Buses taking too much time to get to parks

[chipmunkfan]

Just got back on Saturday and have a theory about the bus transportation:
They take the longest routes possible to make it seem like Disney World is really big.

I'm sorry to say this but you can get anywhere on property within 15 minutes, so why on earth does it take up to 45 minutes to get somewhere? ....Because of my theory....

I have to say the busses ran on time but I experienced drivers taking the longest routes possible to get somewhere. One bus driver went 35 mph in a 50mph going to Epcot. I thought we were going to get killed by going so slow.

Also, I stayed at WL which shared alot of busses with Fort Wilderness. There is a road right before the bus drop off in WL leads to Fort Wilderness. One driver took this route and we were there in about 4 minutes or so. The rest of the drivers went the longest route possible which took about 10 extra minutes.

Why oh why do the drivers want to spend more time driving us around instead of getting to the parks through the most direct way?

Another minor pet peeve...why does the WL bus share with the grand floridian when we go to DTD? It takes forever to go over there and pick them up. Why are they not paired w/ the Poly people?

 

[tammy]

I agree. I noticed on our recent trip that coming back from the MK we took a totally different route to get back to Pop Century that I don't ever remember taking before.

Also, one night I had ressies at JIKO and alloted an hour and a half to get to the AKL. I took the bus to Downtown Disney and waited for the AKL bus and it took me two hours to get there. I was furious.

I have decided that from now on, we will rent a car.

 

[Chip 'n Dale Express]

The reason you are seeing a different route to get to Fort Wilderness is because those are two seperate locations within Fort Wilderness. Only the Studios bus stops at the Settlement (the one closest to WL). Epcot on the other hand will stop at the Outpost Depot, which is on the other side of FW, and is still on the way.

 

[Laz]

Another reason why I drive to most of the parks.

 

[DebbieB]

Another reason why I drive to most of the parks.

Me too! I hate waiting and then having to stand holding on for dear life. With a rental car, you just jump in, turn on the radio & AC and go. Plus you always get a seat!

 

[seashoreCM]

I take it Disney buses are in radio contact with a dispatcher and are rerouted as best as possible if there are traffic problems.

I highly doubt you will be killed riding in a slow bus.

Going resort to resort it is usually quicker to transfer at a theme park (not at or after its closing time) rather than at Downtown Disney.

 

[MariDisney]

The times I've taken the bus I've had the same impression. I always rent a car now. I can pretty much get to any place on the property in 15 minutes from any resort except the entrance to MK which takes a bit longer because of having to take the monorail or ferry over. I really love having the car.

 

[Laz]

Do I start to see a trend here? In the not to distance future, I am seeing more and more people using cars intead of the buses. What will that lead to?

 

[kydisneyfans]

Add us to the car fan club-time is precious-I don't want to waste it waiting for and sitting/standing on a bus. I've seen parts of Disney property that I never knew existed taking bus rides-50 minutes from Pop to DT Disney last trip, we did in in 10 by car.

 

[ztbz]

Just got back on Saturday and have a theory about the bus transportation:

“I'm sorry to say this but you can get anywhere on property within 15 minutes”

Yes that’s true but your not doing a bus route that Disney management wants you to follow. Also a bus does not drive like a car, its big and bulky and you have to watch where the back end of the bus is when making turns, otherwise you might hit something, this might be a reason why the buses are going slow, especially with so many new bus drivers working for Disney these days.

Also, I stayed at WL which shared alot of busses with Fort Wilderness. There is a road right before the bus drop off in WL leads to Fort Wilderness. One driver took this route and we were there in about 4 minutes or so. The rest of the drivers went the longest route possible which took about 10 extra minutes.

Yes, there is a back road that leads to the Campground (called West Wilderness road) but we are not allowed to take this road to Fort Wilderness. The Designated bus stop for Epcot at the Fort Wilderness Campground Resort is at the Outpost stop, which is at the front of the Campground entrance. In order to get to this stop by taking the "other way" the Epcot bus would have to pass a number of Campground Loop Stops, Disney does not want Park routes to stop at the Loop stops, so in order not to have a Bad Show we (Disney Bus Drivers) are told to go out the Entrance of the Wilderness Lodge to the Traffic Light and turn left and come into Fort Wilderness the way that guest who are checking into the Campground would go to get to Fort Wilderness.


