Anyone have success with crowd/which park day calendars?

[gharter]

The simple rule I follow is crowds are higher on EMH days, so we choose a park without EMH.

We generally go to a park the day after EMH. Not sure if it really makes much difference.
This time there is EMH at 3 parks every day, so it will be interesting to see if that has any effect on crowds.

 

[eeudj]

touringplans.com has always worked for me... they will even put together a custom itinerary for you based on your FP. Love them...but miss TGM!!

 

[eeudj]

touringplans.com has always worked for me... they will even put together a custom itinerary for you based on your FP. Love them...but miss TGM!!

 

[Zippa D Doodah]

For us it doesn't matter much anymore. Seems like the general crowd levels are higher than they used to be. As with others, we have basic principles (ie. avoid EMHs) but are content to have FPs planned and then be very adaptable after that. Wait to long at a headliner? Then we can be content riding CoP or something on that level. Then again we sometimes hop to another park.

About the only time I would not go is Christmas-New Years week. I have no desire to be there when there is a 30 minute queue to go to the bathroom

 

[Christopher Rydberg]

Touring plans has always worked great for us. While I might differ as to a 6 in October meaning the same as a 6 in July or something, they provide a good guide to be at this park, not that one on a given day.

 

[edk35]

I remember those posts too- they were very helpful. I think the average wait time difference between the slowest and busiest day was like 5 minutes or something. Made me realize it doesn't matter.

My strategies:
1. Go to MK on party days
2. Avoid the park with EMH
3. Plan for hard to get FP+ at the end of the trip (example: SDD @ 60+6, so I'll go to DHS that day)
4. Plug in special events where they fit the best (Parties, EMM)

Thanks!!!!

 

[edk35]

Thanks everyone......There is so much new stuff happening in the parks now that I do agree that it is hard for any of the OLD crowd predictions to be on point anymore.

 

[Nancyg56]

Touring plans has always worked great for us. While I might differ as to a 6 in October meaning the same as a 6 in July or something, they provide a good guide to be at this park, not that one on a given day.

I use them too. I need a structiure to build a touring plan on,which for me is just park days and ADR's for each day, so TP is a good place to begin that 6 months out. I always plan a day farther in the trip for the difficult FP or ADR's,

I also suggest TP for newbies. I don't worry much about touring plans in general, but I know the parks and can manage the timeing. For somone new, the size of WDW is difficult to imagine, so using TP to build plans helps to picture the distance from one attraction to another. YOu don't need to use the plan, but it will help to get familiar with the parks.

 

[pearljamin03]

Honestly, even Disney has NO idea how many locals with AP or those staying in offsite hotels plan to go to which park on any given day. Certainly, no 3rd party will know any better and not months in advance.

I have to disagree just a little bit... I have family that are park greeters at Epcot. Every morning they're given report from their supervisor and one of the things they go over is anticipated crowd attendance. Every morning they tell them an estimated # of people that will walk through the park. Family claims that for the most part they're pretty dead on. Personally, I used crowd calendars for many years but think it's pointless anymore and luckily I've been enough times that if it is insane, I buy a mickey bar and sit on a bench...

 

[_19disnA]

^^ Employes of Disney getting today's information from management is different from some 3rd party not affiliated with Disney who has no access to non-public information when making future projections. Obviously, Disney would have information about ticket sales or things like number of FastPasses for any given day, but certainly doesn't share that outside of Disney.

 

[pearljamin03]

I'm just saying, you said they have "NO idea" but they do have an idea. That's all. They're smarter than us. They know everything. Probably more than the government

 

[DavidNYC]

I think crowd calendars are very overhyped. If you're enough of a Disney fan to be a member of and read this board, you're probably already ahead of 99% of Disney visitors and know enough to make your own educated guesses. Beyond avoiding EMH days (unless you're actually using the whole of EMH) and understanding special events (i.e. avoid World Showcase on Saturday nights during Food & Wine like the plague) there really isn't a whole lot beyond that. If one park is really crowded, most likely all of them are correspondingly crowded.

Understanding effective use of FP and having a basic plan for a day is far more important than trying to make guesses about relative crowds in each park during the course of a single trip. And definitely don't do anything to create an inconvenient schedule just to go to or avoid a certain park.

 

[_19disnA]

I think crowd calendars are very overhyped......

That was my point as well. Certainly paying a 3rd party for their crowd calendars (even it includes other perks) is a waste of money. Some people don't seem to grasp they are just projections/estimates and aren't based on any internal Disney info which they certainly don't share outside of Disney.

 

[nandojoe]

I think the crowd calendar is important to get an idea of a better month, in some cases weeks and nothing more. You shouldn´t use crowd calendars as a Holy Grail. I live in Brazil and have no idea how the American holidays are like (spring break, for example). So I look some crowd calendars to get an idea of which month I shouldn't go, because the calnder will show me which months are fuller. Obviously the crowd calendar won't be sure, but for me, it serves as a basis for starting a planning.

 

[CastAStone]

That was my point as well. Certainly paying a 3rd party for their crowd calendars (even it includes other perks) is a waste of money. Some people don't seem to grasp they are just projections/estimates and aren't based on any internal Disney info which they certainly don't share outside of Disney.

I wouldn’t pay Touring Plans for just the Crowd Calendar but I find the “other perks” indispensable in terms of actually getting my money’s worth in the parks.