Monorail Expansion?

[WDWFREAK53]

Originally posted by spider-man


I haven't read to the end yet, but if you don't built park to park service then what's the point. I would mainly want to see just that, a lot of you are arguing this too much as a real transportation problem solution, the monorail is meant as a fun alternative found very few places in the world. Why else was the EPCOT track built? It never once occured to me that they would build the monorail to solve a problem, I just thought it would be for fun and atmosphere. I thought the buses were for transportation and the monorail was a perk. That's why I go to the TTC every year to ride into EPCOT rather than take a bus, of course I may be out of the norm.

Nope, you're not out of the norm...I do the same thing...I ONLY take the monorail to Epcot...The monorail gives you a brief overview of the park and introduces you to future world. I agree with you spidey...The monorail should NOT be a resort-park means of transport...Like you said, if it was meant for that, then WHY aren't there any hotels along the Epcot line? PARK-PARK is the way to go! Even if the MONORAIL wasn't a go...maybe a safari-train ride to Animal Kingdom just to get you in the mood for adventure in the savannah or something.

Maybe an old elevated subway ride to MGM...or instead of "colored" monorails, have the stripes look like the clapboards that directors use...just SOMETHING to get you in the mood for the movies...with short films inside the trains about nostalgic movies.

 

[no2apprentice]

Originally posted by Fantasia Boi
Wow... I go to work... and when I come back... tons of new discussions! I have to say, I'm really glad that we have a good, deep, FRIENDLY, intellectual discussion/debate/whatever going on... Keep up the good discussion folks!

I agree completely! Steve should be proud of this thread. Eight pages, 119 replies, and no one's threatened to close it down! Way to go, everyone!

Tyler, I believe you posted once on a different thread (or maybe you were involved in the thread discussion) that in the original plans for the resorts, the Seven Seas Lagoon was supposed to have five (or was it seven) resorts on the monorail line? Keeping that in mind, and that EPCOT was originally supposed to be E.P.C.O.T., I really can't help but wonder if the original designers would have bothered with a monorail at all if they had foreseen how the additional expansions of parks and resorts were going to take place.

If Disney wanted to utilize the existing monorail for all its potential, wouldn't they have continued to build resorts either on the existing line, or close enough that trams or people movers could be added? That would mean resorts centered around EPCOT, or along the line from Epcot to TTC, or more resorts around the lagoon.

But Disney didn't expand like that, which really makes me wonder if Disney recognized from early on, that the monorail would not be an efficient means of transportation for WDW.

More suggestions for the slingshot ride:

Body Count
Flaming Tourist
Rain of Fire

How about this? For whoever survives, free VIP front of the line pass for all the parks, and free paramedic service.

 

[plpeters70]

Originally posted by no2apprentice
But Disney didn't expand like that, which really makes me wonder if Disney recognized from early on, that the monorail would not be an efficient means of transportation for WDW.

I do know for a fact (and this comes from talking to a friend who helped open EPCOT Center), that there was originally going to be another resort loop in the EPCOT area, with another monorail station at EPCOT directly opposite the one that is there now - which is probably why the gates for EPCOT are so much more spread out than the other parks. And there were some monorail pylon foundations built into the ground running by the Horizons area which would have lead from the new resort loop.

I've heard a few different reasons for why this never happened. The first being the environment where they were planning the loop was unstable. Whether or not that is true I don't know -- and I'm more inclined to believe money was a factor -- but either way, the second resort loop was never developed.

But originally, that was the plan.

 

[no2apprentice]

Thanks, plpeters70. Maybe by the time they decided on a new resort location, labor & supply costs had already exceeded their original budget for a new line. After all, "money talks: everything else walks."

I remember on another thread someone commenting about an area where they tried dumping fill dirt, but the ground just swallows it up. I wonder if this could be the same area? Or is it a different area they were trying to develop? From what I've read from people who know more about it than me, is that several areas on Disney property will probably never be touched, due to the instability of the ground. This could really limit any type of rail expansion or development.

 

[plpeters70]

That last post I made got me thinking again about the monorail, so I have another idea!! :animwink: Think about this, and I want you "logistics" people to tell me your opinions of it.

Imagine for a moment that there is no TTC, and all of WDW's theme parks have a parking lot in front of them, and two monorail stations at the entrance. Now also imagine that each park has a resort loop - like the MK has today. But instead of the TTC, the "hub" of each loop is the theme park it is attached to. So MGM has it's own loop that stops and starts at MGM. AK has one that starts and stops at AK, etc, etc. So, one of the two monorail stations at the front of each park is for that parks resort loop.

