Monorail Expansion?

[futurepres]

While a lot has to do with budgets, of course, there are verifiable plans of a monorail expansion of the current track and layout, as well as portions being revamped and combined with new sections that will be designed to connect the DAK vicinity and other localities.

This is still in the initial planning stages but by 200X you should start to see some more detailed information.

The idea is to actually connect all of the parks and most of the major resorts within the next 21 years. (It's a while away so things can certainly change, but this is also based upon a significant amount of park and resort expansiion, as well as the creation of new parks).

 

[monorail_man]

Don't you think that's being a little naive - of course MONEY has something to do with it. I guarantee you that if it had been cheaper to run monorails everywhere on property than to have buses, then I'm sure that Managment would have built monorails - and damn guest flow patterns. It all comes down to money eventually. But I do see your point about the logistics of such a system.

EXACTLY. MONEY has EVERYTHING to do with it. Like you said. if it were cheaper to run monorails all ove the place. then DIsney woudl only have a few buses.

They don't really care about guest flow. They only care about the money and cost to operate transit.

Also keep in mind... Epcot was built in 1982. What resorts existed back in 1982? The Contemporary & Polynesian, as well as Fort Wilderness and the Golf Resort. So, the monorail to Epcot made sense at the time. The only busses they needed was to shuttle from the Golf Resort & FW to TTC, and a FW Internal shuttle.

Now, off the top of my head, I can't think of exact dates, but when the Disney/MGM Studios was built (On a different area of property, mind you) Disney had already built (or was planning to build) Caribbean Beach, Swan & Dolphin, and Hotel Plaza Blvd. In addition, Grand Floridian was added to the Monorail loop, and Wilderness Lodge was built soon thereafter. And of course, Yacht, Beach & Boardwalk came along, as well as Old Key West, and Port Orleans and Dixie Landings. In addition, Along came Pleasure Island as well as other Downtown Disney changes.

Like I said, not sure of exact dates, but Im pretty sure those were all within 85-95. (Can someone give me exact dates?) So as you can see, between 1985 and 1995... Walt Disney World saw a huge growth spurt.

My point with this, is that when Epcot was built... it was a single location to a single location. (TTC to Epcot) When MGM was built, there were dozens more locations to service. A monorail would not be logistically feasible.

That makes abosolutly no sense. Not speaking of the cost of expansion, (since you did not mention it above) the logistics of having a monorail run to the other locations would make PERFECT sense. monoraisl are mor ereliable and efecient then other transportation.

In fact the ORIGINAL plans for the Swan & Dolphin included the monorail to go throuhg it just liek the Contemporary.

So the expansion plans went past just the "thinking about it" stage.

 

[TimeTrip]

That makes abosolutly no sense. Not speaking of the cost of expansion, (since you did not mention it above) the logistics of having a monorail run to the other locations would make PERFECT sense. monoraisl are mor ereliable and efecient then other transportation.

Boy are you stirring up a hornets nest with that one. First off, straight up, monorails probably can be more efficient, but you try connecting all the important points at Disney World via monorail in an efficient way that also handles the guest flow issues at Disney World. Just TRY. It takes a little more effort than just saying "have them run to the other locations".

In fact the ORIGINAL plans for the Swan & Dolphin included the monorail to go throuhg it just liek the Contemporary.

Hah, well there's a highly debatable point of information. Most of the veterans will tell you that this isn't the case. It's just misinformation being spread about.

You're starting to sound like monorail_fanboy instead of monorail_man

 

[Lynx04]

The biggest problem with having a monorail expansion is what do you do when a train breaks down?


If you were to expand the monorail to all the parks and resorts next to the parks, that means you would have to cut back on the buses since you would be spending more money on the monorail obviously you have to cut the budget some where else. If the monorail breaks down, which it will, you now have people stuck everywhere, not going anywhere wasting there vacation time, which leads to a lot of angry guests. Since there would not be enough bus drivers because Disney would not hire a bunch of drivers to sit on the a$$ all day and wait for the monorail to break down, there would be no reliable back up to get guests where they need to go.

