DME Lines on 8/26 REPORT

[raven69david]

So we get to MCO, grab our luggage and head towards Alamo to get our minivan rental. We pass by the DME counter and it is PACKED! I'm sure the line was no less than half an hour (VERY conservative estimate) wait. There were tons of people and the line spilled out past the waiting line which was at least 8 rows deep.

At that point i decided i would NEVER use DME under ANY circumstances. The line was terrible. Hopefully the issues will be ironed out in the future. As for my family, we always get a rental car cuz we need to make store runs for the kids and to explore the surrounding area. Plus it's alot easier with a rental car going to/from the parks at our convenience. Park admission is free with a resort stay.

Anyway, just wanted to share my DME experience. Anyone else ever see the DME line NOT packed/swamped?

 

[Lewisc]

I don't want sound rude but your report is worthless. You saw a line but you don't haven't the slightest idea how long any of the passengers waited to check in, how long they had to wait for a bus or how many stops until the guest got to their resort. Checkin in at the DME desk takes less than a minute and only one person from the family has to check in although I suspect most of the family waits on line. Did you ask any of the guests how long they were waiting on line?

In October DME will be moving to the other side of the airport and will have more room.

Both times I took DME my check in took minutes. Last December I arrived at CSR less than an hour after I landed.

Resort guests don't have to pay to park at the theme parks but they certainly have to pay admission.

So we get to MCO, grab our luggage and head towards Alamo to get our minivan rental. We pass by the DME counter and it is PACKED! I'm sure the line was no less than half an hour (VERY conservative estimate) wait. There were tons of people and the line spilled out past the waiting line which was at least 8 rows deep.

At that point i decided i would NEVER use DME under ANY circumstances. The line was terrible. Hopefully the issues will be ironed out in the future. As for my family, we always get a rental car cuz we need to make store runs for the kids and to explore the surrounding area. Plus it's alot easier with a rental car going to/from the parks at our convenience. Park admission is free with a resort stay.

Anyway, just wanted to share my DME experience. Anyone else ever see the DME line NOT packed/swamped?

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

Anyway, just wanted to share my DME experience. Anyone else ever see the DME line NOT packed/swamped?

I've used DME twice.

The first time, it was fairly late in the evening. There were only a few people in line. There were several people working. The line took less than five minutes.

The second time, it was mid-afternoon. There was a huge line. It snaked back and forth numerous times. I looked at the line and thought, "Oh, no! This will take a long time!" But there were people working shoulder to shoulder at the counter. The line moved quickly — especially because many of the people in line were with somebody else in line, so they weren't really waiting to be helped. The line again took less than five minutes.

 

[Edd]

Lewis,

If Raven69's report is worthless because she didn't get in the line and experience it, does that mean the reports by Carol and the lady from Clermont of the security lines being so long and people experiencing so much waiting are worthless, also. They are the ones who have the Clear pass and don't go through the security lines.

During the day when Disney is humming, those lines are long and they do get long. There are not to many days when I walk through there and see it not busy, Today was one where it was half full. There were still lines. I saw about 8 or 10 receptionists working with the passengers. Disney can only load 16 to 20 busses an hour, at its peak, in those spots. 20 busses equal approximately 1000 passengers. Figure out the math. Someone is going to do some waiting, during peak times, no matter what you guys report on the boards.

P.S. December is a slow month for Disney. Also have some news on the security lines when I get it sorted out. Talked with the ground transportation chairman and the asst. Airport Director this afternoon.

 

[helenk]

Each time I have used DME the lines looked daunting, but my wait time was only about 15 minutes, sometimes less.
Do not let the lines fool you, even though the CMs tell people that only one person per family should wait in line, alot of people do not listen to this so it looks worse than it is. Also there are alot of CMs working the counter, all they do is check you in verify your return date and time and send you on your way.

 

[CleveRocks]

It's funny, I just posted about this on another thread.

When I first saw the DME Welcome Center line, I was at once intimidated and filled with dread. The line filled the serpentine rope lines and spilled out way past the end. Know how long that line took me?
FIVE MINUTES. FIVE. Five minutes from getting in the line to walking away from the counter and walking towards my bus queue. I actually timed it because I wanted to report back to another message board, as this was on May 8, 2005, the 4th day DME was in business, and I was the first from that board to use it.

There were 14 CMs and 2 or 3 managers serving guests that day. It was a Sunday morning, Mothers Day. Crowded day at he airport. REPEAT: That hellishly long line took me 5 minutes until I was on to the next thing.

I saw that huge line and thought I made a big mistake using DME. My only big mistake was pre-judging that such a long line spelled trouble.

 

[jcemom]

We've used DME three times. Two of the three times the line was LONG, one time there were only a handful of people waiting. All three times took only about five minutes each.

 

[fivefordisney]

Interestingly, the line doesn't always determine your wait. Once we had hardly anyone in front of us in line BUT we ended up waiting on the bus for 20-30 minutes before we left. Another time, we were in a long line that moved quickly and the bus left shortly after we boarded.

