Checked out early - Parks too crowded.

[mster425]

I have to agree with you. I was there 3/5-3/9. I made a schedule that was so packed that a lot of people called me crazy. I was able to get everything done on my schedule. I got on all of my favorite rides with little to no wait. The longest stand-by line I waited in was 45 minutes, and that was FEA during EMH. To me, WDW that week was like smaller Disneyland crowds.

Yep, we were in the parks 3/6-3/11 (flew home 3/12) and while the individual wait times were long, the park did not feel as crowded as it has on my May trips. Seems like we lucked out last week. Sorry OP

 

[GeorgiaHoo]

Believe it or not people do. People post frequently about ideas for a stay at Disney with no park tickets. Not something I'd do but people do. But even then, I'm not going to pay a fee to change my flights just because the parks are too crowded. We don't swim but we'd find something fun to do

Oh yeah, not saying they don't. And you make a great point about the fees -- if you are only saving the money associated with one night at a resort then you are going to pay much more in flight change fees if you are flying.

 

[mom2rtk]

This same thought entered my mind. I wonder if they were unprepared based on the drop in crowds recently

MM+ was all about big data.

They knew what to expect.

 

[bryanb]

So true.... when you don't get to go to Disney Parks as often, it's reasonable that you've got to make every visit count.

Regarding park capacity limits, Disney really doesn't like to close the gates. First, it means you already have a horrible consumer experience. People have come all the way to central Florida from around the world, and you have a huge nightmare telling them that they can't enter. So Disney has been hyper-focused on smoothing out demand. Also, closing the gates affects profits, but the real answer is to never allow attendance to reach that point. Just like in hotel industry, studies have shown that maximum occupancy does not equal maximum profits. There is some optimum point lower than 100% where you maximize revenue. Most guests are buying multi-day tickets, and the added revenue for each additional day needs to come from food, souvenirs, and other purchases... not just ticket prices. This is not an easy puzzle to solve, because not everyone can visit at another time of year, and variable price increases can't happen more steeply than they've already been increasing.

About staffing, this is a lot harder than most people realize. It's not that easy to manage staffing when there are huge swings in attendance. Spring Break is the hardest time of year for staffing, because not every CM is out of school at the same time. And full-time CMs, even imports on the College Program, want a semi-predictable number of hours. Even if you know you need more people in certain weeks of the year, you sometimes just can't expand and contract that flexibly.

 

[Sweettears]

Really? We were there 3/4-3/12, so essentially same time as you, and it didn't seem overly crowded to us. Busy, yes, but not awful, some experiences at DAK on 3/5 and 3/11 aside. Wonder what the difference was? We specifically picked that week to beat the spring break crowds and avoid the mardi gras/marathon crowds, and in our eyes it worked.

I was there during the same period. I agree with your assessment and I chose that week for the same reason. I overheard enough discussion to determine that spring break for some college students had begun. I would agree that it wasn't necessarily crowded but it was more crowded than I expected. 60 minute waits for SSE and LwtL on one day. However the 7th at AK waits were less than 30-20 minutes.

 

[Farro]

I now feel better about my 10/25-11/3 choice! After most of fall break and before the marathon. Sure it will be busy, but not like this!

 

[mshanson3121]

Yesterday we checked out of Bay Lake Towers and left Walt Disney World a day early. The hotel was great but my family of four could no longer take the crowds in the Parks.

I get that it is Spring Break, we have Florida Resident Annual Passes, but having school-age kids means we can only visit during vacations and weekends (we only take our kids out of school for Emergencies). We do plan hotel, dinner and FastPass reservations months in advance; so please do not judge.

On Wednesday evening March 15, Space Mountain had a Stand By time of 215 Minutes before it broke down just after the 9PM Fireworks. Sorry, but 30 minutes is my limit for any ride; I wanted to come back in Fall to try Pandora but now we are not going to bother and let our Passes lapse in November.

Can anybody comment on having a similar experience wanting to check out early?

For this reason? No way. We considered cutting our trip a day short because my leg was really hurting me (we stayed the full time, but did have to leave AK earlier than planned on our last day because of my leg), and the kids were starting to get a bit homesick (they had never been away from home so long before). I'm with the others - we would have done other rides, taken a break and come back, gone to a different park etc... But then again, we also traveled in summer leading up to July 4th, with crowd levels of 8/9... so.... pretty much what you experienced. I knew what it would be and accepted it for what it was and planned accordingly.

 

[DISNEY1975]

This seems to be the norm for Disney. They keep building and building! Even extra magic hours for resorts guests only arent a great thing anymore. With so many resorts now, there are thousands and thousands in that ONE park for an extra hour!

My last trip in 2015, we went in September. Supposed to be the slowest time of the year. We were elbow to elbow in the MK. The only time I noticed anything reasonable was late at night in the parks. I fear for my vacation next week! I am somewhat "forced" to go in March because my nieces will be dancing in a show and parade. I bought the water parks and more feature in case the 4 major parks are too crowded.

Are the waterparks just as busy this time of year?

 

[AngiTN]

This seems to be the norm for Disney. They keep building and building! Even extra magic hours for resorts guests only arent a great thing anymore. With so many resorts now, there are thousands and thousands in that ONE park for an extra hour!

My last trip in 2015, we went in September. Supposed to be the slowest time of the year. We were elbow to elbow in the MK. The only time I noticed anything reasonable was late at night in the parks. I fear for my vacation next week! I am somewhat "forced" to go in March because my nieces will be dancing in a show and parade. I bought the water parks and more feature in case the 4 major parks are too crowded.

Are the waterparks just as busy this time of year?

