I was a little surprised.... Touringplans.com personalized plan

[DizBelle]

On our upcoming trip, we have a morning planned at MK. I wanted to hit the Fantasyland attractions (that we wanted to see) from park opening at 9am to about noon. We have fastpasses for another park that day so no fastpasses for MK on this day for us.

MK does not have AM EMH this day but it does have PM EMH. So that may be a factor.

The attractions on the hit list are:

SDMT
Pooh
PP
PhilharMagic
ETWB

I had been thinking about the order in which we should see these attractions. Then I thought I'd use the personalized touring plan tool at touringplans.com. Tell it the day we are visiting, what time we arrive, what attractions we want to see, hit the button, and it will spit out an optimized order in which to see the attractions based on predicted wait times.

I thought, for sure, it would send us to SDMT first. But it didn't. It ordered the attractions and anticipated wait as follows:

Pooh - 5 min
PP - 17 min
Philharmagic - 7 min
ETWB - 20 min
SDMT - 37 min (at about 10:50am)

I thought this was odd. The tool has this other feature where you tell it the order in which you want to see the attractions and it will evaluate that order and tell you the wait times. I moved SDMT to first and this is what it spit out:

SDMT - 50 min (at 9am)
Pooh - 14 min
PP - 36 min
Philharmagic - 4 min
ETWB - 21 min

So, what do you think? SDMT wait at park opening is 50 minutes and drops by 13 minutes after an hour and 50 minutes of the park being open? Is it the throngs of people that rush to SDMT at opening and it lets off after a while? Or is it something else?

 

[MischaOz]

Seems odd to me. PP lines build fast, I would never do Pooh before PP...

 

[Magpie]

Well... even if you hop straight in line for SDMT, you'll still be behind all those people coming in from breakfasts in the park and also everyone who managed to line up at the gates ahead of you. Then, about fifteen minutes after park open, Fastpass returnees begin arriving. If you wait until 10:50... you'll be behind even more FP returnees, as well as the other folks already in line ahead of you. Maybe the automated program figures the best they can do is make sure you get to ride everything else at the optimally shortest time possible, and when you rock up to 7DMT, you'll either decide the wait is crazy long and not worth it, or you'll have the maximum amount of time to waste standing in line for it?

Because, no matter what you do, the line's going to be long. And if you head straight for it, you could be guaranteeing long lines for everything else by spending your whole first hour standing in line for the train.

Personally, I wouldn't bother with 7DMT without a Faspass, but your mileage may vary.

Edited to add: Me, (just going with your list) I'd do PP, Pooh, ETWB, check the length of line for SDMT and nope on over the Barnstormer instead, then Philharmagic. The Little Mermaid ride is sweet, too, and it's right close by.

 

[Richard M Nixon]

I found the TP wait times to be very accurate (sometimes the true waits were 5-10 minutes shorter than what TP said). I would trust the system and follow what it says.

 

[nkereina]

Seems odd to me. PP lines build fast, I would never do Pooh before PP...

Both lines build fast, especially with the interactive queue at Pooh. Both standby lines were consistently 30-40 minutes when we were there last November. IMO, I'd flip a coin as to which I'd do first.

 

[jtowntoflorida]

Remember that posted wait times tend to be inflated, especially for popular attractions and especially first thing in the morning. I personally have witnessed a HUGE SB line for 7DMT right at RD, that is very diminished by 10:15 or so. Then there is a lull until 11ish, when the "want to sleep in/later arrivals" start flooding the park. I assume that Touring Plans' data indicates that the actual wait times during this 45 minute lull is much, much lower than the posted SB times, which makes sense to me.

 

[Happy_2_B]

I never second guess their plans. They have a team of professionals that work on this stuff every day, and their system has been nationally recognized by major publications over and over and over again. I am paying for their expertise, and plan to use it. They haven't failed me over the course of many trips- and I don't expect them to this December, either.

 

[JeninTexas]

I created personalized plans with TP for all 11 days of our last trip and ended up scrapping all the MK ones in short order. The wait times ended up being significantly higher than what they estimated and it took longer to get to every attraction because the park was so full and it was difficult to walk. And this was on days that TP said were level 2/3 attendance. Also, I picked the slowest possible walking option even though we are fast walkers. Still, our plans were thrown off by more than 30 minutes after only hitting up a couple of attractions.

Like the PP said, I would not do SDMT standby and the lines continue to build as the day goes on. It does not seem like a sound strategy to not do it first.

