Jan 2018 wait times longer than Summer 2017: Disney reduced ride capacity

[ELLH]

Crowd levels aren't necessarily directly proportional to wait times. Like I said above, Disney knows well in advance how many people will be at a given park on a given day/time. They choose whether to staff in proportion to the crowds or not. Let's say Disney has two plans: A and B. Plan A would be their one-thousand people staffing plan. Plan B would be two-thousand. (yea, these numbers are made up for illustrating a point). All things the same, if Disney is running on Plan A then wait times will be higher if crowds levels were really two-thousand people. That's not rocket science. However, staffing/operations is a decision made by Disney. Disney is choosing to run on Plan A rather than Plan B for some reason (debated here already).

Additionally, just because wait times are longer and the notion of reduced ride capacity may very well be true, don't overlook the fact that the parks really are more crowded. There are more people there based on my own experience and pictures/posts I've seen since late last year.

Ultimately the increased crowds and how Disney chooses to deal with that is up to them. But let's not say on one hand that Disney has come up with this brilliant scheme to extract money from guests by cutting ride capacity and then on the other hand assume that Disney doesn't know in advance, thanks to their FP+ system, how many guests to expect on a given day.

 

[SCSteve]

All the analysis aside, every time I go to WDW it seems more crowded and it seems the standby lines are longer, most too long to wait on ...

 

[Linkura]

Here is what I witnessed a few weeks ago at the Peoplemover. There was quite a line at the bottom of the escalator, so as I stood waiting, I noticed the front half of the trains were all going out empty. Only the vehicles in the back half of the train were being loaded with people. When I got to the top, you could actually see they had set red cones in the seats of those vehicles to keep them from being used. Back in the day, there were several castmembers at that ride. That was not the case that day. There was someone at the bottom, someone loading, and someone getting people off the ride.

Not as weird as this particular instance, but when I rode Magic Carpets Monday, they would only have people in the back of the cartpers if there were several people in a single party. If you were a party of only one-two adults and a small child, for example, they weren't loading another party in the back of the carpets at all, leaving them empty. As a solo traveler, I was in a carpet entirely by myself. Last year when I rode Carpets as a solo traveler, I was in the front and another party of 2 were in the back of the same carpet.

I also did PeopleMover. I had 8 minute wait for it midday, I thought that was ok. And they weren't sending out seats completely empty like you saw. But I did see very few CMs staffing the attraction. As I mentioned in another thread, I lost my hat in Tomorrowland somewhere. I thought it was Laugh Floor, but I wanted to check at People Mover just in case. Except I couldn't believe the only CM that wasn't at the top of the ride was right at the escalator portion at the end of the queue. There was literally no other CM at the ride except for up top... and I believe it was only one guy up there, two max. So I had no one I could even ask. Even at Laugh Floor they had a couple folks out front.

 

[Allison]

We watched from the line below while in line, and each set of cars only had one car filled, usually with 2 people. That's one car out of 4, I believe? Why did they do that with the longer lines to get on????? It just didn't make sense to us that they would send every set of cars out with only one out of four used?

Because they have fewer castmembers working the attraction and can only handle so many people at a time.

 

[disneyseniors]

Because they have fewer castmembers working the attraction and can only handle so many people at a time.

Um, I don't know, Allison. They had the same number of CM's that they have always had, so don't think that was the problem. Still a mystery. Maybe the cars weren't running right? just don't know.

 

[Davey Jones II]

If people are willing to wait in that line, then yes. However many times instead of getting in line for a ride of 30 minutes +, we instead went to grab a drink or fries or popcorn, or into a gift shop. I know we spent more money this trip over all. Just doing the rides is 'free' once you pay for your ticket but it costs Disney money in staff and maintenance.

Clearly, a lot of people are willing to get in those lines...otherwise, the line wouldn't be so long in the first place.

 

[Allison]

Um, I don't know, Allison. They had the same number of CM's that they have always had, so don't think that was the problem. Still a mystery. Maybe the cars weren't running right? just don't know.

That wasn't the case when I was there. There were just 3. In the past, there have been more than that. In my opinion, I don't believe the cars aren't running right. Too many people are seeing this happen. Capacity is being manipulated.

 

[Davey Jones II]

As other posters have said, the peoplemover seems to be running without filling up the cars, and with longer waits at the bottom of the escalator.
We saw the same thing this past week, and wondered why?
We watched from the line below while in line, and each set of cars only had one car filled, usually with 2 people. That's one car out of 4, I believe? Why did they do that with the longer lines to get on????? It just didn't make sense to us that they would send every set of cars out with only one out of four used?
If anyone has insight into this mystery, please let us know.
I may be wrong in the number of cars in each set, but only one was in use each time.

When you see crap like this, complain to Guest Relations and/or by email. Crowds are one thing, but we can't just tolerate deliberate, artificially created long lines.

 

[ITALIANNYC]

I hate the fact that Disney will ignore this fact. The more we speak out and the bigger this thread gets, The bigger impact it will hopefully have.

You have all this money for every little thing. You nickel and dime us for everything and you can’t afford to pay some kid minimum wage to make some money and get to full capacity all year long.

