Anyone already post that paper FP will be gone at MK as of 1/14?

[KatieCharlotte]

And you also have restaurants that fill to capacity within minutes or hours that booking day being.opened to the public..think CRT, bog, etc..

To get a state park campsite, you have to book exactly six months ahead. If you want a campsite at the most popular campgrounds, you must book a stay starting in the middle of the week at least two weeks before any major events, and be on the phone when the spots open at 8 a.m. To get a room at Yellowstone, I would have had to put our names on a waiting list before the bookings opened up one year before our trip. This all sounds crazy to me, yet it's this way because people learned that this was what they had to do to get their spots.

 

[NickyKnack]

And you also have restaurants that fill to capacity within minutes or hours that booking day being.opened to the public..think CRT, bog, etc..

That said, and not denied, my point still stands.
My point was that despite the pressure to book, and plan ahead quite a few people just won't. No matter how hard Disney pushes them to do so.

That and the restaurants have massively less capacity then the parks themselves. It takes fewer folks making ADRs to start being problematic then it would FPs.

 

[Laketravis]

A bit OT but you know what we did to keep our teenage son interested in WS? We call it "Eat The World". He's a bottomless pit, growing like a weed, and is ALWAYS hungry. So we start with a little tray of nachos in Mexico, and work our way around. He obviously doesn't buy something in every country - often it's nachos, maybe a pretzel in Germany, then a bowl of Udon in Japan, and perhaps a dessert in Paris... but it keeps him interested, and we get to do the grown up stuff in WS.

So how large of a HELOC do you need to support that sort of spend rate?

 

[estherhead]

To get a state park campsite, you have to book exactly six months ahead. If you want a campsite at the most popular campgrounds, you must book a stay starting in the middle of the week at least two weeks before any major events, and be on the phone when the spots open at 8 a.m. To get a room at Yellowstone, I would have had to put our names on a waiting list before the bookings opened up one year before our trip. This all sounds crazy to me, yet it's this way because people learned that this was what they had to do to get their spots.

This is so true. I'm a big Disney person and hang out here all the time. It's easy to buy into the negativity and think, "Yeah, Disney IS really expensive and you DO have to plan forever in advance." But try camping at Yosemite. You have to have a reservation a year in advance, it's well over $100 a night for one of their tents and we found the food to be very expensive, more than Disney, and yucky. And yet... I would go to Yosemite again in a heartbeat. Because it's worth it.

So that's how it is with Disney. The people who say they are done, I think that's great. That's how I feel about Vegas. It's too crowded and expensive. And it isn't really my thing now. So I'm done. But that doesn't mean I think people shouldn't go there. That's silly. I just would choose Disney or Yosemite over Vegas. And I've proved that with my wallet.

 

[Anal Annie]

A bit OT but you know what we did to keep our teenage son interested in WS? We call it "Eat The World". He's a bottomless pit, growing like a weed, and is ALWAYS hungry. So we start with a little tray of nachos in Mexico, and work our way around. He obviously doesn't buy something in every country - often it's nachos, maybe a pretzel in Germany, then a bowl of Udon in Japan, and perhaps a dessert in Paris... but it keeps him interested, and we get to do the grown up stuff in WS.

Thanks but that's not a big draw for my DS. He only eats well if he skips his ADHD meds. He has spurts where he will eat well but for the most part he's not a snacker and just eats his 3-square a day. He's 16 and about 5'10" (or so) and about maybe (on a good day) 112 Lbs. He'd rather be on a ride or on his iPad than walking anywhere in Epcot.

 

[Praying Colonel]

I believe that the new system could make rope drop even more crowded and I think that a lot of that will be due to the tiering and the 3 FP+ limit. If they truly increases FP users from 50% to 90% then that will potentially be a lot more people in all of the FP return lines and waits for the middle tier rides could become worse. Besides there are all of those top tier rides that people won't be able to get FP+ for not to mention re-rides.

It should be interesting to see how it all plays out.

Yesterday at MK we saw something in the afternoon that looked a lot like the above. We went to Philharmagic in the morning and there were very, very few people there. We went in the afternoon and it was PACKED--people were lined up outside the door to get in, and the theater was at capacity. A short time later we returned to BTMRR for our FP+ window at 2:15 and saw a FP+ return line backed all the way down the hill to the entrance, and the standby line virtually empty but with a posted wait time of 60 minutes. Even though it seemed counterintuitive, we got in the FP line and were on the train in about 10 minutes.