Now, about the second station. What if that station was a "Grand Loop" that directly connected all 4 WDW theme parks. This would be a HUGE route, so I'm assuming they could fit quite a few trains on it. Plus, there would be two beams - each traveling in the opposite direction so that if you were at MGM and wanted to go to EPCOT, you wouldn't have to travel to AK and the MK, but would go directly from MGM to EPCOT.

So with this "Grand Loop" scheme coupled with the 4 resort loops, you could get from any WDW hotel to any WDW theme park with only ONE transfer neccesary. As for the water parks and Downtown Disney, I'll leave that to alternate modes of transporation.

The only real problem I see with this scheme is if the "Grand Loop" had a breakdown, they would have to have a way to clear the track really, really fast. But, since there would be two tracks, they could at least utilize that one until the other is clear - it would just cause a slowdown in the system. But I'm sure that if it was designed really well, it could work.


Unfortunately, WDW Today is not designed with 4 resort loops, so I doubt this could be implemented today - but it's not totally impossible. Perhaps they could divide up the resorts into MK, EPCOT, MGM and Animal Kingdom resorts, and have a monorail loop for each. Then, they could construct the "Grand Loop" between all the parks, but they would really have to bypass the TTC and go directly to the MK for this to really work. And maybe since the Downtown Disney area is so HUGE now, we could add that as a fifth stop on the "Grand Loop", and have another resort loop (or PeopleMover system) for those hotels. The water parks and any other extras, I would leave to the buses - but this scheme would seriously cut down on the number of buses needed at WDW!

OK all you "monorail haters" , tear my idea to pieces!!! Tell me why this scheme could never work in a million years!

 

[garyhoov]

plpeters70,

I'm not a monorail hater, and I'm certainly not going to tear your idea to pieces. It is a neat idea, but I think there is one major flaw (besides the one you already mentioned concerning break-downs).

It's my understanding that two monorails simply couldn't handle the traffic. Unless you are willing to supplement your plan with busses (and it would be hard to convince the board to lay out the kind of cash needed for such a system if busses will also still be required) you are going to have a real mess when the parks let out.

Based on other posts, it doesn't seem that we can expect a single line to handle much more traffic than the one in place. I guessed earlier (and no one argued with me) that less than 20% of mass transit guests currently leave the Magic Kingdom on the Monorail, and there are still lines. Logistically (there's that word again) your plan would only work in conjunction with busses or some other system (something that I wouldn't be entirely opposed to, but it does make it harder to justify such an undertaking).

What does everyone else think?

 

[JLW11Hi]

I still think double decker busses would be cool

 

[plpeters70]

Originally posted by garyhoov
It's my understanding that two monorails simply couldn't handle the traffic. Unless you are willing to supplement your plan with busses (and it would be hard to convince the board to lay out the kind of cash needed for such a system if busses will also still be required) you are going to have a real mess when the parks let out.

It's funny you mention that - I was actually on my way back here to post about guest flow patterns, since I realized that this would still be a problem with the "Grand Loop" scheme. But there are ways to control this...

For the individual resort loops, I think it would be necessary to make an alternate mode of transportation available from each resort on the loop to the main park on that loop - whether it's boats or buses, I don't know, but something to take the weight off the monorail during peak hours (and this would only need to be available DURING those peak hours. There will always be times when there are lines - heck, even the buses have long lines at times, but there are ways to even out the lines.

As for the Grand Loop, I see traffic being a real concern here. This system would need to be designed with LARGE trains in mind to handle the guest flow. But remember - not everyone on these trains is getting out at the same stop, so it's not like they would be releasing 1000 people in front of the MK at once - instead they would release people at 4 (or 5) different stops along the way.

Second, this type of system would probably have to be basically automated to keep wait times down. No waiting for Joe Blow and his family to get up the ramp, the trains must depart every few minutes. This would mean that the system would need to be designed with no more than a five minute wait between trains - and should probably maintain this rate all day long.

Plus, another way to ease traffic on the system would be to stagger opening and closing times at the 4 parks, and stagger the times of fireworks shows and parades. The system could never handle all 4 parks emptying at once, but maybe two at a time would be all right.

