@AnneK - I’m sorry that this has been such a struggle for you. I don’t think anyone here is trying to gatekeep. I know that I am not. I’m just trying to be a somewhat rational/impartial voice in an area where clearly there are strong emotions.
Unfortunately, at least in the short run, ride capacity is limited, meaning that only a certain number of people can get on the ride at any one time.
The problem is that there were so many people accessing rides through the Lightning Lanes that it was overwhelming ride capacities, especially for popular rides, such that LL wait times were 20-30 minutes or more. Disney management - and many guests - felt that this was unacceptable.
No one here knows the exact breakdown of what type of users were accessing rides through the LLs, but we do know it was some combination of FastPass/
Genie+, DAS, and a negligible number of VIP tours, Make a Wish guests, etc. We can speculate based on the fact that LL wait times are practically walk-on even with the introduction of Premier Pass AND with Multi-Pass at times selling out that DAS users made up the (vast?) majority of the users pre-change.
So with all of those constraints in mind, Disney HAD to do something to reduce the number of DAS users and their guests in the LLs, because even taking away every other product there would still be “too many” people in the LLs. And unfortunately, the removal of paid options might have incentivized more people to apply for DAS.
There are a couple of ways to accomplish this:
1. Change what conditions qualify for DAS
2. Reduce the size of DAS party
3. Have people enter the standby queue first, and then only enter the LL if they need to
Disney is trying to pull all three levers as a way to not pull too hard on any one.
1. DAS is now primarily meant for those who will
always have trouble in lines, not just
maybe. That’s why they are focused on developmental disabilities primarily but not exclusively.
2. By reducing the maximum party size from 6 to 4 Disney can increase the number of DAS accommodations by 50% without changing the number of people physically in the line.
3. This speaks to the idea of always vs. maybe. Taking bathroom issues, as that seems to be one of the areas that has been most triggering to those who have been denied. Management wants guests to enter the standby queue and exit if needed rather than starting out waiting outside. This is particularly true for larger party sizes where there are people capable of waiting in the standby line.
I don’t want to presume how you would prioritize giving out the *limited* number of spots available before it begins to impact park operations again, but I do think that Disney is trying to approach this in as fair a manner as they can. Looking at the experience at a local amusement park, an aquarium or zoo, or even some of the bigger domestic parks just isn’t comparable at all. I’d also argue that looking at the overseas examples also isn’t comparable, as the overall population of guests with disabilities is dramatically smaller than here in the US. E.g. when we were in Paris I only saw a handful of scooters and only one party ever taking advantage of the DAS-equivalent line access.
They other thing that I think people sometimes lose sight of in the argument of “well this was all just to sell more LLMP/LLPP” is that Disney is not a charity but a business, and it actually makes sense to offer a variety of paid options to allow guests to have the experience that they want to. It may not be worth it to one family to pay $25 for one ride, or $50 for LLMP, or $400 for LLPP but other families may want to make different choices. For all that people are calling Disney greedy, based on how much better LLs are working now I actually think that they could probably sell even more passes at even higher prices if they chose to.
