ART or drive?

[mom2rh]

I would appreciate some advice...we are staying at the Embassy Suites, we will have a rental car. Should we take the shuttle to the parks or should we drive our rental car? The cost is about the same...3 over the age of 10, one toddler.

Is the parking in and out? Is it a challenge to get from the parking lot to the entrance? Enough of a challenge that the shuttle makes more sense.

I appreciate the input...

 

[Mom2micayla]

I think it depends on what you prefer. It'd be $9 a day for the ART, $10/day for parking there. The convience of parking there is that you can go whenever you want and have your car at your disposal should you want to go out and drop something off or whatever. The downside (IMO) is that there can often be long waits for the tram. Oh and whether or not you park in the parking lot or the parking garage.. who knows. It depends on the day and time of the year it seems.

As to the ART, they run every 20 or 30 minutes. You're stuck with their schedule and they stop running just 1/2 hour after park closing. But you get dropped off practically right at the entrance.

I think that if it were me and it would cost approx. the same to drive vs. using ART, I'd likely drive. I just find that unloading and loading a stroller on the ART is a pain in the rear. Plus I never liked the fact that while you might be there plenty early for the next ART pick-up, the bus might be full and you can't get on.

 

[pixleyyy]

We didn't try ART so I have no suggestion there, but we drove and I found it to be a major pain the rear. The lines in the morning to get to the parking where sometimes pretty bad (it took us nearly 1/2 hour one day!). The trams are often very full in the evenings and mornings and the parking sometimes is fairly far away from the tram station. Those with strollers full of stuff sometimes had to wait for 6 or 7 trams before they got a turn to get on, as there is limited space for strollers that aren't folded up. But the good news is that they had trams running every few minutes during busy times.

 

[mom2rh]

Thanks for your replies...I guess I need to figure out how far we are from the Parks. Does ART fill up in the same way as the trams do?

We have a fairly portable stroller...folds up quickly and easily so hopefully that won't be a factor for either ART or parking...

Thanks again...

 

[mom2rh]

OK. The hotel is 1.5 miles from Disneyland...not that far unless you've got a cranky toddler! LOL So does that change the attractiveness of ART? Will there be a bunch of stops between us and the park? We may just have to try it both ways and see which way we prefer!

 

[hlbtimes2]

Here is a link to their site. You should be able to find the schedule / route to decide how many stops will be before and after your pick up. My computer at work doesnt like the site- so I can't see anything but the home page http://www.rideart.org/

 

[mom2rh]

Thanks for the link! I hadn't been able to find it previously. I couldn't open the route page either but I emailed them...hopefully they will respond with the information! I really appreciate it!

 

[mom2rh]

Wow! They were quick in responding.

Here is the link they sent me in case it would help anyone else.


Apparently I have not been deemed "trustworthy" by this website as I have too few posts... I'm not allowed to post url's. Sorry.

From what I see, our hotel would be the first stop on the K line but there are only 3 stops...is that correct? Or am I missing something?

 

[Mom2micayla]

Most of them only have a few stops. But of course they fill up quickly. If you're the first stop on the line then you should be good.