Now I do realize that when all is said and done, the cheapest and most efficient way of getting everyone around property is probably the bus system. But let's face it - buses are so mundane. This is WDW we're talking about here, and show is almost as important as efficency. Maybe a "Grand Loop" wouldn't be the fastest and most efficient way to travel the property, but just imagine a WDW with a monorail to every park, 4 or 5 monorail resort loops, resort launches, and even buses. Now THAT would be a system worthy of the Disney name -- something that would just make you sit back and go WOW!!! And isn't that what WDW's all about anyway?? :king:

 

[WDWFREAK53]

It's as simple as this...

ONE MAIN HUB:
Resort Monorail (as exists)
Express Monorail (as exists)
Epcot Monorail (as exists)
MGM Monorail Express
MGM Monorail Resort (hit a couple along the way...if possible)
Animal Kingdom Express
Animal Kingdom Resort (hit a couple along the way if possible)
Downtown Monorail Express

NUFF SAID!

Get rid of the colors!
Theme each Monorail name per park!
-Buzz Lightyear (Lime stripe w/ red deltas) RED "lasers" for headlights
-Pooh Bear (Yellow stripe w/ red deltas) honey pots on windows
-Mickey Mouse (Black strip w/ red deltas and 2 white dots)
(have some fun with the monorail)

MGM's could all be named for movies!
-Star Wars
-Twilight Zone
-Indiana Jones
-Wizard of Oz
-Fantasia

Animal Kingdom
-Gorilla
-T-Rex
-Flik
-Unicorn
-Tiger

Epcot
-Figment
-Motion
-Land
-Sea
-Space

I dunno...the stripes are cool but they really aren't "disney-esque" like the direction the parks are heading.

 

[WDWFREAK53]

Leave the resort busses...but this WOULD cut them down a bit...People wouldn't complain that much because they would have the CHOICE to either use the monorail or the bus...

 

[freediverdude]

ok one last time

Ok you guys still don't seem to get it, so I'll try to explain one more time. Yes, currently there is minimal park-to-park transport demand, but with the system I discussed, that would change radically. Yes, there would be monorails only going between the parks and DD, but since the buses would be eliminated, people would be using them to get to the peoplemover station they needed to be at in order to get to their resort, so the interpark traffic would be much much higher. In regards to the 1000 people at a time, to explain this again, the 1000 people would NOT be getting off of a single train at a time. In other words, I'm not talking about a single train that can hold 1000 people. I'm talking about a single train that can hold 500 people, having two tracks going in between each park, and two trains per track- one loading/unloading at each end of each track at the same time, so that a new train could probably arrive at each station every 5 minutes all day long. Therefore each double stretch of track in between each park could probably unload as many as 1000 people in each 10 minute period, maybe 15 at the most. A higher capacity or double peoplemover would probably have to be built to connect the value resorts with their nearest monorail station. Since the MK and Epcot would be the hubs and have monorails arriving from two different places, those parks would have 4 monorails arriving in each 10-15 minute period, and the timing would have to be spaced out so that two cars wouldn't be unloading at exactly the same time. The one valid point about this plan that I feel has been raised so far is the capacity of the park entrances to accomodate this. A new larger turnstyle entrance would have to be built at the MK, and Epcot's would have to be enlarged somewhat, although they have a pretty large entrance already. The whole front of both of these parks would have to be redone to accomodate all this, but I think it could be done. I still don't see anything really wrong with this plan if people really thought about how it's going to work.

 

[no2apprentice]

So, based on what I think I'm reading, if I'm staying at AKL and want to get to MK, I will have to transfer twice, and once I reach the loading platform at AKL, it may take me 45-60 minutes to reach MK?

 

[plpeters70]

Originally posted by no2apprentice
So, based on what I think I'm reading, if I'm staying at AKL and want to get to MK, I will have to transfer twice, and once I reach the loading platform at AKL, it may take me 45-60 minutes to reach MK?

Not if you're using MY plan as shown above, no2apprentice!! :animwink:

With my plan you will only have to transfer once at the Animal Kingdom station. You can then ride on the Grand Loop to any of the other 3 theme parks!

 

[no2apprentice]

Actually, I was just trying to figure out freediverdude's plan. I hate to sound dense, but I have a hard time understanding everyone's explanations for either the current system or any expansion. That's why I wrote earlier about seeing charts, time flow studys, crowd movements, etc.

That's why I keep coming back to the money. THAT I can understand!:lol:

 

[TURKEY]

Originally posted by plpeters70


Not if you're using MY plan as shown above, no2apprentice!! :animwink:

With my plan you will only have to transfer once at the Animal Kingdom station. You can then ride on the Grand Loop to any of the other 3 theme parks!