Not really but they are unpredictable. As others have mentioned, this past week turned really cold. The Water Parks both closed for a couple of days and the others it was open were not all that pleasant to be wet. Especially if it's not sunny

 

[AngiTN]

MM+ was all about big data.

They knew what to expect.

How? What tells them about off site guests?

 

[DISNEY1975]

Not really but they are unpredictable. As others have mentioned, this past week turned really cold. The Water Parks both closed for a couple of days and the others it was open were not all that pleasant to be wet. Especially if it's not sunny

Thanks! Ive been checking the weather, seems like it will warm up very soon. Im just crossing my fingers the time I will be there wont be as bad as this week has been since this week a lot of FL schools are on vacation. But I know it will be a lot worse than what I am used to. Like I said, I got the waterpark tickets and also chose Yacht Club this time in case we have a lot of pool time! Worst case scenario, we sit by the pool, relax and have cocktails all day

 

[mom2rtk]

How? What tells them about off site guests?

30 day FP+ reservations.

Years of data collected on offsite guests as a percentage of total expected attendance compared with onsite bookings.

Yes, I know plenty of people show up and buy same day tickets. Disney knows that too. They have years of data on it.

 

[erc]

9's this week according to easywdw.

 

[mbrown2097]

I'm curious as to how Touring Plans, EasyWDW etc create their forecasts. At least 4 weeks ago, there were no resort rooms available for our stay (at all.) I knew at that point that it was going to be crowded. Kept looking at the crowd calendars and they were saying 6,7,8 (Depending on the day). How did the crowd calendars miss it as much as they did?

 

[Zippa D Doodah]

I've never felt like cutting a vacation short at WDW. As others have said, there always seems to be something I want to do

 

[Zippa D Doodah]

I'm curious as to how Touring Plans, EasyWDW etc create their forecasts. At least 4 weeks ago, there were no resort rooms available for our stay (at all.) I knew at that point that it was going to be crowded. Kept looking at the crowd calendars and they were saying 6,7,8 (Depending on the day). How did the crowd calendars miss it as much as they did?

Honestly, I don't mean to denigrate any of the forecasters because they are committed to their data and I assume operate out of a genuine affection for WDW. It's all a "best guess". Processes can be adapted and tweaked, but when it comes down to it your instinct about park crowds is going to be as reliable as any of the forecasts out there. Forecasts make people feel better, but it should surprise no one when the occasional 6 becomes a 9 or whatever.

 

[erc]

Processes can be adapted and tweaked, but when it comes down to it your instinct about park crowds is going to be as reliable as any of the forecasts out there. Forecasts make people feel better, but it should surprise no one when the occasional 6 becomes a 9 or whatever.

I would be willing to bet that if they had access to the data that WDW has, they could very accurately predict crowds. In fact I would be willing to bet that Disney can predict to within + or - a thousand guests exactly how many will come through the turnstiles in each park almost a month in advance.

 

[ArwenMarie]

If I was saving a significant amount of money or work vacation time by leaving early, I might definitely leave early...no sense dropping an extra $400/night on a villa if all I was gonna do was swim and then buy another meal out and I was already sick of all that...

Now, I've never left a full vacation early, but I have cut my losses in other areas of my life when they were obvious disasters and just ate the costs (I remember leaving a live theater event performance at intermission b/c I couldn't imagine sitting through another 90 minutes of it)...so, I could even see leaving it and being out the costs if all I was dealing with was whiny, cranky family who just wanted to go home...

That was exactly why we left that time, cutting our losses. Two more nights of the villa, eating out, etc wasn't worth it the money. United took pity and let us fly standby on a 6 am flight without change fees.

 

[adisneyaunt]

Ugh, sorry OP.. sounds like it was just Overwhelmingly too busy for ur family.

I recall we were at Disney over Xmas a few years back. It was a splurge trip, Poly CL.. we never even went to MK as the particular day we chose to go the crowds were Crazy large and there was talk of the park reaching capacity.
We enjoyed the resort instead.

And despite my love for Disney, that trip was different for us and knew I would not return during certain time periods.
I think that the downtown at Disney is essentially gone, which def saddens me.
I'm headed there last week march into April and if I'm getting the picture it ll be crazy ... I'll prob wait till early may?? Who knows... it's crazy for all the planning that has to be done.
Which gets me thinking about that "value" thread again.

Hope enjoyed some of ur trip!

 

[DOOM1001]

There is literally SO MUCH to do outside of the MK. There is no way I would cut my vacation short.

I just spent a full day at the theme parks and literally did not ride one ride,and when I say the theme parks I mean the theme parks as I visited Universal,Sea World and Epcot.Okay so I live very close to Disney Springs and wanted to go see Beauty and the Beast but at the AMC Disney Springs with the big lounger seating there was no good seats available so I chose to drive over to Universal to go catch the 11:45am show,great movie by the way.I will say I was glad I was not going to the theme parks as the amount of people walking into City walk was scary.

After the movie I drove over to Sea World to eat using my pass holder dining plan and to get my AP card swiped as they're giving a free Seven Sea Food and Wine festival mason jar on your third visit to the festival.

After Sea World drove over to Epcot and caught the 5:30 and 6:45 Simple plan concerts,left right after as I knew it was pointless to try to ride anything,the crowds were intense at all three parks.Still had a great time,sometimes you know the crowds are not going to be easy so you have to figure out a plan around them. Sea World for example is a great park to go when crowds are crazy,finding a seat for the shows is guaranteed unless you show up right at the shows start time and for the bigger kids and adults the waits on the coasters are not awful even during peak periods like today.