AKL or WL

[tracylynnrose9]

Can someone please provide some insight into exactly how bad the bus lines are for AKL? We looked at renting DVC points but not sure what will be available, we're going the end of February. First time at Disney with my kids and we tried to plan for a time when it would be moderate crowds. Our initial choice was savannah view at AKL but then heard the travel time is terrible to MK and have been "warned" about staying there. Don't want to spend most of my day waiting on the busses. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[dansdad]

Can someone please provide some insight into exactly how bad the bus lines are for AKL? We looked at renting DVC points but not sure what will be available, we're going the end of February. First time at Disney with my kids and we tried to plan for a time when it would be moderate crowds. Our initial choice was savannah view at AKL but then heard the travel time is terrible to MK and have been "warned" about staying there. Don't want to spend most of my day waiting on the busses. Any help would be appreciated.

In our experience the waits for the buses are on par with every other resort we've stayed. The travel time to MK is usually 17-18 minutes. Travel times to other parks are all under 10 minutes.

WL with have shorter travel times to MK than AKL, but longer than AKL for every other park.

 

[Deb & Bill]

In all our stays at AKV/AKL we never had a problem with buses. Travel time to Epcot was about 13 minutes.

 

[DisneyWishes14]

Can someone please provide some insight into exactly how bad the bus lines are for AKL? We looked at renting DVC points but not sure what will be available, we're going the end of February. First time at Disney with my kids and we tried to plan for a time when it would be moderate crowds. Our initial choice was savannah view at AKL but then heard the travel time is terrible to MK and have been "warned" about staying there. Don't want to spend most of my day waiting on the busses. Any help would be appreciated.

If it's a first trip and you are choosing between AKL and WL, I would recommend staying at WL. AKL is gorgeous, but if you are spending a lot of time in MK, it's not very convenient. WL offers you both a boat and bus to MK and it's so close. We've stayed at AKL and AKV three times and it was really more for short, resort-only trips without a lot of park touring.

 

[clayfolks]

We have never had a problem with buses in the 10+ times that we have stayed at AKV. We find the bus service from the MK area resorts much worse than we do AKL/AKV. When we have stayed at WL, most of the time(except for first thing in the morning) the bus is shared with another resort. This is true for all MK area resorts. At AKV, the bus is never shared with another resort. The bus picks up first at Kidani and then picks up at Jambo. The only exception to this is DS.

 

[CogsworthTN]

To us the buses have not been great. I do understand some of the overcrowding on the buses is due to it being thanksgiving week, but we had a bad experience yesterday. Epcot had an opening time of 8:00 am and so did animal kingdom park. The other parks had 9:00 am openings. We arrived at the bus stop at 6:50 am. 4 animal kingdom buses, 2 Hollywood Studios buses, and 2 magic kingdom buses all came before our one Epcot bus.

Lots of unhappy people. The bus was already packed because animal kingdom lodge buses go to Kidani Village first. Needless to say it was standing room with double rows standing on the bus. We also did not make it into Epcot until 8:20. The couple behind us at the bus stop said the same thing happened on early morning hours at Hollywood Studios.

The resort has been great. We love the theming and the food offerings, but for us the buses were very lacking in efficiency. If we ever come back it would only be for relaxing, not a park visiting trip to Disney. Or we would just take a Lyft to the parks like we did one day this trip.

 

[Babsy]

To us the buses have not been great. I do understand some of the overcrowding on the buses is due to it being thanksgiving week, but we had a bad experience yesterday. Epcot had an opening time of 8:00 am and so did animal kingdom park. The other parks had 9:00 am openings. We arrived at the bus stop at 6:50 am. 4 animal kingdom buses, 2 Hollywood Studios buses, and 2 magic kingdom buses all came before our one Epcot bus.

Lots of unhappy people. The bus was already packed because animal kingdom lodge buses go to Kidani Village first. Needless to say it was standing room with double rows standing on the bus. We also did not make it into Epcot until 8:20. The couple behind us at the bus stop said the same thing happened on early morning hours at Hollywood Studios.

The resort has been great. We love the theming and the food offerings, but for us the buses were very lacking in efficiency. If we ever come back it would only be for relaxing, not a park visiting trip to Disney. Or we would just take a Lyft to the parks like we did one day this trip.

We have had similarly horrendous experiences that stand out with buses from the GF, Poly, YC and WL. Terrible, long wait times that resulted in large crowds waiting when the bus finally arrived to bring us to the TP. These experiences have not been the norm, but do occur occasionally at pretty much every resort. Fortunately, the norm is a wait of about 10 - 20 minutes on average. Sometimes the bus is waiting for you (yay!), but usually you will have some wait. No way of foretelling what kind of luck you will have at any particular resort.

I did once read a report on transportation times that were measured from each resort to each theme park . I was surprised that the overall longest amount of time getting to/from TP's was from the WL. IDK if that was accurate or not, but the conclusion has stuck in my mind over the years. The few times that I tried timing bus rides and wait times, I concluded that it really doesn't make a big difference where you stay on property, you will have some good and some bad experiences at them all. If anything, I have had marginally better experiences with buses from the All Star resorts. Guess I am lucky at AS resorts!

Obviously, the MK resorts have a longer commute to the AK. In the same way, the AKL will have a longer commute to the MK. But it is only a few extra minutes bus time, which is a small part of the total transportation times. Also, When you can walk to a theme park, you have a real advantage for that park, but only that park. AND, so that is as much consideration as I give to transportation times. Otherwise, I give priority to everything else about the resort when choosing where to stay.

OP: the WL is markedly closer to the MK than any but the monorail resorts. If you plan to spend most of your time at the MK, then the WL would be more likely to reduce your transportation times (due to proximity).

 

[iona]

Can someone please provide some insight into exactly how bad the bus lines are for AKL? We looked at renting DVC points but not sure what will be available, we're going the end of February. First time at Disney with my kids and we tried to plan for a time when it would be moderate crowds. Our initial choice was savannah view at AKL but then heard the travel time is terrible to MK and have been "warned" about staying there. Don't want to spend most of my day waiting on the busses. Any help would be appreciated.

We're DVC owners at AKL so have stayed quite a few times. Apart from the odd disaster (similar to that described by CogsworthTN above) which can happen at any resort (we've had similar issues at Beach Club, Contempory and POFQ) we've not had any problems. We have found the bus service to be a bit better from Kidani than Jambo (due to most of the buses stopping there first as someone mentioned above) and if you're renting DVC points then there's an increased chance that you'd be staying at Kidani (as a higher % of the DVC rooms are in Kidani than Jambo so depending on how far out you book you're more likely to get availability there) so that may be something to consider.