Don’t turn the happiest place on earth in the most greedy place on earth

I don’t care how many new areas you make. The vision of Walt was a place anyone can go to and enjoy. I doubt Star Wars would have ever been something he wanted in his parks. ( random thought. )

Amazing to me

 

[whiporee]

I wonder if Disney is staffing/running attractions based decade old procedures for January, meanwhile, the parks are now mobbed in January.

And just my opinion, fastpass plus has destroyed life as we know it.....

I don’t think it’s FP+. I think it’s the whole concept of FP, not just the reservation system.

I hate to seem this old, but when I was growing up in Orlando, 30-45 minute waits were the norm for almost everything decent. 90 at Space and Pirates was what you expected. That’s actually the case with most amusement parks I’ve been to. There were slower times during the year -- the weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas, especially -- but there were always lines. Unless it was very early or very late, there were lines. And that was before 3/4s of the 30,000 hotel rooms came along. But as I kid I waited for Snow White and I waited for MR. Toads and I waited or 20,000 Leagues and. None of those rides were walk ons -- I can remember very few walk-ons at all in my childhood there. There's a reason the queue lines are so long.

But with the advent of FP, the idea of waiting became abhorrent, so now what was once considered a part of being at an amusement park is now thought of abnormal and, so some on this thread, abusive. We are a very impatient society these days (myself included) so any significant wait for anything feels like quite the imposition. But I can promise you the standby lines for WDW headliners aren't any worse than standby lines for headliners at most amusement parks around the country. It always sucks to be in one, but I've been in plenty of hour-long lines at Six Flags or at Sea World and Universal or at the local water park.

While I've no way of knowing this I think WDW has an idea that 30-45 minutes is fine for a standby line, regardless of when you come (unless it's a ticketed, controlled event). And if you come during a "slow" time then it's still going to be the same wait -- I don't think WDW has any obligation to make anyone's wait shorter than what they as a company have decided is reasonable. If you disagree with their choice, that's understandable. But I think it's there choice to make, just like it's a consumer's choice to decide where to spend their money. But I don't think you'll find many amusement parks that can consistently show a shorter wait time for headliners.

I also want to point out that when considering wait times, it might be fair to also consider the people in the FP line. If a third of the people are using FP, and they're through the line in 10 minutes, and two thirds are in the standby line at 45, then the average wait time for all visitors is 33 minutes. it doesn't make the standby one any shorter, but if you're damning them for perceived actions, then you ought to be fair about it.

 

[lentesta]

As other posters have said, the peoplemover seems to be running without filling up the cars, and with longer waits at the bottom of the escalator.
We saw the same thing this past week, and wondered why?
We watched from the line below while in line, and each set of cars only had one car filled, usually with 2 people. That's one car out of 4, I believe? Why did they do that with the longer lines to get on????? It just didn't make sense to us that they would send every set of cars out with only one out of four used?
If anyone has insight into this mystery, please let us know.
I may be wrong in the number of cars in each set, but only one was in use each time.

I'm told that they restrict the number of people on the elevator belt going up to the loading platform. That increases the number of empty cars, reduces capacity, and increases waits.
The two reasons I've heard for the restriction are: (1) to avoid breakdowns on the belt; and (2) to avoid pile-ups on the belt if the people who just got off don't make room for others.

 

[Stasieki]

How strange.

Yes! This happened 2/11, and then a week later on Presidents Day. It was so strange to me at the time. * edited to add that I meant to quote comment before about People Mover.

 

[DLgal]

I wonder if Disney is staffing/running attractions based decade old procedures for January, meanwhile, the parks are now mobbed in January.

And just my opinion, fastpass plus has destroyed WDW as we knew it.....

This is absolutely what is happening. I know so. I visit Disneyland a LOT. Like, once a week on average.

I went a month ago or so and it was a weekday but slightly crowded. Probably a 6 or 7. There was a long line at the train station and a lady was chatting up the CM there and asking why it was taking so long between trains. The CM said "Well technically, this is our slow time of year, so we only run 2 trains during the week." The lady was like, "Slow??? This is what you call slow?" The CM gave her that look like "Lady, you're preaching to the choir." But, true to form, she said something more along the lines of "Sometimes our projections are off but it's hard to get people to come in at the last minute so we can't make changes to our operations with the amount of staff we have on hand."

In a nutshell, Disney hasn't updated their staffing levels to reflect ACTUAL crowd levels, likely in several years. They are still operating on that arcane January through early March = Slow Season. Because updating their crowd projections is going to cost them more money in labor.

 

[mom2rtk]

This is absolutely what is happening. I know so. I visit Disneyland a LOT. Like, once a week on average.

I went a month ago or so and it was a weekday but slightly crowded. Probably a 6 or 7. There was a long line at the train station and a lady was chatting up the CM there and asking why it was taking so long between trains. The CM said "Well technically, this is our slow time of year, so we only run 2 trains during the week." The lady was like, "Slow??? This is what you call slow?" The CM gave her that look like "Lady, you're preaching to the choir." But, true to form, she said something more along the lines of "Sometimes our projections are off but it's hard to get people to come in at the last minute so we can't make changes to our operations with the amount of staff we have on hand."