I think he's talking about freediverdude's plan.

 

[plpeters70]

Originally posted by turkey leg boy
I think he's talking about freediverdude's plan.

I know -- I was just trying to sell him MY plan instead!!

No offense to freediverdude, of course!

 

[freediverdude]

nope

nope, probably 10 minute peoplemover to AK, then 5 min wait for monorail if you're unlucky, then 5 minute travel time to MK- looking at prob 20 min of non-bus riding :animwink:

 

[Invero]

Re: ok one last time

I hope this makes sense... it's 3am, and I just got home from an E-Ride

Originally posted by freediverdude
Ok you guys still don't seem to get it, so I'll try to explain one more time.

Okay, this time you explained it a bit more clearly, so I pretty much understand what you are talking about. The idea does have merit, don't get me wrong, however, there are a few things that I dont think would work out for the best.

Originally posted by freediverdude
I'm talking about a single train that can hold 500 people, having two tracks going in between each park, and two trains per track- one loading/unloading at each end of each track at the same time, so that a new train could probably arrive at each station every 5 minutes all day long. Therefore each double stretch of track in between each park could probably unload as many as 1000 people in each 10 minute period, maybe 15 at the most.

That's actually a very low capacity. Flipping that in reverse, I would assume that I could LOAD 1000 people in every 10 minute period. That's 6,000 people per hour. Now, at a MK Park Exit, we can sometimes have on an average day 30,000-45,000 people in the park. Now, supposing we have 45,000. 15,000 will go to the parking lot via watercraft, people movers, and whatnot. And 6,000 of them are taking the People Movers to the MK Resorts. You've still got 24,000 people to move. At 6,000 people per hour, that will take 4 hours to get them out of the park.

Also, another question that I will pose... will the connection for MK be at the TTC? Or the MK itself? The reason I ask this is because there is very little space at the MK entrance itself. If you were to institute your monorail plan, we'd have to ditch the original monorail system completely to make room. Also, the Monorail would no longer be able to go through the Contemporary. The reason being, the Contemporary was designed for the Mark IV trains. When Disney phased in the new, Larger Mark VI trains, they had to modify the Contemporary doors to fit the new trains. As it stands right now, they cannot get any bigger. And due to the weight on the beams, they cannot get any longer, either.


By the way... on a little side note... A monorail expansion would be designed by the same Imagineers who designed and built the current flawed Bus Loadzones at AK Lodge, Disney/MGM Studios, and the All Stars. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about... When AK Lodge was built, the Imagineers designed the roof over the bus stop too low... and when a bus would pull in, the bus couldn't get over to the curb without hitting the roof. (Same with Boardwalk.) Thier solution: Extend the curb. So instead of fixing thier error... they make it so guests have to step out into the rain to board the bus. At All-Stars... when the Wheelchair ramp/lift is deployed, there is either a light pole, or a bush in the way. And at the Studios, the designers designed the load zones for 30ft busses. We run 40ft busses. Load zones 4 and 11 are very hard to get in... if a bus is in Load Zone 4, we cant get around... and Load Zone 7 is impossible to get into properly.

Originally posted by freediverdude
I still don't see anything really wrong with this plan if people really thought about how it's going to work.

Please don't think I'm dissing your plan or whatnot... it has merit... but unfortunetly... Disney just is a funky place when it comes to Transportation.

 

[jmarc63]

Fantasia Boi

I was so anamered with disney as a kid and I was lucky enough to appreciate WDW. I was 8 years old in the summer of '70 and there was a special preview of the property for stockholders before the official opening in October of '71 and I was there that summer with my family. I remember some of the preview I saw and recalled from the preview commerative book that I refered to at "BIG D" book( because the front cover was cut out to resemble the disney"D" logo for WDW) that they used a jet engine that was fueled by natural gas for the power generating plant on the west side of the property. and natural gas is a very clean fuel compared to desel fuel.

Has Disney replaced these engines with another source that less environmentaly frendly that natural gas?

What about Disney being a company that is a "GREEN" company that eisney touted in the early '90s, What every hapened with that concept????

THE MONORAIL RULES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[WDWFREAK53]

I don't think that ANYONE here doesn't agree with the fact that the monorail rules! Tyler is just stating the fact that it is just not "an answer" to the transportation problem and he has really opened my eyes about it. (I would still LOVE to see all 4 parks connected AT LEAST)