If a bus breaks down, then all you need to do is call in another bus and it only effects the people on the bus instead of the most of the resort. This is the biggest reason that they will not expand the monorail. I don't know what the monorail percent equals in amount of total transportation traffic for the resort, but I don't think it should be any higher then what it is now.

 

[wdwmagic]

In fact the ORIGINAL plans for the Swan & Dolphin included the monorail to go throuhg it just liek the Contemporary.

So the expansion plans went past just the "thinking about it" stage.

That's a myth. Those black areas are just Michael Graves design touches, not areas marked for monorails. There are large amounts of rooms behind those squares, not to mention structural supports. There was a plan with the monorail going between the Swan/Dolphin and the Yacht/Beach, but not actually through the Swan/Dolphin buildings.

 

[Legacy]

That makes abosolutly no sense. Not speaking of the cost of expansion, (since you did not mention it above) the logistics of having a monorail run to the other locations would make PERFECT sense. monoraisl are mor ereliable and efecient then other transportation.

In fact the ORIGINAL plans for the Swan & Dolphin included the monorail to go throuhg it just liek the Contemporary.

So the expansion plans went past just the "thinking about it" stage.

FYI dude... Invero works Disney Transportation and has for a few years. As a result, he is the local expert on the subject. Don't get your dreams mixed with reality. It won't win you any party favors.

(But at least you ressurected an interesting thread...)

 

[dixiegirl]

hay don't know if this has already been posted but, i was ebay and they are selling a door from one of the monorails...lol i thought it was pretty comical..then i thought to myself where could you put something of that size? ohh and they also had the front potion of the buzzlight year car... for any diehards...

 

[aklodge]

Yea, just to let you know that has been posted before, but thats ok.

 

[phlydude]

Wow, nothing like digging up a 6 month old thread!

 

[Lynx04]

Wow, nothing like digging up a 6 month old thread!

It is much better then some one starting a new thread on it. Yeah, kudos to the person that searched instead of starting a new thread!

 

[tigger1968]

Here is my official RUMOR report regarding the monorail expansion as of my recent trip in January...... :lookaroun

According to the cast member leading the backstage tour I was on, who was a 10 year employee AND a trainer AND the guy that wrote the script for the tour....there is some discussion about the need to continue to expand the hotels and that they would be on a monorail line. His comments were three new hotels, and eventual monorail lines linking more areas of the entire WDW resort. He sounded very well informed and seemed to have good knowledge of what he was speaking of. I am being vague about him on purpose, as this was a private conversation after our tour, and I liked him!

According to every single Disney Transport CM I talked to during my stay, around six of 'em I think......Everything was cool until 9/11, and now there's no way it will happen, but they all wish it would.

As always, I take all of this information with a grain of salt about the size of a baseball.....and you should too!

 

[DisneyFreak529]

that is an old rumor. I agree with every one eles, I heard it's not happening!!

 

[DonickCo]

EXACTLY. MONEY has EVERYTHING to do with it. Like you said. if it were cheaper to run monorails all ove the place. then DIsney woudl only have a few buses.

They don't really care about guest flow. They only care about the money and cost to operate transit.






That makes abosolutly no sense. Not speaking of the cost of expansion, (since you did not mention it above) the logistics of having a monorail run to the other locations would make PERFECT sense. monoraisl are mor ereliable and efecient then other transportation.

In fact the ORIGINAL plans for the Swan & Dolphin included the monorail to go throuhg it just liek the Contemporary.

So the expansion plans went past just the "thinking about it" stage.

please learn to use the search function of thease forums... u keep showing how little u know and keep diging your self a grave.... read up... get some insight into the monrails.... do a search for monrails... and read up, there are over 100 pages of well document monrail information.... please READ IT!!!!! :brick:

 

[PhotoDave219]

You know, when im on my deathbed, i'll want these past 30 seconds i wasted on this thread back.