In a nutshell, Disney hasn't updated their staffing levels to reflect ACTUAL crowd levels, likely in several years. They are still operating on that arcane January through early March = Slow Season. Because updating their crowd projections is going to cost them more money in labor.

Except that WDW has far more information at their disposal in advance than DLR has. Because people are making ride reservations 60 days in advance. They have TONS of data to help them predict crowd levels that DLR does not have.

 

[DLgal]

Except that WDW has far more information at their disposal in advance than DLR has. Because people are making ride reservations 60 days in advance. They have TONS of data to help them predict crowd levels that DLR does not have.

Yeah, but Disneyland has been experiencing larger and larger crowds every year since 2012. This is well known. They have over a million annual passholders alone. They know when it is going to be crowded. My point is that they are STILL basing staffing decisions on outdated crowd predictions. It is so crowded at Disneyland that the parking lots routinely fill up. This never used to happen. It's not an anomaly, they know it is happening. The truth is, that day I was at the park was the Monday, Feb 12. ALL KINDS of schools were out that day. Plus, several rides were down for refurbishment. Too many people, not enough open rides, and "technically" a holiday (Lincoln's birthday). They were not staffed adequately. At all. I might be way off on my crowd level of 6/7. I don't have a Touring Plans subscription. I just know it felt like there were people everywhere. We use a DAS and MaxPass so we didn't wait more than 10 min for anything, except the train.

 

[mom2rtk]

Yeah, but Disneyland has been experiencing larger and larger crowds every year since 2012. This is well known. They have over a million annual passholders alone. They know when it is going to be crowded. My point is that they are STILL basing staffing decisions on outdated crowd predictions. It is so crowded at Disneyland that the parking lots routinely fill up. This never used to happen. It's not an anomaly, they know it is happening. The truth is, that day I was at the park was the Monday, Feb 12. ALL KINDS of schools were out that day. Plus, several rides were down for refurbishment. Too many people, not enough open rides, and "technically" a holiday (Lincoln's birthday). They were not staffed adequately. At all. I might be way off on my crowd level of 6/7. I don't have a Touring Plans subscription. I just know it felt like there were people everywhere. We use a DAS and MaxPass so we didn't wait more than 10 min for anything, except the train.

I'm not saying DLR shouldn't know to expect big crowds. I'm just saying that WDW has even less of a reason to be "surprised" by big crowds in the off season.

 

[JillianLeigh]

As a former attractions CM, I highly doubt Disney is reducing attractions staff. Safety is #1 priority, and all rides have different positions that MUST be filled. It didn't matter if it is low or peak season, there was always the same number of CMs located at those positions. You can't take away CMs from attractions without compromising the safety of the guests. During "peak season" there may have been more CMs added to help with greeting, FP, stroller parking, etc. but the positions that deal with the actual running of the attraction, grouping guests, loading, and unloading never changed. Unless safety is being disregarded by Disney, staffing reduction for attractions just doesn't seem feasible.

 

[hereforthechurros]

We saw this too! We were stunned there was any wait time for the People Mover (it's one of my favourite rides) Several times we had a 10-15 minute wait downstairs, when we got the the top, several 'carts' were sent empty and they didn't even have the 'breakdown' orange or red tarpaulin over the top. They were just being sent empty for no reason.

Interesting. I’ve never ridden People Mover before and made it a priority for this past Feb. trip. Read it was typically a 5-10 minute wait but after waiting 20 minutes and the line snaked and snaked we never even approached the walkway and eventually bailed. Forget even trying anything else in Tomorrowland at the point.

Just throwing my two cents in that it has to be both higher crowds at unexpected times as well as WDW seeing how far they can push the limits of wait times. It wasn’t just long lines on our trip, it absolutely was crowds too. When you can’t even walk across the path because of the sea of people, you can’t even move in Gorillas Falls, you give up on even trying to do more because it’s just a mob scene everywhere you can’t just blame wait times.

 

[Shanti]

I just listened to an excellent podcast here on the DIS for March 6, 2018. I linked it below, starting around the 30 minute mark.

It contains an interview with Len Testa who has objectively documented the reduced capacity of popular Disney rides. While there is speculation as to the reason or motivations for the reduced capacity, the reduced capacity is factual. The speculation is that Disney is purposely lowering capacity to save staffing costs and encouraging upsales on special event ticketing.

He also noted that January 2018 (when 95% of school children are in school) had longer ride wait times than the Summer of 2017 (when 95% of school children are out of school). It is worth a listen.

The fact that more kids are out of school in summer than in January doesn't mean there are fewer guests. We were there in late July 2016 and were shocked at how few people were in the parks. Midsummer is a relatively slow season for WDW now.

I haven't observed or experienced ride capacity being cut. I think that assumption is a reaction to people's experiences of touring during newly busy times of year that used to be less busy. They're in denial about the new crowd patterns.

 

[Shanti]

We went the first week of February in 2012. It was incredible. The attached pictured was taken at Epcot on 2/2/12. It was almost like having the park to yourself.

That picture looks like our experience in late July 2016.