As a WDW bus driver, i can tell you a little about our new system which will be coming online in a few weeks. The new system will start at Downtown only for about 1-2 weeks, then the parks will come online 1 by 1 with the last one coming at the end of may/begining of June. Not all features will be online when it first starts but it should be fully functional by Sept. First off, cameras will be in the load zones to moniter the lines. second, instead of the old method of always returning to the same park each run, now if we drop off people at say, PoP Century from the MK, and there are no guests waiting to go to MK, but there are 40 people waiting to go to Epcot, the driver will get a dispatch from the new black boxes on the dash, and the marquees will be automatically changed and he will pick those people up and go to Epcot. Once at epcot he will be sent to another resort, from which he may pick up for any hub (parks/downtown). This is to improve our service times. Also, our safety spiels will be automated, and there will be background music playing along with info spiels like on the monorails that will be cued when the bus passes sensors on the roads. The music will be themed so that a bus headed for AK will have different music than a bus to MK. The driver will be able to overide the spiels if he wishes to talk to guests on the P.A. system or do trivia. The LED screen will display the spiels in text form so even if you don't hear it, you can see it being said. They have been testing the new system with a van and bus 4949. they have been driving the routes (w/o guests) for the past month, so hopefully most of the bugs will be worked out. i know that Disney is going to start training all it's driver on how to use the new system starting Apr. 15. LEts hope it works and that it does what it's supposed to do, and brings the wait times between busses down from every 15-20 mins. Also in bus news, 9 new Gilligs busses, (4886-4952) are being delivered this month and should be painted and fitted and on the road by late may. and then 9 of the 2700 series of busses that were built before 1981 will be taken off the road. Disney is buying 16 new busses a year and will eventually replace all of the RTS busses with the new Gilligs. granted it will take 10 yrs to do it. As for the Nova busses ((4817-4885,4953) no word on when/if they'll be replaced after the RTS busses.
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New Bus Enhancements.
- Thread starter Fantasia freak
- Start date
Palofmickey
Member
Great news:sohappy: Everything should be debugged when we go down in Oct. I don't know how many times I would see a bus stop at one stop to let people get off and wait for people to show up and then leave empty while we are waiting for our bus.:brick:
Pumbas Nakasak
Heading for the great escape.
Interesting news.
SewIn2Disney
Well-Known Member
Would they be unloading at a specific spot, then move on to where they are supposed to be loading from? For example, a bus from Pop is heading to Epcot, but is instructed to pick up people from the Poly and bring them back there. Does the bus drop of the Pop people at the Pop stop, or at the Poly stop? I only ask because if the bus drops off people at one stop (and there are new people waiting there) but then abruptly leaves to go somewhere else, aren't those people who just saw a bus come to their spot and leave get mad?
The improvements sound nice! Any way to get me to the parks faster is fine by me!
The improvements sound nice! Any way to get me to the parks faster is fine by me!
LudwigVonDrake
Well-Known Member
Thanks for the news :wave:
SewIn2Disney
Well-Known Member
I forgot to add.....the themed music related to the park in which you are heading sounds nice....do they also have music for DTD and the waterparks? I hope it's not too loud....just subtle enough so that it's "there".
astewart
Member
I would assume, if they were dropping people off at the pop, they would be picking people up at the pop, just not necessarily at the stop as where the bus came from.
EX: Going to pop from MK. If the EPCOT line at pop is huge, but MK has none, then the bus would stop at the EPCOT stop at the POP instead of the MK stop. It would let ppl off, then get the EPCOT ppl onboard, and head over to EPCOT
edit: Nevermind, I just re-read your post, and my reply isn't really what you were looking for! haha... they most likely would drop people off at whatever bus stop they are picking the next batch of people up at. I'm only basising this on that they have done it that way in the past... I've been dropped off at DTD at a stop that wasn't for the POP, but for another resort before.
This is a day that will go down in history!
This is the first time in recorded history that we have news/rumors coming from a WDW bus driver and it is 100% true!:lol:
This is really great news. The bus system as of late has been sub-par and these new enhancements should remedy many of the problems.
This is the first time in recorded history that we have news/rumors coming from a WDW bus driver and it is 100% true!:lol:
This is really great news. The bus system as of late has been sub-par and these new enhancements should remedy many of the problems.
LeeSeeBabe
Active Member
This is awesome news! I love the idea of music for the different destinations. Thanks!:wave:
someone asked where we would p/u and drop off our guests. the answers is and will remain, that we drop off guests at the load zone that we are picking up for. If i drive into Pop with people from MK, and am told to P/U for Epcot, then i would pull into the epcot load zone. same at the parks. if i am coming from pop to MK, and am dispatched to Saratoga, then they would be dropped off in the Saratoga load zone and i would p/u guests going to Saratoga. hope that clears it up for you. it will take a while for all the components to come online, since we still have some old 2700 busses that dont have the new black boxes. Until Disney takes them off the road when the new Gillig busses arrive, those busses will have to be dispatched the old way. But we have been told that barring a MAJOR problem with the system, everything will be online by the end of Sept. but the first few weeks are going to be getting average travel times for each route, and accurate guest counts. The new system counts every passenger getting on and off the bus, both front and rear doors, and tracks if we use our wheelchair ramps and how many wheelchairs are on board. this is supposed to take one week at each hub. once all the hubs are online, then you should be able to see a difference. And in case you're wondering, Disney paid $28 million to upgrade it's 300 busses, and all the tracking software and other whatnots to implement this new system. thats 28 miles of monorail line that could have been.
