s before submitting your credit card info. If that feels worthwhile, then you'll be happy. Anyone thinking they will end up scoring all of the MK Tier 1s will end up angry. We will still need to wait in line. Express Pass lets you skip every line but it also costs hundreds of dollars for a family to use for a day.

Great, but the system they just got rid of gave those that used it a good chance of doing all the T1s. So we lose that so people can get two T2s ahead of time? Seems like a bad trade to me.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

are you saving knocking down half of Epcot....building an adult planter near half working lights purchased from Kmart's going out of business sale and Communicore Hall's middle school cafeteria wasn't a great reinvestment strategy?

…the planter gets the boys daydreaming at least

 

[el_super]

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

The overall wait times don't go down though. They never have. Historically if a new ride opened with a 6 hour wait, the other attractions might have a shorter wait, but for the people electing to wait 6 hours, their overall average wait time stayed the same, or went up. Avg wait times would only go down if people elected to NOT RIDE the newest attraction.. right?

The same is still true today. Wait times exist because more people are lining up than capacity can accommodate. That only changes if people elect NOT to ride.

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

You build more to increase your attendance. You build more to accommodate more people.

Can you name a point in history when a new ride resulted in power wait times?

 

[el_super]

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.

Yeah so generally time is finite and where there are wait time increases (for new attractions) there ARE decreases for other attractions. But the decreases don't apply evenly to all attractions, they are weighted toward the least popular attractions. People would rather ride Tron or Space Mountain a second time than Carousel of Progress.

Which is the whole reason Disney tends to close attractions after new ones open. The demand drops off a cliff.

But really none of this changes the bigger point: you still need a line management options for the newest attractions.