 

[Tbiafore]

I have used them multiple times and for various reasons when planning, but I have found over the years there is inconsistencies in their reporting and their planning tools have bugs in them (as you are listing). In two times I "lived and died" by what they said, I got burned. I have found Josh’s predictions to be much better. I still keep the subscription to Touring plans as I like to compare what multiple sites say but I always keep this in the back of my mind. You can see on this page that their “predications” and what actually happens are way off. Even on their own website they are pointing this out: http://touringplans.com/magic-kingdom/wait-times/date/2015-09-14

Also if you go to the “Wait times” section as I linked below, you can see that on this particular day, the wait time does not drop as your plan suggests it does, it actually goes up fast and stays that way pretty much all the way until around 5pm which is what has been reported. If you continue to go through the days you will see that be the case for all days. http://touringplans.com/magic-kingdom/wait-times. However, your touring plan says otherwise…both data is from the same website…one word…”buggy”.

Don’t rely on all the information that the touring plan suggests and while there is good information there to weigh in but time and time again you will get bogus or incorrect information. Use your gut if something feels off.

 

[MermaidMommy]

That's a terrible plan! Peter Pan's line is always longer than Pooh, so you'd never do Pooh first. Philharmonic almost never has a line, but it takes a while to see, so you definitely don't want to do it first thing in the morning. And, there's no way that SDMT has a 37 minute wait that time of the morning. It will be longer than that.

I've found that the Personalized Touring Plans often don't make sense. Once, I had one tell me to do TTA for my first ride! I'd use TP for other things, but don't trust those personalized plans. As other poster mentioned, check out Josh's cheat sheats at easyWDW.

 

[tink9702]

I'd do PP, Pooh, ETWB, SDMT, Philharmagic knowing that I'd be waiting for an hour in line at SDMT but very little waits at the other 4. OR SDMT, PP, Pooh, ETWB, Philharmagic and know that I'm waiting in a decent line for SDMT if I'm not at the front of the pack at RD, a 20-30 minute line for PP & a 30 minute line for Pooh.

Waiting in one long line might be preferable to waiting in 3 medium lines? What park are you combining with MK? perhaps you are better off using FP+ in MK?

 

[tink9702]

I'll add that we did SDMT at RD twice in November. Took about 10 minutes the first day, 20 the second. We were near the front of the pack. But by the time we were done, both PP and Pooh were listed as 25-30 minute waits on the queues. Crowds were quite light, I think level 3-4 days maybe and it was a Tuesday & Friday so less heavy days for MK historically.

Edited to add: this was also prior to the BOG breakfasts being released before the park opened.

 

[Spork24]

If it were me I would do exactly what touring plans suggested accept swap PP and Pooh to do PP first.

I have been in an hour wait at 8:59 (with 9:00 rd) and still seen an hour wait at noon on the same day

 

[MermaidMommy]

If it were me I would do exactly what touring plans suggested accept swap PP and Pooh to do PP first.

And move Phliharmagic after ETWB and SDMT.

 

[vleeth]

I used touring plans on my last trip and the times we way off on some things. It put my whole day off early in the morning. I did better on my own from knowing what has a longer wait...like riding Peter Pan before Pooh.

 

[Happy_2_B]

OP, the post below is something to consider. This was done in March after a BOG breakfast. They did 7DMT first- but you would ignore this part since they came out of the attraction AFTER the rope drop crowd caught up to them. The reason I copied this here is so you will notice when they did a given attraction after 7DMT, in what order, and how long it took them during spring break. There is also a link in the post to another post that covers a normal rope drop just after 7DMT opened so you can see why the wait is as long as it is if you do decide to do it first. It is still a very popular attraction and the information in the post still applies for the most part IMHO- with the following caveat. If I had to guess, the reason 7DMT is put at that point in the plan is because a lot of repeat visitors won't go back. We have seen posts here of it being 'underwhelming'- so the group that has experienced it and thought it was 'just OK' simply won't return. Keep in mind that every day that passes, 7DMT and A&E are going to lose their desirability of being people's first choice except for those experiencing it for the first time and those with little kids. Just because a touring plan worked 6 months or a year ago doesn't mean it is applicable now. Time passes and preferences change. Those that like thrill rides at rope drop will start heading back to those attractions on repeat visits since they already experienced the stuff in New Fantasyland. Anyways, check out the post below- especially the time-elapsed pictures just before the park opens- was pretty eye opening the first time I read it.

http://www.easywdw.com/uncategorize...gdom-morning-touring-over-spring-break-32715/

 

[MrInfinity]

So, what do you think? SDMT wait at park opening is 50 minutes and drops by 13 minutes after an hour and 50 minutes of the park being open? Is it the throngs of people that rush to SDMT at opening and it lets off after a while? Or is it something else?

Go with your common sense here. SDMT, then PP, then everything else. The SDMT wait will be dependent on where you are in the rope drop line, not necessarily 50 minutes.

 

[wareagle57]

SDMT really depends. If you can actually be one of the very first there, then that's a no brainer to ride first. But if the wait is already at least 20-30 minutes (and you need to judge it by looking at the queue not the posted time) then I'd save it for next to last, before Philharmagic.

 

[ESDisneyAddicts]

You need to go to SDMT, PP & the sisters first.