ToTBellHop
Well-Known Member
Good--this is exactly how I wanted it to be when I had heard about this a few months ago--drivers can override if they want, and the music is themed appropriately to each of the parks. Could make for a more exciting, immersive experience, with the experience with each park now starting right when you leave your Resort. Magic 24/7! Props to Disney.
k.hunter30
New Member
Wonderful news. I hope it actually works without too many bugs in the system.
it shouldnt. right now, we run every 15-20 min between busses (supposedly). This new system will decrease that wait time. and even if their bus was diverted, the bus thats 30 secs behind would get diverted to them. And how many of you have seen 3 busses for MK show up for every downtown bus. i know i did when i was a guest. So while it may increase their new wait time a bit, it will still be less time than what it is now. does that make sense?
Robfasto
New Member
What they did back in February was to let guest off at the stop they where picking up from. This was only at the parks where many times we would be let of at a different stop and told what stop we would need to get back to our resort.
One evening going from the Grand Floridian to Animal Kingdom Lodge we rode a bus to Downtown Disney and got off at the first stop and ended up getting right back on the same bus as it changed routes.
One evening going from the Grand Floridian to Animal Kingdom Lodge we rode a bus to Downtown Disney and got off at the first stop and ended up getting right back on the same bus as it changed routes.
rdour@techminds
New Member
Blind guests.
Hello,
This news is especially good news for me. I know that these systems may help drivers assist blind guests. The only question is how?
Issues I have with the current system only occur when in the loading and unloading zones. I am unable to determine where the lines are for each bus. I also am not able to determine which line is for each specific route. There is a sign at every park, and posted signs at hotels. I unfortunately am unable to read either method. Will they be implementing any talking signs? I'm imagining something like a sign at a hotel stop that once every 15 seconds announces "Magic Kingdom" and that each sign is slightly offset so you can walk around and hear these as you get closer. The Metra stations in Chicago have signs that announce the train times and tracks. The tracks each announce "Track 1, track 1, track 1" every few seconds. They have the sound level set to just the right amplitude. This keeps travelers from becoming irritated with the talking presence. In fact, I'd say most people only notice this feature the first time they use the stations. After that it becomes part of the familiar background noise of the immediate environment.
If I may, could I ask a serious favor? The next time you are on duty, could you simply ask around to see what may be in motion to make the experience for blind WDW guests more comfortable? It isn't that I can't just ask around and eventually find my bus, but it can get extremely annoying. Imagine being given directions to a bus by more than a dozen people. They all mean good, but they all don't have a clue what they're talking about. You go in circles until finally a CM notices and offers direct assistance. I'm so excited that the possibility exists for improvement.
Hello,
This news is especially good news for me. I know that these systems may help drivers assist blind guests. The only question is how?
Issues I have with the current system only occur when in the loading and unloading zones. I am unable to determine where the lines are for each bus. I also am not able to determine which line is for each specific route. There is a sign at every park, and posted signs at hotels. I unfortunately am unable to read either method. Will they be implementing any talking signs? I'm imagining something like a sign at a hotel stop that once every 15 seconds announces "Magic Kingdom" and that each sign is slightly offset so you can walk around and hear these as you get closer. The Metra stations in Chicago have signs that announce the train times and tracks. The tracks each announce "Track 1, track 1, track 1" every few seconds. They have the sound level set to just the right amplitude. This keeps travelers from becoming irritated with the talking presence. In fact, I'd say most people only notice this feature the first time they use the stations. After that it becomes part of the familiar background noise of the immediate environment.
If I may, could I ask a serious favor? The next time you are on duty, could you simply ask around to see what may be in motion to make the experience for blind WDW guests more comfortable? It isn't that I can't just ask around and eventually find my bus, but it can get extremely annoying. Imagine being given directions to a bus by more than a dozen people. They all mean good, but they all don't have a clue what they're talking about. You go in circles until finally a CM notices and offers direct assistance. I'm so excited that the possibility exists for improvement.
Shaman
Well-Known Member
First, thanks for the update, we have been hearing about these changes for a while now but weren't really seeing progress (at least I wasn't). Nice to see things being finalized as it relates to the bus upgrades.
Excellent post! I hope Disney reads this and/or this message reaches them somehow.
Good luck.
Excellent post! I hope Disney reads this and/or this message reaches them somehow.
Good luck.
i'll be more than happy to ask about any upgrades for our guests with visual imparment. But until then, the only advise i can give is to always find ANY, and i do mean ANY cm, and we will be more than happy to help you get where you are going. I'll ask around and post anything i find out. Now before you start hounding me with all kinds of questions and what ifs, remember that once it comes online at the end of may, they will have June, July, August and Sept. to test the system and work out any kinks, so that by Oct 1. (that date sounds familiar for some reason. hehe) it be declared fully operational. this of course is barring a complete system crash along the way.
surfsupdon
Well-Known Member
I'm not a fan of the background music. I think of those late night bus rides back home when all you want is peace and quiet and everyone is cooperating. I hope the music isn't loud enough to make people have to talk over it at any time of day.