There are two routes which are allowed to go the "back way" they are the Disney/Mgm route that stops at the Settlement (it comes back the way the bus came when leaving the stop) and the Orange route which is one of the Campground Internal routes (also a tip for those who get off at the wrong stop either at WL or at the Forts Outpost stop, this route connects the two stops, so you can get on the Orange route to get to WL or to Fort Wilderness depending on where you went by mistake).

I have to say the busses ran on time but I experienced drivers taking the longest routes possible to get somewhere. One bus driver went 35 mph in a 50mph going to Epcot. I thought we were going to get killed by going so slow.

It should be noted that Traffic Speed Enforcement from the Orange County Sherriff Department is in full effect at Walt Disney World, in fact many areas at Walt Disney World have a 35 mph speed limit, this includes from the Magic Kingdom toll plaza to the Wilderness Lodge entrance, and coming into the Magic Kingdom toll plaza as well as coming into the Epcot toll plaza’s which is 35 mph. The only areas that have a 50 mph speed limit is on World Drive from half-mile south the Mk Toll plaza south to Interstate 4 and on Epcot Drive in the 4 lane section outbound or inbound before the tear drop on Epcot Drive at the Epcot exit. Anyone including Disney Bus Drivers could be pull over and receive speeding ticket if going above the speed limit, in addition the bus driver could be fired or remove from the Bus Dept for getting a Speeding Ticket while on the clock. Also anyone who has a CDL Licenses can lose their licenses by going 15 mph above the speed limit and if that were to happen to me I would lose my job and income.

It may look easy to drive a Bus or a Large truck but you need to know what the routes are depending on the resort or park your are going to and you will need to know what the speed limit is, like when it drops from 50 mph to 35 mph because if you are a speeding whether you’re a Disney Bus Driver in a Disney Bus or in your own car, you will get ticketed from the fine Officers of the Orange County Sherriff department.

 

[dsneygirl]

Just got back on Saturday and have a theory about the bus transportation:
They take the longest routes possible to make it seem like Disney World is really big.

I'm sorry to say this but you can get anywhere on property within 15 minutes, so why on earth does it take up to 45 minutes to get somewhere? ....Because of my theory....

I have to say the busses ran on time but I experienced drivers taking the longest routes possible to get somewhere. One bus driver went 35 mph in a 50mph going to Epcot. I thought we were going to get killed by going so slow.

Also, I stayed at WL which shared alot of busses with Fort Wilderness. There is a road right before the bus drop off in WL leads to Fort Wilderness. One driver took this route and we were there in about 4 minutes or so. The rest of the drivers went the longest route possible which took about 10 extra minutes.

Why oh why do the drivers want to spend more time driving us around instead of getting to the parks through the most direct way?

Another minor pet peeve...why does the WL bus share with the grand floridian when we go to DTD? It takes forever to go over there and pick them up. Why are they not paired w/ the Poly people?

We also just got back from a week long stay at VWL and our group (10 of us) all commented that we had great bus service all week long. I don't think we ever experienced a ride that seemed to take longer than it should. Interesting how perception can be different.

 

[Boston5602]

I'm always grateful for most all of the WDW bus drivers. I will not drive on vacation if I can help it. I'm on vacation to enjoy Disney , but also relax and while taking the bus, if the system is having a bad day then I sit and relax waiting for the bus and then get on the bus and relax until my kind bus driver gets me to where I want to be ( I never need to be anywhere on vacation , if I can help that too ) all the while I am relaxed. I don't get to relax at work!


p.s. ( most of the time ) <G>

 

[Fabooliss]

I agree. I noticed on our recent trip that coming back from the MK we took a totally different route to get back to Pop Century that I don't ever remember taking before.

Also, one night I had ressies at JIKO and alloted an hour and a half to get to the AKL. I took the bus to Downtown Disney and waited for the AKL bus and it took me two hours to get there. I was furious.

I have decided that from now on, we will rent a car.

Why did you take the bus to Downtown Disney from POP if you were going to AKL? It is in the opposite direction.

I'm not trying to be rude, I'm actually trying to figure this all out myself right now. (We'll be doing POP to AKL too).

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Me too! I hate waiting and then having to stand holding on for dear life. With a rental car, you just jump in, turn on the radio & AC and go. Plus you always get a seat!