 

[tigger1968]

You know, when im on my deathbed, i'll want these past 30 seconds i wasted on this thread back.

Hey, you clicked on the thread, smart guy..... :lookaroun

 

[dixiegirl]

wow did someone not take their happy pill this morning?? perhaps a trip to disney might change that crabby mood.....


why can't we all just get along???

 

[optjay]

Get along, ya right.

On here opinions vary and tempers flair.

Chances are, any monorail expansion would be to costly! The busses do a fine job with min. complaints. Dont fix it if its not broken.

Go patriots

 

[imagineer boy]

Get along, ya right.

On here opinions vary and tempers flair.

Chances are, any monorail expansion would be to costly! The busses do a fine job with min. complaints. Dont fix it if its not broken.

Go patriots

The only thing I understood what you said was "Go Patriots." Other than that, I'm clueless to what you just said.

 

[donsullivan]

If you dig underneath all of the issues surrounding monorail expansion there are really two constraints toward anything in the future.

1) COST- This has been beaten into the ground to no end and I think everyone agrees that it is the biggest barrier.

2) ROUTES- For all of you who want to hypothesize on expansion regardless of the economic aspects of things let me suggest an exercise that if you are thorough about it will likely change your perspective on expansion given the current development of the overall WDW property.

a) get yourself a large photo of the entire WDW property and print it on the largest piece of paper that is practical for what you have available.
b) Take a piece of tracing paper of something similar and sketch in the current monorail routes.
c) now sketch in the parks and resorts served by the current monorail system in their appropriate relative positions on that map.
d) Now sketch in all of the other theme parks and resorts that you believe should be connected via monorail. Make sure that you put them in the correct actual locations on the piece of paper.
e) If it is at all possible make a whole bunch of copies of this piece of paper if you can.

Now the fun part begins.

f) Draw in your proposed routes for the new monorail beams. Remember that you can't go in straight lines through currently undeveloped areas of the property. Assume that your beams must be within currently developed areas, or along existing roadways.
g) Now that you have this all drawn out, take a virtual ride between all of the connected points to see what the experience would be like. Connect from park to park in every combination, or go from each resort to all parks and other areas.

A couple of things are likely to happen if you are honest when you do this:
1- Some routes will require multiple connections to get from point A to point B.
2- In some scenarios, you'll have to go well past your destination to reach a beam connecting point and then had back toward your final destination.

If you really think the monorail should be expanded, please spend the time to go through this exercise and see if you still think the guest will consider it a better experience than what they have today.

 

[cloudboy]

It was posted somewhere a while ago. I will have to redraw up a quick schematic of it again, but it is really quite simple. Same route as teh current monorail to Epcot, except that you have to rotate the station around. Then back down to one side or the other of Epcot to the Studios, and then across and down to the the Animal Kingdom. A tram brings guests from Fort Wilderness and the Wilderness Lodge to the Magic Kingdom, you have bus service from Saratoga, Port Dixie, and Key West to Epcot. Either a bus or people mover connects the Epcot resorts to the Epcot station, and a shuttle or tram connects the Carribean, Pop Century, and Coronado to the Studios. All Star is connected to the Animal Kingdom.

It's actually pretty simple if you stop trying to compare it to the current syustem - you simply hop on the next bus/shuttle/tram/mover what have you that connects your resort. If that's the park you are going to, you are all set. Otherwise hop on the monorail to whatever park you want. Going to dinner at the Wilderness Lodge? Just hop the monorail to the Magic Kingdom stop and get on the tram.

he one tough spot is Downtown Disney - you could have a bus from the Epcot or Studios stop, or you could simply have a bus that services there from each resort. Of course that requires a lot of busses and a lot of space to park them.

By the way, there is no reason that you have to follow the current roads. I do not uderstand why your are including that - that is an example of completely illogical requirements that are there just to make things difficult.