Monorail accident

...and of course they're going to run the monorails until they can't run them anymore.

Seriously? There are *people* on those monorails. The last time Disney chose to "run it till it can't run no more" people died.

That's what I do with the machinery at my business. And I'm still shaking my head at this comment: "Tens of millions is chump change..." I'm glad you're not the CFO.

I'm not actually sure why you're shaking your head at that? He's right. 10 million is more or less one average day's gate for WDW. For infrastructure that underpins the functioning of three resorts, two parks, and is heavily weighted into guest experience for a decent percentage of park visitors, they can absolutely drop 10 million. Frankly I'd love to know how much they dropped building the new restrooms behind HM.
 
Seriously? There are *people* on those monorails. The last time Disney chose to "run it till it can't run no more" people died.



I'm not actually sure why you're shaking your head at that? He's right. 10 million is more or less one average day's gate for WDW. For infrastructure that underpins the functioning of three resorts, two parks, and is heavily weighted into guest experience for a decent percentage of park visitors, they can absolutely drop 10 million. Frankly I'd love to know how much they dropped building the new restrooms behind HM.

...and so you think that one day's gross is insignificant to Disney Corp? Again, I'm glad y'all aren't the CFO. Also, I assume that a new fleet of monorails would cost much more than 10 million $$, which is why I said tens of millions. Heck a new fleet might cost hundreds of millions. I have no idea.
 
...and so you think that one day's gross is insignificant to Disney Corp?

Yes. For a fundamental service that could cause loss of life, it damn well should be. Also I didn't say gross. I said gate. You can see the difference, no?

If I've spent 4K to visit WDW for three days, at around 1.3K a day, I'm going to be very po-d if I lose two - three hours of a day due to Disney's decaying infrastructure.

Disney have two obligations to their customers 1) Safety! 2) Providing a good show. Value for money or other such ephemerals they can play hard and fast with, but if you think they should be playing hard and fast with the other two, I'm damn glad *you* aren't in a position to make decisions that matter.
 


Yes. For a fundamental service that could cause loss of life, it damn well should be. Also I didn't say gross. I said gate. You can see the difference, no?

If I've spent 4K to visit WDW for three days, at around 1.3K a day, I'm going to be very po-d if I lose two - three hours of a day due to Disney's decaying infrastructure.

Disney have two obligations to their customers 1) Safety! 2) Providing a good show. Value for money or other such ephemerals they can play hard and fast with, but if you think they should be playing hard and fast with the other two, I'm damn glad *you* aren't in a position to make decisions that matter.

OK - I'll step back the rhetoric for the sale of niceness...

It is my opinion that the Monorails are fine. They are a little long in the tooth, maybe, but they are still functioning fine. They are not a "danger" to anyone (certainly not as much as Space Mountain or Everest). Putting in a new fleet wouldn't any more guarantee no break downs than maintaining the current ones. Mechanical things break, period. I suspect that before too long we'll see The Mouse start to put in new ones for all the reasons that have been discussed here. But that will come when they cannot be maintained cost effectively any longer. The current state of the Monorails do not risk safety or the "good show."

Disney's infrastructure is not decaying. The place still looks as fabulous as the day it opened - because of the ridiculous amount of work they are constantly doing on the place. I'm going back next week :yay: and there is a list of new things since just last year that I'm looking forward to seeing.

When I said gross, I was also referring to the "gate" gross - meaning that only a small part of that is profit. I have no idea what percentage, so I will not hazard a guess. Tens of millions of dollars is a significant amount of money for any corporation, and it is also for Disney. They have to spend their money wisely to present the best show possible, while keeping the shareholders happy. I am certain that Iger and Co. work to do that every single day.
pixiedust:
 
Disney's infrastructure is not decaying. The place still looks as fabulous as the day it opened
I think many would disagree here. People often say you would be able to eat off the ground on opening day and in the 70s today people don't think you can. Also the cleanliness of the bathrooms have been brought up a lot lately.
 


The biggest problem with the monorail is the lack of an emergency walkway. If the trains break down there is no where for the people to go. I work for the company that built the Disneyworld Monorail trains and the ones in Las Vegas as well as many of the automated trains at a lot of the U.S. Airports. As a company we always try to sell an emergency walkway as part of the design of the system for these very types of problems. Many cities, counties, port authority's, and private companies turn down the emergency walkway for visual astetics as well as cost savings. Every system like this should have an emergency walkway. It is very unsafe to not have one


Second, if the brakes locked up that means there is a lack of air pressure. Most likely what happened was there was a massive air leak somewhere like a broken air hose. If there is air pressure in the system, these trains have the ability to bypass certain things and release the brakes. Then get towed back with their maintenance vehicle. However, they may hav policies against towing with people on board. I don't know their policies.

In my opinion Disney does have a very reliable system. It is their lack of options when things go wrong the magnify the problems. I wouldn't be such a big deal if people could walk off the trains when there is a problem like all other Disney rides.
 
okay you may disagree with me - but when WDW was getting rid of people who had been there a long time - think they made some errors in not making sure the replacement people knew what they were doing.

my opinion only.
 
Boat service is stopped during electrical storms and not restarted until the threat of lightning is passed. This is for guest and CM safety.
 
OK - I'll step back the rhetoric for the sale of niceness...