So true and it's even more fun if you get a convertible!

 

[spiceycat]

Fine - tell Disney to do away with the controllers and go back to the days of the bus driver deciding their route. not being told how to do it.

there are too many controls on the way the bus driver MUST go.

plus there are a BUNCH of new drivers - that don't know where they are - take the wrong turn and sometimes end up in Kissimmee not WDW because they KNEW where they were going.

this is a short cut.

to the WDW drivers - one guy say training is only 3 to 4 days - another guy say it was 3 months - which is it? this is including getting the C-license.

 

[ztbz]

to the WDW drivers - one guy say training is only 3 to 4 days - another guy say it was 3 months - which is it? this is including getting the C-license.

The amount training one received would depend upon how long a driver has been with Disney. For me I started with Disney in the 1980's (there are still a few of us Bus Drivers who remember having color-coded flags on the buses. Disney did away with the flags because they wanted to manipulate the bus operation to save money and having flags on buses would have prevented them from being able to cut back on service the way they do now days). When I was trained the new bus drivers were started out on what was consider the easy short routes. We had about two weeks of training just for the short routes like TTC to Ploy and Golf Resorts, Contemporary resort route and the Ft Wilderness route. Once a driver master these short routes usually after a couple months, then another two weeks of training was done for Epcot and the LBV routes (LBV = Lake Buena Vista). So after about 3 months a driver was fully trained and knew all of the Walt Disney World property. (Training for Disney/Mgm and Animal Kingdom came later; I pretty much learned those routes by myself with very little training).

Now days a new driver coming in has to do DOT training first (about 1 week or 5 days) which would include learning how to drive a bus for the first time. Many times new drivers have never driven anything longer than their cars. For example a car can make a right-turn pretty much without having to cross into two lanes, However a Bus in order to make a right turn has to go into two lanes in order for the back end of the bus to clear curbs, poles, rocks and other objects.

Once DOT Trainng has been completed then its time for Route Training. Each driver has about 1 to 2 days for each hub (one day for Day time driving and one day for Night driving which is where most new drivers start out at). Total route training time is about two weeks plus the one-week of DOT Training which equals about 3 weeks before new drivers are turn loose on you guest. Many drivers will quit once they get their Class-B License then they get other jobs with companies that won't pay for training. (What these companies do is to tell a driver to get a Job at Disney, Disney then pays for the CDL/DOT and Route training even pays or reimburses the drivers for the cost of getting the License. Once they have the CDL License they go back to first company for a better job then Disney offers in Pay & Benefits).


By the way Disney has some of the training is done on a computer simulator, think of a Playstation 2 or a PC with a steering wheel next to a monitor with foot/brake pad, I was quite surprise when I saw this when I was at the training office a while back.

 

[2Princes2Princesses]

Why did you take the bus to Downtown Disney from POP if you were going to AKL? It is in the opposite direction.

I'm not trying to be rude, I'm actually trying to figure this all out myself right now. (We'll be doing POP to AKL too).

If AK is open when you are going, take the bus from pop to AK, then from AK to AKL. That would be the quickest way.

If AK is already closed, go to MGM and change buses there.

In case you did not know, there are no direct buses from one resort to another, you must transfer at DTD or a park.

Personally, I am not in that much of a hurry when I am at Disney. My kids love the bus, they sing whatever Disney song is stuck in their heads with me and point out the Mickey signs and the "phony Mickey signs," which are the ones that are purple and teal, but have no Mickey ears. My 3 yr old is convinced there is some crazy criminal posting fake Mickey signs in WDW.

I make my ADR's first thing in the morning or for times when I know we will already have been in the park for a while, so we usually are not rushing to those either.

 

[manning]

In this day of technology why can't the have GPS units in the bus with pre-program routes. All the driver has to do is punch in the route to drive and Friendly little voice will tell them where to turn.

 

[disneykid4ever]

Whenever we visit Mickey I'm just happy to be there, so the bus rides never seem extraordinarily long to me or inconvenient. It's vacation! Just mellow out and enjoy, why stress about the minor things?!

 

[TDC Nala]

Do I start to see a trend here? In the not to distance future, I am seeing more and more people using cars intead of the buses. What will that lead to?

More room on the bus for me.