Are EMH parks REALLY that much more crowded?

[pinkcheezit]

I am planning my family's first trip this September! I planned everything out based on the EMH and made all of our ADR's. I just read in a book to avoid EMH parks because they will be more crowded. I get that, but I can't really figure it out...for the first hour you don't have to wait in long lines, so after 9am how can the park really be that much more crowded?
In anyone's experience, do you have any advice to offer??
Thank you!

 

[pinkcheezit]

oh,I should add I didn't plan ALL of the parks on EMH, and since I have young kids, we don't plan to stay at the parks late.

 

[Hootch]

the parks getting crowded sometime after noon.

We have always had park hoppers. We go in and get a lot done and leave for our mid afternoon break. The evening will usually be in another park.

 

[miztressuz]

I am planning my family's first trip this September! I planned everything out based on the EMH and made all of our ADR's. I just read in a book to avoid EMH parks because they will be more crowded. I get that, but I can't really figure it out...for the first hour you don't have to wait in long lines, so after 9am how can the park really be that much more crowded?
In anyone's experience, do you have any advice to offer??
Thank you!

guess it depends on the time of year. we always go 'off season' in sept/oct and always use EMH and never felt a problem. but i can understand the suggestion of avoiding when in peak times as the parks will be crowded anyways so anything that bumps the people up could make an impact.

but we're also flexible with our touring plans (and i use that phrase very loosely) so if we get to an attraction that has a horrible wait, we'll try to fastpass and then head to another land as we don't mind the backtracking - works off the food!

as for explaining the extra crowd levels, the parks are made up of on-site guests and off-site guests. assume that the off-site guest levels are equal amongst the parks. i believe the assumption is, because of EMH the on-site guest levels will increase on the EMH park and therefore decrease in the other parks. So for that first hour you are in the park only with other on-site guests, but for the remainder of the day you have that same amount of on-site plus the 'normal' amount of off-site thereby increasing the crowd level over the other parks. Same when there is night EMH.

 

[lucyem]

What happens is the average guest sees the morning "EMH" advertised. Lets say MK opens at 8 for on-site guests. So that guest decides MK that day. But that same average guest is the kind of guest who will show up at 10am at best. The first hour+ of a morning EMH is about as empty as you will see MK. You can get so much done. Evening EMHs are another story. Like the morning one, the on-site guests flock to that park. But the evening hours do not require getting up and out of the hotel early. So they tend to be more crowded.

Meanwhile the off-site guests see the EMH and tend to stay away. They have three other parks to spread out at.

We always take advantage of morning EMHs. We are big on being at rope drop every day. Start with the popular rides and then work our way into the rides that have little or no waits and maybe grab an FP here or there. Then we have lunch and head back to the pool. We rarely if ever pay attention to evening EMH. Usually we are asleep What always amazes me up is when leave MK at 11am having done a good portion of the park, we see the lines of people just arriving. All I can think is that they will have a long hot afternoon.