It is my opinion that the Monorails are fine. They are a little long in the tooth, maybe, but they are still functioning fine. They are not a "danger" to anyone (certainly not as much as Space Mountain or Everest). Putting in a new fleet wouldn't any more guarantee no break downs than maintaining the current ones. Mechanical things break, period. I suspect that before too long we'll see The Mouse start to put in new ones for all the reasons that have been discussed here. But that will come when they cannot be maintained cost effectively any longer. The current state of the Monorails do not risk safety or the "good show."

Disney's infrastructure is not decaying. The place still looks as fabulous as the day it opened - because of the ridiculous amount of work they are constantly doing on the place. I'm going back next week :yay: and there is a list of new things since just last year that I'm looking forward to seeing.

When I said gross, I was also referring to the "gate" gross - meaning that only a small part of that is profit. I have no idea what percentage, so I will not hazard a guess. Tens of millions of dollars is a significant amount of money for any corporation, and it is also for Disney. They have to spend their money wisely to present the best show possible, while keeping the shareholders happy. I am certain that Iger and Co. work to do that every single day.
pixiedust:
I don't agree with the bolded. Just like any vehicle, the odds of a new vehicle breaking down is way less than an old vehicle with many miles. Of course anything new can break too but aside from defects I wouldn't worry about it as much.
 
I think many would disagree here. People often say you would be able to eat off the ground on opening day and in the 70s today people don't think you can. Also the cleanliness of the bathrooms have been brought up a lot lately.

Cleanliness is not infrastructure. While I agree with you, it does not have anything to do with the foundation, tunnels, water pipes, electrical wiring, etc... that actually make up the infrastructure. That particular gripe is aimed at custodial services. And I am not sure that anything can be done about it. The restrooms are so busy that the staff rarely has a chance to clean them. I see them in there working hard, but it is a losing effort in MK. They would have to routinely close them down to clean them while the park is open and that would cause havoc! The other three parks seem cleaner and so do their restrooms by virtue of smaller crowds.
 
Boat service is stopped during electrical storms and not restarted until the threat of lightning is passed. This is for guest and CM safety.


From what I remember, when lightning is within a specific distance, watercraft are not run because of the possibility of lightning strikes

Ok. Thanks to both of you. I thought there might be an implication that the electrical components of the boats were also stalled at the same time the lightning presumably hit the monorail/ track.
 
In my opinion Disney does have a very reliable system. It is their lack of options when things go wrong the magnify the problems. I wouldn't be such a big deal if people could walk off the trains when there is a problem like all other Disney rides.

I agree that this is a real problem. There needs to be a way to get all the people off quickly.
 
How is Everest a danger? Space mountain definitely needs a major refurb but Everest other than the yeti doesn't have any major problems.

It's not a danger to most people... but I know plenty of folks that won't ride it because of motion sickness. That's all I meant. NOW - I hurt my neck on Space Mountain, and will never ride it again. That thing's a rough ride...
 
It's not a danger to most people... but I know plenty of folks that won't ride it because of motion sickness. That's all I meant. NOW - I hurt my neck on Space Mountain, and will never ride it again. That thing's a rough ride...
Yeah Space Mountain need some infrastructure work. It was all set to get a big refurb a few years back but that got cancelled.
 
I worked the Disneyland Monorail system for a couple of years, and my best guess is that the problem is with their intrusion system. This is the system that lets trains know when they are getting to close to one another, and will actually E Stop the train if it thinks you are getting too close. I suspect they made adjustments to it after that accident at the TTC a few years ago, but the re-calibrations are still giving them fits. We had this problem on the Disneyland Monorail system when the intrusion system was installed there (this was about 10 years ago) the trains would E-Stop, and then you have to power down the train, power it back up again and then restart the train. We had a small delay between the TTC and the Polynesian on our last trip. I noticed that the train's AC shut off, and then went back on again after the announcement that we would be moving in a few moments.

Just a guess though...
 
It's not a danger to most people... but I know plenty of folks that won't ride it because of motion sickness. That's all I meant. NOW - I hurt my neck on Space Mountain, and will never ride it again. That thing's a rough ride...

That's not a reason to change or "fix" a ride. The part of the ride that gives most people motion sickness, is a huge part of why tons of other people love it. I know you weren't suggesting that it be fixed. I just felt worth pointing out.
 
Just to add a little more TMI, here is another mostly electrical subsystem in a monorail train that can malfunction causing delays: Interlocks to prevent movement if all doors are not securely shut. The most modern subway trains have a readout up front that can tell which door is malfunctioning but I am not sure whether trains of Disney monorails' vintage have that feature.

The school buses I rode (this was several decades ago) had cushioned plastic seats which, on a fall or spring morning would often be slightly damp, you could say dew covered. Together with that locker room smell.

Did you know that the Orlando (MCO) airport has evacuation walkways all the way from airside to main terminal for its trams? Not fun to schlep your bags on with the sun beating down with all its Florida humidity, but better than waiting 2 hours for a rescue truck. For all I know all airports with elevated tram systems have such walkways.
 
Last edited:

GET A DISNEY VACATION QUOTE

Dreams Unlimited Travel is committed to providing you with the very best vacation planning experience possible. Our Vacation Planners are experts and will share their honest advice to help you have a magical vacation.

Let us help you with your next Disney Vacation!





Top