I have found the Hotel Plaza Blvd. buses to be very good. These buses run on a schedule and in my experience they keep to their schedules. The schedule is very simple to understand. The buses pick up guests at the hotels on the half hour (i.e. 8:00, 8:30, 9:00, 9:30, 10:00, 10:30, etc.) and the buses depart from the parks a quarter after each hour and a quarter till each hour (i.e. 8:15, 8:45, 9:15, 9:45, 10:15, 10:45, etc.). Please note that these DEPARTURE time schedules are very strict. The buses depart at their appointed times with only minor (less than 2 minutes) deviation. There was a slight variation for AK but that is not germane to this discussion. People with poor time management skills will be left behind and forced to wait for the next bus. People who practice good time management will be generously rewarded.
In reality the Hotel Plaza Blvd. buses have really just two routes (except for the water parks, but that's another deal). You either catch the Epcot/MGM bus or the MK/AK bus. It's that simple. We learned a long time ago (with over 20 years WDW experience and our AP's), that it doesn't really matter at which park you begin the adventure.
In our experience it has always worked just great for us. In the mornings (from 8 AM until 11 AM) the buses actually pick up more frequently than every half hour. So, for example, if you walk out of the hotel just as the MK bus was leaving you only had to wait 10 or 15 minutes for the next MK bus. Or, if you didn't want to wait that long, all you had to do was catch the next Epcot bus and then take the monorail to the MK from the TTC.
The Hotel Plaza Blvd. buses have a fixed route and the hotels are picked up in the following order:
1. Wyndham Palace
2. Hilton
3. Holiday Inn
4. Royal Plaza
5. Doubletree
6. Lake Buena Vista
7. Grosvenor
If you are staying at any of the first three resorts then you are pretty much guaranteed to get a seat. If you stay at any of the last four resorts then you may have to stand. However, during our stay we made about 42 bus trips and only during two of those trips did some folks end up standing. We stayed at the Hilton during our last trip so we always got seats.
Based upon my observations, the guests staying at the Royal Plaza, Doubletree, Lake Buena Vista and the Grosvenor are generally dissatisfied with the Hotel Plaza Blvd. buses while those guests staying at the first three resorts (Wyndham, Hilton & Holiday Inn) are generally very pleased with the bus system. The reason is simple, the guests staying at the first three resorts are picked up first on the trip departing for the parks and they are dropped off first on the return trip!
The departure from each park is interesting because many folks seem to misunderstand how it works and this is what causes them to miss their bus! As I stated above, the Hotel Plaza Blvd. buses always DEPART each park on a fixed schedule. However, they always arrive 10 or 15 minutes prior to their appointed departure time to leave adequate time for loading. As an example, if you decide to leave the MK at 3:15 PM it would be in your best interest to arrive at the Transportation and Ticket Center by 3:00 PM. We used this technique when we departed each park and NEVER had to wait for a bus. We simply walked out to lane #26 and got on the bus. Also, the buses either had a movie playing on the overhead TV monitors or they had one of the local easy listening music radio stations (FM 105.1 or 107.1) playing on the sound system. So, even if you had to sit on the bus for 10 or 15 minutes before departure you got some entertainment! This was a true blessing because it really kept all the mindless chat and banter to a minimum. The bus passengers kept quiet! No matter what time of day or night, we found that a trip from the hotel to the parks took about 25 minutes and the return trip averaged the same time.