The length of the line has little impact on how long you'll wait...

 

[teamagic]

I agree with the other posters. Although the line looks like it is going to take a long time, the line moves very quickly. From the time we landed until we arrived at our resort it was 65 minutes. The line to check into the resort was alot shorter than the DME. However, resort check in took a very long time. I stood there thinking that DME was much longer, yet much quicker.

 

[CleveRocks]

Disney can only load 16 to 20 busses an hour, at its peak, in those spots. 20 busses equal approximately 1000 passengers. Figure out the math. Someone is going to do some waiting, during peak times, no matter what you guys report on the boards.

Okay, I just did the math. Seems to work out pretty favorably (but then again, I went to public school, so others people's results may vary ).

DME serves how many people a day, on average, 7,500? 5,000? Let's say it's 10,000, even though we know it's less. Let's say 10,000 just to do Edd's math.

I know nothing about the tides and flows at MCO like Edd does, but I'll assume that "peak times" encompasses less than 10 hours a day. But for sake of getting this math done, let's say there are 10 peak hours per day. If during each of those 10 peak hours, DME puts 1,000 on buses as Edd says they can, then there's the 10,000 passengers a day even if they SHUT DOWN the counter during the remaining hours of the day.

From the math Edd suggested we do, it seems DME can handle the workload.

 

[CleveRocks]

I agree with the other posters. Although the line looks like it is going to take a long time, the line moves very quickly. From the time we landed until we arrived at our resort it was 65 minutes. The line to check into the resort was alot shorter than the DME. However, resort check in took a very long time. I stood there thinking that DME was much longer, yet much quicker.

Same here. I was the first from my DME bus to get inside CBR's Custom House and get into the line at the front desk. There was a decent size line, but nothing that gave me cause for concern. I was wrong. THAT line took 30 MINUTES. THAT annoyed me.

 

[raven69david]

I don't want sound rude but your report is worthless.

You did sound rude and it's NOT worthless. The line was brutal. NOBODY in that line got out of there in 5 minutes. My Alamo line was half as packed, but they got me out in 10 minutes. The family on my flight that jumped in line while i was on my way to the Alamo counter was NOWHERE close to the front of the line by the time i LEFT the Alamo line.

My report is about the lines at the DME counter. It's brutally obvious i didn't use DME so i didn't comment on check-in or anything else of that nature.

Regardless of how important you think you are or how important you think your post count makes you, don't bash someone else in their thread and try to be a smartass. I posted my experience and that's what this forum is about. Sharing our knowledge of our trips.

I'm glad the others that used this service went through the line quickly. It's good to know that there are varying wait times when using DME at a certain part of the day. I'm sure towards the evening it gets better, but at 2:30 or so when we got there, the line was very long.

 

[Edd]

Peak hours at MCO are between 1200 and 2000. You are right 8 hours. However the biggest daily counts came 6/3, 6/4, 6/10,6/11, 6/17, 6/18, 6/24, 6/25 when the counts were over 7000. DME boarded 180,695 passengers in June.

What wasn't taken into account was the fact that maybe busses were not available to chalk up 20 loaded in one hour or maybe the crowds were to big to get them all loaded in 15 minutes. One of these days, when Disney moves to the B side, I think I will go over and time the busses.

Lewis, I personally thought that shot stunk. You never questioned the two women with Clear, on their observations.

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

My report is about the lines at the DME counter. It's brutally obvious i didn't use DME so i didn't comment on check-in or anything else of that nature.

However, you did say that the line was no less than half an hour — while others who have actually waited in long DME lines have explained that the line moves quickly because DME check-in is quick, the counter is well staffed, and the majority of the people in line are just with someone else who is checking in.

I'm not saying that everyone should use Magical Express, even though I've been happy with it. A rental car is a better choice for some. A livery service is a better choice for others.

People should make informed choices. That means people shouldn't make their choices on the basis of misinformation.

If waits of a half hour or more at the DME counter were common, there would be all sort of complaints on this board. But there really haven't been.

 

[Edd]

Growth in the airport is huge. In the future there will be continued growth with the New Birnum project, don't get on me if I spelled it wrong, coming in. A large acreage south and east of 417 south of the airport will be housing the new UCF Medical college, a VA hospital and the Birnum research labratories. The site was picked as it is close to the airport. This will spurt the airport growth tremendously.

DME fits into the overall plan for transportation out of the airport. Within five years the airport will be host to over 35 million passengers each year and we are planning for it now. DME will move to the B side with larger space to work in.

The airport has now had a new plan settled in that promises to eliminate the lines that are formed on the third floor. Like Disney the lines at peak times have been tremendously heavy and long. They have moved fast contrary to what many think. Not many passengers have complained about missing their departure time.

