Do people wait in lines anymore?

[ericf70]

We're one of the families that don't wait in crazy long lines either. 30min is the absolute max we are going to wait for an attraction but mostly its 20min. We have no problems doing everything we want to do. Rope drop is key. We used to be able to do a lot more before FP+

 

[LOL!]

I truly believe that as WDW accumulates more data thru the magic of MM+ and FP the days of walk-ons and very short wait times will be history. Rope drop and other historic advantages will no longer be as advantageous. Why? Because a walk-on attraction is a waste of resources for Disney. And smart businesses don't waste resources. So if they have determined that a 20 minute wait is acceptable to 90% of the guests for, say, It's a Small World, why spend more money and open additional queues or other attractions at that particular time to bring the wait down to 5 minutes? Their optimization goal for that attraction will be 20 minutes, not 5.

That's why I think that less-crowded periods will no longer equate to zero or low wait times for attractions. For guests, standby will become an even greater stochastic element while for Disney it will become more predictable. While I'm sure all of us would love to walk onto every one of our favorite attractions, the reality is that most of us are probably fine with a 10-20 minute wait.

 

[GaryDis]

The question is,

Why would you want to wait in line if Disney is offering you a way not too.

If you enjoy waiting, go for it. If you think it adds to your Disney experience, by all means do it. Everyone does Disney differently. Do what you want to do.

I don't think that's what people are saying.

What they're saying is that just because you couldn't get the FP+ that you wanted, don't rule out the standby line option. Or, if you find yourself with an hour to kill, don't rule out spending that hour in line solely because there was a theoretical possibility that you could have gotten a FastPass but chose not to. Finally, there are things you can do to make that hour in line more enjoyable.

The "no lines more than 20 minutes" rule is a good rule for helping to optimize your schedule. But when it becomes "we couldn't see attraction XYZ at all because the line was an hour", the rule deserves some balance.

 

[MischaOz]

I don't think that is necessarily true. After all, someone who is waiting in line isn't spending money on food or in the shops...

 

[gorkt]

My tolerance for lines is minimal and always has been. My husband is worse than I am. Yet we both like WDW. We just tour off season, FP the "must-do" rides and do rope drops and late evenings for the rest. We used FP+ during testing in late 2013 and it worked really well for us. I am not sure if we would have FP more than 3 rides, although since lines are now longer for stuff like HM and POTC, which are my 2 faves, I can imagine using the extra FPs for those.

 

[5kidsmommy]

I don't think that's what people are saying.

What they're saying is that just because you couldn't get the FP+ that you wanted, don't rule out the standby line option. Or, if you find yourself with an hour to kill, don't rule out spending that hour in line solely because there was a theoretical possibility that you could have gotten a FastPass but chose not to. Finally, there are things you can do to make that hour in line more enjoyable.

The "no lines more than 20 minutes" rule is a good rule for helping to optimize your schedule. But when it becomes "we couldn't see attraction XYZ at all because the line was an hour", the rule deserves some balance.

Thank you! This is exactly what I was saying. I just think a lot of people seem to think if they can't get a fast pass that means they can't ride the ride and that is really absurd.

 

[itchin2go]

Thank you! This is exactly what I was saying. I just think a lot of people seem to think if they can't get a fast pass that means they can't ride the ride and that is really absurd.

I don't think most people or even many people think this. But Plan A for popular and coveted rides is FP+ now. People are understandably disappointed when they can't get them. That's a different thing than thinking no FP+ = no ride.

And if some people do think this ... you know, this is a complicated new system. If people aren't 100% up to speed, I'm not willing to lay that solely at their feet. Give 'em a minute to figure it out. I think people who are trying to figure this out need assistance, not ridicule.

 

[Roxyfire]

I would say for me, a wait time of one hour at a park like six flags is the absolute maximum. I read somewhere that my local one will be updating wait times on their app which would prove very useful for me. I applied some of the strategies I read here and found a great amount of success. Why wait in line if you don't have to? I feel like if I use the resources (like Touring Plans which looks phenomenal) I can do a pretty good job of getting a lot out of the day at the parks. But there's only 2 of us so it will be a lot easier to plan fast passes. Oh and no A&E so that helps tremendously. I'm hoping by next year the new frozen stuff in Epcot will be up and running and some of that pressure will come off soarin and test track but who knows.

 

[ttintagel]

I just wanted to add that I used the same policy of choosing not to wait longer that 30 minutes BEFORE there were no Fastpasses of ANY kind, way back in the 1980's when dinosaurs roamed the Earth and people called each other from phone booths. It worked just as well back then.

 

[momimouse27]

Same here, 30 minutes is my threshold, and always has been. I just don't think it's worth it most of the time to wait longer. I know that I can take heat more than lines, definitely not both if it can be helped, so I plan accordingly. I'll avoid the lines, that's my #1. September is great, I know its not as uncrowded as when my kids were small-back then you could go to Epcot or MK midweek and in some of my photos of them there isn't another soul to be seen!

But still, lower times are preferable even if they aren't what they used to be. If given the choice between super busy and not at all, i'll go anyway. Maybe with the exception of Christmas week. Because its WDW, what can i say??

 

[MrInfinity]

Yep, Cedar Point is our local park. And yes 1-2 hours is a normal time. I guess that's why Disney seems so relaxed when lines are only 45 minutes.

Yep. The theme park norm is over an hour for a headliner, half-hour for a mid-ride, and 10 min for a kiddie ride. We learned this when we were teens. It just doesn't bother me. You go to a theme park, you expect lines.

