I Thought Disney Parks were busier, but...

[raidermatt]

The problem with that is with the folks who purchased regular APs because those dates were blacked out on the seasonal AP. When you start lifting those dates, those people will feel hornschwagled.

Its similar to the problem with changing hours around, but worse because it hits people in the pocketbook instead of just screwing up their PS's and itineraries.

I'm not saying its the wrong thing to do, but I would hope they are only doing it this way once, as a way of testing whether they want to make the dates permanent going forward.

 

[drdelsol]

If the early school return is a factor they may not have fully anticipated it. In our county this is only the second year of this---I'll hold my opinion

 

[Planogirl]

Originally posted by KNWVIKING
I don't know what the other resorts are doing, but AKL almost always had steep discounts. Guess it just isn't a very popular resort. I wonder what affect DVC sales are starting to have on resort bookings at the deluxes and mods ?

All of the budgets and moderates were very well priced. The rates for the Contemporary, Wilderness Lodge and the Boardwalk were also lower as I recall. The Grand Floridian was there too I think but it's so high even when discounted that I pay little attention to it.

I use Expedia as my monitor. I figure that if Disney releases several discounted rooms to the online travel services that they have a huge number of late vacancies.

 

[rascalmom]

We just returned Sunday from a week at the World. Crowds in the parks seemed heavy to us, even compared to our previous visits during 4th of July week, Memorial Day, etc. Waits were up to 2 hours for the bigger rides and many FastPasses were all issued by mid-day. We saw expanded line corrals for many attractions that we had never seen added before, even when were there for NYE a couple of years ago. HOWEVER, we really decided to wing it this trip & had not pre-arranged any PS's. We were able to get same day seatings every day with pretty much our pick of times. Artist Point, Brown Derby and California Grill all had seatings at prime times & seemed quite empty. Maybe they are trying to boost revenues from locals for food & beverage? With those long lines we were definitely grateful for someplace cool!

 

[patsal]

I don't know what August looks like now-a-days, the last time I went in August was 1992! However, the last two weeks in July were Waaayyy crowded! I have never seen lines like this even during Easter. Even with fastpasses we waited in line at SM for 40 minutes. Peter Pan still had lines of 60 minutes at 9:30 pm and most stand-by lines were well into two hours throughout the vacation. Our children are used to riding things multiple times, but with the crowds July 17-31 we hit most things just once. Fastpasses were gone very early and though we are used to touring in the more crowded times these were crowds that really warranted parks staying open much later.

 

[starboard]

This may be to increase revenue based on the knowledge that 'season pass' guests will steer clear of parks that are already overcrowded? I can imagine a regular visitor probably visits the parks much differently than someone who has only visited once or less seldom?