 

[xie]

So how large of a HELOC do you need to support that sort of spend rate?

None yet, but I swear I cannot believe how much I spend at the grocery store right now.

A few weeks back Husband went with me and at the end of the trip, we looked in the cart and realized 70% of what was there was to top off the great gnawing hunger on legs.

I hear of families with 6-8 kids and I seriously don't know how they keep them all fed as teens.

Anyway, I figure dropping 20-30 bucks on counter service snacks is a small price to pay to get him to walk around WS with me.

 

[FlipHipster]

Yesterday at MK we saw something in the afternoon that looked a lot like the above. We went to Philharmagic in the morning and there were very, very few people there. We went in the afternoon and it was PACKED--people were lined up outside the door to get in, and the theater was at capacity. A short time later we returned to BTMRR for our FP+ window at 2:15 and saw a FP+ return line backed all the way down the hill to the entrance, and the standby line virtually empty but with a posted wait time of 60 minutes. Even though it seemed counterintuitive, we got in the FP line and were on the train in about 10 minutes.

Wow. Sounds like they are stacking the queues. I wonder if you got in the SB line if you would have gotten on in ~10 mins since you were presumably at the end when you got in the FP line and it only took you 10 mins.

 

[mom2rtk]

Wow. Sounds like they are stacking the queues. I wonder if you got in the SB line if you would have gotten on in ~10 mins since you were presumably at the end when you got in the FP line and it only took you 10 mins.

I've heard too many stories this year of ratios being 8 or 10 FP to each SB person let in. So I would always choose the long FP line over SB when I have a FP.

We encountered a similar situation with BTMRR one day last summer. I couldn't believe how long that FP return line was. And I couldn't see anyone in line for SB from where I was. But I stayed, and was glad I did. We were on pretty quickly.

 

[FlipHipster]

I've heard too many stories this year of ratios being 8 or 10 FP to each SB person let in. So I would always choose the long FP line over SB when I have a FP.

We encountered a similar situation with BTMRR one day last summer. I couldn't believe how long that FP return line was. And I couldn't see anyone in line for SB from where I was. But I stayed, and was glad I did. We were on pretty quickly.

Yeah we hit a FP queue like that at PP one day in Nov. It moved fast but the SB queue was packed. In that scenario 1:8 sounds probable. I'm wondering if they are tweaking and trying to find some good ratios. One can hope....

It's hard to tell what caused the FP line to queue up and I guess I could be reading too much into it. I'm wondering if the SB time really is 60 mins in the Colonel's scenario. My first thought was that they are up to something nefarious (insert evil laugh). Suppose you know that you have 300 FP booked between 1:15-1:30 (made up numbers). You could theoretically at ~1:00PM bump the SB time to 60 mins whether it is or not assuming most people avoid a 60 SB line. This would allow SB to mostly clear before your 300 FP show up. Not necessarily a bad thing IMO. If I know this is the case and the 60 min time is fudged, Imma prolly get in SB knowing I'm not really going to have to wait 60 mins. Then I get back in the FP line and ride again. However, if a queue you can't even see really is 60mins that would kinda suck.

All complete speculation of course.

 

[magicbob]

Yesterday at MK we saw something in the afternoon that looked a lot like the above. We went to Philharmagic in the morning and there were very, very few people there. We went in the afternoon and it was PACKED--people were lined up outside the door to get in, and the theater was at capacity. A short time later we returned to BTMRR for our FP+ window at 2:15 and saw a FP+ return line backed all the way down the hill to the entrance, and the standby line virtually empty but with a posted wait time of 60 minutes. Even though it seemed counterintuitive, we got in the FP line and were on the train in about 10 minutes.

FP+... the new standby.

 

[mom2rtk]

FP+... the new standby.

Maybe they should rename the lines. FP could now be standby. And the other line could be standby-.

I really think it could catch on.

 

[magicbob]

Maybe they should rename the lines. FP could now be standby. And the other line could be standby-.

I really think it could catch on.

If you don't have a reservation to enter the 60 minute line (FP+), you can choose "standby" and we'll let you in if we have an opening.

hmmm... come to think of it, standby could be the new single rider line.

 

[crostorfer]

Maybe they should rename the lines. FP could now be standby. And the other line could be standby-.

I really think it could catch on.