We just got back from Cedar Point! The lines during the day were crazy... and not themed, and barely covered. Nothing like WDW. But, they're still full all day long, w the popular rides well over an hour. We didn't wait in too many tho, cuz we'd do a couple hours at open and close, and that's about it. I bet we got in more during those two blocks than most guests did during the entire rest of the day. Most guests don't think that way tho. They just go. For one, this is largely a teenager park, and teens are just wanting to ride ride ride, all day long. So they get there in the morning and stay thru the day. Can't say I would ever go to a park for 2 hours as a teenager and then leave. You just don't do that... you go w your friends, you go for the day. So the lines can be beat if you want to, but most families just do not tour that way. Nor are they trying to optimize wait times, or even trying to get on a set number of things. They're on vacation. Go to Disney World, pick a ride, have fun! Nothing wrong w that. Some folks talk about them like they're foolish for touring this way.

 

[LilyWDW]

I don't get it. I didn't wait in any more, or longer, lines on my last trip with FP+ then I did with the old Fastpass system. Yet I got just as much done on my last trip. Same time of the year and not a "dead" time at all (though also not peak). I also refuse to wait more then 30 minutes and often won't wait more then 20.

 

[Julylady]

When I was a senior in high school, our senior day trip was a 6hour ride to Cedar Point in Ohio. We arrived about noon and left for home about 6pm. I only went on 4 rides all day as we had to wait in long lines for every ride. I would not choose to repeat that trip today.

We always get to Magic Kingdom for rope drop. We knock out 3-4 "big" rides in the first 90 minutes with minimal waits. We then have our 3 fast passes scheduled for either late morning or late afternoon. We typically either take an afternoon break, or leave the park by 3pm for the day. We are a one and done family, that is, we rarely repeat rides on the same trip....and never on the same day. I have a tentative list of attractions we want to experience each day. If we get to one and the line is more than 20 minutes, we just pass it by and do something else. We are pretty efficient and don't criss cross the parks. We experience about 10-11 attractions per day using our method, a mix of headliners and rides with minimal waits. And we are normally in the parks between 7-8 hours per visit.

 

[Xennia]

I don't think that's what people are saying.

What they're saying is that just because you couldn't get the FP+ that you wanted, don't rule out the standby line option. Or, if you find yourself with an hour to kill, don't rule out spending that hour in line solely because there was a theoretical possibility that you could have gotten a FastPass but chose not to. Finally, there are things you can do to make that hour in line more enjoyable.

The "no lines more than 20 minutes" rule is a good rule for helping to optimize your schedule. But when it becomes "we couldn't see attraction XYZ at all because the line was an hour", the rule deserves some balance.

Of course

 

[quagmire0]

I've been seeing a lot of threads lately talking about how they didn't get this fp or that fp and lamenting the fact because it will make their trip less enjoyable. Granted I've only been once with fp+ and I didn't fully utilize it because that's not how we like to spend our time at Disney, we like to wander and not really follow touring plans of any sort. And when they had the old fastpass we would use it if we were there but would never run for the kiosks.

I guess when I go to an amusement park I assume I will be spending a good amount of time in line along with the other people there. But I'm sensing now that people don't want to wait in line.

And how long are the lines? Granted I do not travel during heavy times. I've been in January, May and September. I never remember huge lines, occasionally we would see a line that was an hour long and we'd pass. Growing up in Southern California I spent many, many days at Disneyland and Space Mountain was usually close to a 2 hour wait and that was pre-electronics, so we just waited and waited and waited. Have lines gotten so horrible or are people just not wanting to wait more than 15 minutes?

We've always followed a certain touring plan and taken advantage of fast passes and child swap. In two trips during the first full week in June each time, the longest line I ever remember waiting in was Toy Story Mania. And that was probably ~45 minutes. I don't recall lines being a huge problem. We sort of take a hybrid approach though. While we do following a touring plan, we also keep our eyes out for wait times. If some attraction catches our eye and has a low wait time, we jump on it. Child swap + Fast Pass was a godsend. This will be our first FP+ experience, so I don't know if it will go as smoothly. But when we could do Child swap and Fast Pass, one of us would go with the older kids on the ride with the Fast Passes, then the other would run back on with them again with the swap.

 

[holden]

20 min is about our max. 25 for a ride we really love and must do. There are too many other things to do than wait in line for a ride.

 

[Summertinkerbell]

I don't think that's what people are saying.

What they're saying is that just because you couldn't get the FP+ that you wanted, don't rule out the standby line option. Or, if you find yourself with an hour to kill, don't rule out spending that hour in line solely because there was a theoretical possibility that you could have gotten a FastPass but chose not to. Finally, there are things you can do to make that hour in line more enjoyable.

The "no lines more than 20 minutes" rule is a good rule for helping to optimize your schedule. But when it becomes "we couldn't see attraction XYZ at all because the line was an hour", the rule deserves some balance.

I can honestly tell you that there is no attraction in all of WDW that would be worth me standing in line for 60 minutes...it will never happen.

 

[Pageantprincess]

I can honestly tell you that there is no attraction in all of WDW that would be worth me standing in line for 60 minutes...it will never happen.

I agree! There is so much to do in Disney World. I don't want to waste one minute standing around.

 

[WIcruizer]

15 minutes is my wait time, I have been willing to go up to 30 minutes every now and then- depending on the ride. FP+ is very easy to use, so why not use it? That's the way I see it anyhow, but we're all different.