News New Gondola Transportation - Disney Skyliner -

[monothingie]

Good points. 6,000 might actually be max heading to the resorts on a very crowded day. There are about 7,400 rooms serviced by the gondola line so even at extreme high occupancy times there are probably roughly 7,000 rooms occupied. Each room probably has 2 to 3 guests on average so let’s be conservative and say 3, that’s 21,000 guests but they are spread between all 4 parks, Disney Springs, hanging at the resort and trips off property. 6,000 would assume almost 30% chose EPCOT that day and that they all stayed for Illuminations and all tried to leave right after the show. On most nights the number will be much less than that. The one wildcard is factoring in how many guests are boarding to hop over to DHS for a later evening. When SW:GE first opens that number may be higher. Remember how they kept Pandora open late that first summer and it stayed relatively busy.

For perspective the monorail system as a whole moves 150,000 daily riders on average per day.

 

[Lensman]

For perspective the monorail system as a whole moves 150,000 daily riders on average per day.

And has a throughput of about 7,000 passengers per hour per loop "per direction", right?

 

[peter11435]

For perspective the monorail system as a whole moves 150,000 daily riders on average per day.

That’s counting all three monorail lines.

If each of the three gondola lines is capable of carrying 5000 per hour, that’s 15,000 per hour. Assuming a standard operating day of 8am-10pm that would mean the system as a whole has the potential to move 210,000 riders a day.

Obviously it will never move nearly that many...

 

[monothingie]

That’s counting all three monorail lines.

If each of the three gondola lines is capable of carrying 5000 per hour, that’s 15,000 per hour. Assuming a standard operating day of 8am-10pm that would mean the system as a whole has the potential to move 210,000 riders a day.

Obviously it will never move neatly that many...

Yes 210K seems out there.

Do you even have even half that quantity of people who will utilize the system?

 

[MisterPenguin]

And has a throughput of about 7,000 passengers per hour per loop "per direction", right?

That’s counting all three monorail lines.

If each of the three gondola lines is capable of carrying 5000 per hour, that’s 15,000 per hour. Assuming a standard operating day of 8am-10pm that would mean the system as a whole has the potential to move 210,000 riders a day.

7k per loop per direction is way too high. I think 5k is the peak.

And yes, that's how many can get on at a station. So, while 5k/hr is getting on at one end, 5k/hr can be getting on at the other end.

So, the potential is 400k/day. But of course, at rush hours, most the of the traffic is heading one way.

Obviously it will never move neatly that many...

I agree. People are slobs.

 

[monothingie]

And has a throughput of about 7,000 passengers per hour per loop "per direction", right?

Who knows. Who cares. People are going to not survive the gondola trip anyways because they’ll be melted into goo or incinerated by lightning.

 

[peter11435]

Yes 210K seems out there.

Do you even have even half that quantity of people who will utilize the system?

210k is certainly out there because there won’t be nearly that much demand throughout the day. But the system could certainly be capable of it.

I believe the system will service less than 7,500 rooms. Which even at 100% occupancy (doesn’t happen) with 4 guests per room average (doesn’t happen) that would be one seventh of the maximum capacity of the system over a typical day. Which is why fears over capacity are unnecessary.

 

[monothingie]

210k is certainly out there because there won’t be nearly that much demand throughout the day. But the system could certainly be capable of it.

I believe the system will service less than 7,500 rooms. Which even at 100% occupancy (doesn’t happen) with 4 guests per room average (doesn’t happen) that would be one seventh of the maximum capacity of the system over a typical day. Which is why fears over capacity are unnecessary.

Does this bring back my queueing theory class nightmares.

The system will always have excess capacity, just like the monorails and gondolas (not running max trains, gondolas etc). It’s the method of dispatch that will determine wait times. I’m sure they’ve modeled this in the design, hence the large queues that are being constructed at DHS and IG.

 

[mmssbrg2]

Go sit near a lift... It's not just the drive motors making noise. The vehicles being accelerated makes a very distinct noise.. because the drive wheels are taking load as they accelerate the cabin. It's not the spin up of the wheels.. it's the wheels going from unloaded to loaded and their contact patches. That is not silent.

Found this:

 

[Rich Brownn]

Valid point. I guess property wide would be really infrequent or non-existent.

We had a property-wide outage back in the 70s. I was working monorails and apparently a power surge shut down central energy, which in turn shut off access from the main trunk. The parks, the hotels, and the campground all lost power for several hours. And it was summer. We couldn't even evacuate the monorails because there was no way to move all of them with the tractor.

 

[peter11435]

Does this bring back my queueing theory class nightmares.

The system will always have excess capacity, just like the monorails and gondolas (not running max trains, gondolas etc). It’s the method of dispatch that will determine wait times. I’m sure they’ve modeled this in the design, hence the large queues that are being constructed at DHS and IG.

They have large queues at the bus stops too.

 

[joelkfla]

They have large queues at the bus stops too.