 

[wisblue]

Maybe they should rename the lines. FP could now be standby. And the other line could be standby-.

I really think it could catch on.

You do realize that the poster who started this particular chain of witty responses said that, despite what looked like a large FP line, they were on the train in 10 minutes. If that is too long for you to wait for a ride when the park is crowded and standby lines are an hour or longer, you really need to gain some perspective.

 

[mom2rtk]

You do realize that the poster who started this particular chain of witty responses said that, despite what looked like a large FP line, they were on the train in 10 minutes. If that is too long for you to wait for a ride when the park is crowded and standby lines are an hour or longer, you really need to gain some perspective.

It was a joke. Lighten up.

 

[wisblue]

Yeah we hit a FP queue like that at PP one day in Nov. It moved fast but the SB queue was packed. In that scenario 1:8 sounds probable. I'm wondering if they are tweaking and trying to find some good ratios. One can hope....

It's hard to tell what caused the FP line to queue up and I guess I could be reading too much into it. I'm wondering if the SB time really is 60 mins in the Colonel's scenario. My first thought was that they are up to something nefarious (insert evil laugh). Suppose you know that you have 300 FP booked between 1:15-1:30 (made up numbers). You could theoretically at ~1:00PM bump the SB time to 60 mins whether it is or not assuming most people avoid a 60 SB line. This would allow SB to mostly clear before your 300 FP show up. Not necessarily a bad thing IMO. If I know this is the case and the 60 min time is fudged, Imma prolly get in SB knowing I'm not really going to have to wait 60 mins. Then I get back in the FP line and ride again. However, if a queue you can't even see really is 60mins that would kinda suck.

All complete speculation of course.

Because all FPs have a stated return time window of 1 hour and an actual window of 80 minutes (5 minutes before and 15 minutes after the stated times) it is impossible to predict exactly when someone holding a FP will return. Therefore, it is inevitable that there will be some ebb and flow in the length of the FP lines. And this ebb and flow is going to affect how many people are taken out of the standby line.

We saw that at the Safari on our recent trip (Sunday, December 29).We went past the line at 1:30 PM while we walked toward the gorilla trail before using our FP at 2 PM. There was a pretty significant line waiting to enter the FP line. But, when we came back at 2 PM there were literally 2 people ahead of us to enter the FP line, so we breezed through and walked nonstop through the queue to the boarding area and right onto a truck. Because there were so few people in the FP line at that time, the standby line (which had a posted wait of something like 60-90 minutes) was moving along. When the FP line was more congested, the standby line likely moved more slowly.

I'm sure that Disney is studying this constantly and adjusting the number of FPs it makes available to reach an appropriate balance between FP and standby.

I should add that when we used standby lines on our recent trips, our waits were always shorter than the posted times. I'm sure this isn't always the case because of the unpredictability of how FP holders will return. But, our observation over the years has been that Disney is very conservative with those standby waits and that the actual waits are shorter than the posted times much more often than they are longer. That didn't change on our latest trip. For example, we entered a standby line at the Jungle Cruise that had a posted wait time of 30 minutes because it didn't look like there were that many people in the standby line. We were on a boat within 15 minutes, in part because there usually weren't enough people using FPs to fill even half a boat.

 

[wisblue]

It was a joke. Lighten up.

You may know that, and I may suspect that, but because of your frequent and vocal complaining about the whole FP+ system, it is impossible to know for sure. You have shown that you know how to use the emoticons to give clues that you are making what is meant to be a joke.

The casual visitors to the board come here, see comments like this, and think "wow, if even FP lines have long waits, this really is a mess."

 

[Laketravis]

You may know that, and I may suspect that, but because of your frequent and vocal complaining about the whole FP+ system, it is impossible to know for sure. You have shown that you know how to use the emoticons to give clues that you are making what is meant to be a joke.

The casual visitors to the board come here, see comments like this, and think "wow, if even FP lines have long waits, this really is a mess."

You really should try to be a bit less dismissive. You originally denied the very existence of FastPass end-of-line CM's because you had never personally observed them, despite the reports from others.

I've noticed several "just got back" posts lately that comment about long FP waits. And during one of the historically low crowd weeks of the year?

 

[thptrek]

I wonder what the distribution of people using their FP+ window is. My guess would be that a large percentage get in the FP+ line within the first 15 min of the window. Thus the ebb and flows. I think that we will see Disney stagger the FP+ windows more to even out the flow.