Continuously moving standby lines

[charmed59]

I’m not all that familiar with Disney World, and have had the worst luck picking rides to get FPs for over rides to ride standby. For instance, I’ve gotten FPs for Soarin twice, and both time the FP wait was around 30 minutes. However, the FP worked great for Navi, the Safari ride, and EE.

As for standby, last time there we got in the line for the Dinosaur ride because the standby sign said 20 minutes, it was 40 minutes before we got to the preshow. You could read everything a thousand times. However, we did the Frozen ride standby the first day open after Irma and the line moved very consistently. There wasn’t a lot of standing still, but it could have been the extremely low crowd day.

When I used to go to Disneyland I know the lines could be long, but they would move. At Disney World I’m looking for lines that continuously move to save for standby, and pick the exceptionally long lines where the fast pass actually helps for FP.

I live somewhat near Orlando, so any visits will be last minute, and I can wait a few years for FOP, so no need to go for the really hard to get rides.

 

[Robo]

You seem to be operating under quite few broad-based misconceptions based, in part, on some usual individual circumstances.

 

[Lesley Wake]

I agree with PP. Some things to consider:

• Fastpass will be faster than standby. Even if you waited a long time in the FP line, you would have waited even longer in the standby line. If you waited 30 minutes for Soarin in FP, I’d expect the standby wait could have been 60-90 minutes.
• Rides with pre-shows will typically have an even longer wait and can involve lots of stopping and starting as they can load in another pre-show group.
• No lines are truly continuously moving anymore; there will always be stops and starts due to ride loading and including the FP guests (even if you have a ride on a continuous track). It would only be continuously moving if there was almost no one in line and the wait was basically the time it took to walk the queue.
• Having good luck with FPS can be just that, luck. I’ve found the longer the standby line, the longer the FP could end up being. Also I’ve found FPS in the morning will usually have an even lower wait, as you will also not have the possible impact of people who have multi-experience FPS due to ride breakdowns during the day. On the same day I’ve had a morning Safari FP which was virtually a continuous walk straight to the merge (then of course there was still a small wait); on the same day I got another FP for the afternoon, it was probably a 15 min wait to the merge point.
• Don’t base anything on the dates around Irma. Those crowds were ridiculously (and awesomely) low, probably the lowest crowds in over a decade.
• At Disneyland, the lines aren’t continuously moving anymore. There are less Fastpass rides so that could have some impact, but the crowds are larger than when you may have gone in the past.