When you go through the lines you will notice to different color shirts. White for the TSA and now blue for what the airport is calling, customer service representatives. The CSR as they are called are now assistants, so to speak, to the TSA employees. Due to the high volume of baggage the Federal boys were unable to handle the work load. This resulted in the long lines and painful attitudes of some people. The CSR's have been hired by Orlando International Airport to the tune of an extra 2 million per year. They work all shifts and are literally bag pickers. They pull the goods out of the bag for the TSA to look at it. They also do the lifting and all the work that took a TSA employee away from his actual job of inspecting. The TSA employee now literally inspects while the CSR gets everything ready for the TSA. I do not know how they exactly work together, but because of this there have been no lines in the past few months at OIA. I have watched lines for about 7 hours these past three days and they farthest out in the hall I have noticed was about twenty feet and that line disappeared fast.

Within the next year all the inspection equipment will be going out of sight and the 3rd level will again be clear for the traffic coming in. The airport will become much more roomier, a condition that has not existed since before 9/11. The airport report that dropped Orlando in the rankings was an eye opener, but already there have been many improvements that will get it into the top ranking it normally enjoys.

 

[Aisling]

People should make informed choices. That means people shouldn't make their choices on the basis of misinformation.

So the OP didn't see a DME line that was 8 rows deep?

Anyway, just wanted to share my DME experience. Anyone else ever see the DME line NOT packed/swamped?

I've used DME 3 times, and twice it was empty, and once we had maybe 5 people in line ahead of us. I never saw it packed before.

Thanks for sharing your experience. Your post wasn't worthless to me.

Lewis, I personally thought that shot stunk. You never questioned the two women with Clear, on their observations.

Are you surprised?

 

[kaytieeldr]

You did sound rude and it's NOT worthless. The line was brutal. NOBODY in that line got out of there in 5 minutes. My Alamo line was half as packed, but they got me out in 10 minutes. The family on my flight that jumped in line while i was on my way to the Alamo counter was NOWHERE close to the front of the line by the time i LEFT the Alamo line.

Now, see, THAT would have been a relevant, pertinent and reasonable post. You didn't simply view a line and make a judgment, you actually had someone else's experience to compare yours to. FTR, either the family (despite, as stated above, that only one person from a party needs to get in line; if an entire family does, that artificially inflates the line) that jumped in the DME line as you were walking to the Alamo line (I thought Alamo was in the middle of the ground level of the) terminal while DME was at a far end?) stopped to grab their luggage from the carousel - likely delaying their arrival IN the DME line by an average of twenty minutes, or delayed getting to the line for some other reason; or you didn't have any checked luggage for which you had to wait. Otherwise, you and they would not have arrived on the ground level at approximately the same time.

What wasn't taken into account was the fact that maybe busses were not available to chalk up 20 loaded in one hour or maybe the crowds were to big to get them all loaded in 15 minutes

Well, those two "Clear"ed passengers have experienced the regular security line at MCO so have a basis for comparison; the OP here merely observed a line and made a judgment.

 

[Edd]

Great picture of Steve. I am still stunned and saddened by his death. He is an Icon in my world.

 

[Aisling]

the OP here merely observed a line and made a judgment.

Exactly. That's what people do. They observe, they make a judgement, they post it and report it.

Following your line of reasoning, half the threads on this board are worthless.

By the way, the poster who used that word merely read a post and made a jugement.
He'she should have said the post was worthless "to me." Don't make a judgement for us all.

(Actually, you can do/post anything you want. I'm usually strong enough to bypass the silliness of some of these flaming back-and-forths. Geez I've fallen into the petty junior high school zone.)

Well, those two "Clear"ed passengers have experienced the regular security line at MCO so have a basis for comparison; the OP here merely observed a line and made a judgment.

By the way, the OP wasn't making a comparison. It was a report on DME lines on a specific date at a specific time. Who wants to be a lawyer?? Me!!!!

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

FTR, either the family (despite, as stated above, that only one person from a party needs to get in line; if an entire family does, that artificially inflates the line) that jumped in the DME line as you were walking to the Alamo line (I thought Alamo was in the middle of the ground level of the) terminal while DME was at a far end?) stopped to grab their luggage from the carousel - likely delaying their arrival IN the DME line by an average of twenty minutes, or delayed getting to the line for some other reason; or you didn't have any checked luggage for which you had to wait. Otherwise, you and they would not have arrived on the ground level at approximately the same time.

Good point about baggage claim.

I've waited at baggage claim at Orlando International (many times) and I've waited at the DME counter (twice). The wait for my bags has been much longer than the wait to check in for DME.

Imagine two families on the same flight sitting on opposite sides of the aisle. One goes to baggage claim prior to going to their car rental company. The other goes directly to Magical Express, because they used the yellow tags. The family that went to baggage claim will probably still be waiting for their bags to appear on the conveyor when the other family has successfully checked in for Magical Express. (It takes time for the baggage handlers to unload an entire airplane, transport the bags to baggage claim, and unload the bags onto the conveyor; it takes even longer then the baggage handlers get backed up or there are thunderstorms.)

I'm not trying to talk people out of renting a car. The justification for rental cars should be that some people like to drive every day and want an easy way to go off-site for dining, shopping, and entertainment — not the fiction that there are half-hour-plus waits in line at the DME Welcome Center.