Yes, but that's why the load zones for Pop, AoA, and CBR are either the furthest ones from the parks, or on a separate platform. If the queue overflows, it doesn't get in the way of anyone else.

I believe the original question was whether an overflowing queue at IG would get in the way of Guests walking to the Epcot resorts.

 

[joelkfla]

That’s counting all three monorail lines.

If each of the three gondola lines is capable of carrying 5000 per hour, that’s 15,000 per hour. Assuming a standard operating day of 8am-10pm that would mean the system as a whole has the potential to move 210,000 riders a day.

Obviously it will never move neatly that many...

That's a misleading number, because the majority of riders will be transferring between lines, and you're double-counting them. E.g. a rider traveling from Epcot to Pop is only one rider, but they're using capacity on both the Epcot & the Pop/AoA lines.

 

[GoofGoof]

Does this bring back my queueing theory class nightmares.

The system will always have excess capacity, just like the monorails and gondolas (not running max trains, gondolas etc). It’s the method of dispatch that will determine wait times. I’m sure they’ve modeled this in the design, hence the large queues that are being constructed at DHS and IG.

My opinion is the gondolas will not be filled to near capacity either. If they have a group of 7 will they find 3 more people to fill to 10? I doubt it. That will lower overall riders per hour, but as stated earlier the capacity with the system filled to max and operating optimally is probably two to three times the demand at most times so even if it’s 50% inefficient there should be plenty of room for everyone.

 

[Goofyernmost]

Found this:

Pretty close to the same sounds made at a NASCAR event or an Airport. However, will we be able to maintain our Cherub like demeanor with all that noise going on.

 

[peter11435]

That's a misleading number, because the majority of riders will be transferring between lines, and you're double-counting them. E.g. a rider traveling from Epcot to Pop is only one rider, but they're using capacity on both the Epcot & the Pop/AoA lines.

That's a misleading number, because the majority of riders will be transferring between lines, and you're double-counting them. E.g. a rider traveling from Epcot to Pop is only one rider, but they're using capacity on both the Epcot & the Pop/AoA lines.

Correct. Just as it is misleading to talk about the numbers moved by the monorail for the very same reason.

The point is that this system will have a significantly higher capacity than the current bus system.

 

[GoofGoof]

Yes, but that's why the load zones for Pop, AoA, and CBR are either the furthest ones from the parks, or on a separate platform. If the queue overflows, it doesn't get in the way of anyone else.

I believe the original question was whether an overflowing queue at IG would get in the way of Guests walking to the Epcot resorts.

Even if it backs up its pretty easy to redirect crowds with some simple ropes. Just rope off a path for walkers heading to EPCOT resorts. They do it for parades and night shows pretty effectively.

That's a misleading number, because the majority of riders will be transferring between lines, and you're double-counting them. E.g. a rider traveling from Epcot to Pop is only one rider, but they're using capacity on both the Epcot & the Pop/AoA lines.

I think that was his point. The monorail quote included all 3 lines so if you combined all 3 gondola lines you get 210,000. What matters for this debate is capacity from IG to CBR since that’s the bottleneck being discussed.

 

[GoofGoof]

We had a property-wide outage back in the 70s. I was working monorails and apparently a power surge shut down central energy, which in turn shut off access from the main trunk. The parks, the hotels, and the campground all lost power for several hours. And it was summer. We couldn't even evacuate the monorails because there was no way to move all of them with the tractor.

That would be a nightmare. Does each hotel have a separate backup generator or is the backup centralized?

 

[Goofyernmost]

Even if it backs up its pretty easy to redirect crowds with some simple ropes. Just rope off a path for walkers heading to EPCOT resorts. They do it for parades and night shows pretty effectively.

I think that was his point. The monorail quote included all 3 lines so if you combined all 3 gondola lines you get 210,000. What matters for this debate is capacity from IG to CBR since that’s the bottleneck being discussed.

I don't understand that thought. Do we really think that everyone is going to go to the same place at exactly the same time during most of the day. There is never that big a crowd at rope drop, even at MK. All those hotels will have two other parks to go to so they aren't all going to be riding the Gondola's to Epcot or DHS. It is just a silly conversation and requires just a little imagination to see that these are all just imaginary problems.

 

[GoofGoof]

I don't understand that thought. Do we really think that everyone is going to go to the same place at exactly the same time during most of the day. There is never that big a crowd at rope drop, even at MK. All those hotels will have two other parks to go to so they aren't all going to be riding the Gondola's to Epcot or DHS. It is just a silly conversation and requires just a little imagination to see that these are all just imaginary problems.

The discussion is specifically about leaving through IG after Illuminations is over. The rest of the day will be no issue. There could be a wait at that time depending on time of year and crowd levels. It’s not going to be everyone leaving at exactly the same time but since when the show ends and the park usually closes most people will be exiting around the same time depending on how long it takes you to get to the exit from where you were standing.

If you walk out and 500 people are waiting it would take less than 10 minutes to clear so we aren’t talking about long waits but it’s a bottleneck where even a few hundred people gathered could require crowd control which I’m sure they will have.