June 15th-21st

[Dexican]

How do you guys think the crowds will be? Obviously it'll be packed but middle of the summer packed? Also, do you think the opening of Cars land may make other rides and attractions lines shorter or will it all be packed? Sorry if I've confused you just looking for the dates we are wanting to go. We want to either go the 6th through the 13th or the 15th-21st but we want to do Cars land and the Matterhorn. Would it be pretty risky to go the week before?

 

[Malcon10t]

How do you guys think the crowds will be? Obviously it'll be packed but middle of the summer packed? Also, do you think the opening of Cars land may make other rides and attractions lines shorter or will it all be packed? Sorry if I've confused you just looking for the dates we are wanting to go. We want to either go the 6th through the 13th or the 15th-21st but we want to do Cars land and the Matterhorn. Would it be pretty risky to go the week before?

The 15th-21st will be PACKED. We would be there, but there is a wedding I must attend...

If you want to try Carsland and Matterhorn, you need to wait til the 15th.

 

[coaches24]

Probably one of the busier weeks of the year with Carsland opening. But I your going to be there for 6 days and I am assuming that means atleast 4 days in the park then I wouldn't worry as much about the crowds. If you are going to be in the parks 2 or 3 days then I would worry about crowds. But with 4 or 5 days I think you can do everything even of its packed. Esspecially if you get there early when it's slower and if you have a MM use it as well.

As for the 15th itself, I personally would stay away from cars land (and DCA all together ) that day. The opening ceremony has to be insane crowds wise.

 

[Dexican]

I knew it would probably be super packed just don't know what I should do. Banking on soft openings usually works but in this case who knows nothing has been announced yet.

 

[skiingfast]

The good thing is the SoCal APs being blocked out on the 15th and 16th. Then open back up for the smaller segment of them the regular SoCal AP.

Hopefully if they want to go they will just take a day for Cars Land and leave not the whole park or both parks. With the blocks the 16th may be the day to try Cars Land if you want to go right away but not on the opening day but the 20th and 21st when they are blocked and a weekday should be much better. The 17th being a Sunday and a couple hundred thousand SoCal APs unblocked may be the day they show up.

Not that the 17th will be the worse day, but in a sense possibly the busiest day everywhere. On the 15th, it's likely that RSR will have a 8 hour wait, tying up lots of people in that single line, keeping people out of other lines in the resort. Plus with the Matterhorn probably getting a 2 or 3 hours wait, and LFT and MJJ having a 2 hour wait. That will be a good percentage of the day's visitors spending a lot of thier time in those lines verses other lines.

 

[Dexican]

So skiing fast would your advice be to go the week of the opening if we want to go on these attractions? Do you think the lines of the other attractions will be about the same in both weeks if they don't soft open Cars or the Matterhorn?

 

[Carmatts]

If you really want to experience Carsland when it opens, prepare for very large crowds. My guess is that it will soft open, however they may only run the rides for a few hours a day and they won't tell you when those hours will be. Do you really want to stand around and waste time waiting for something that may or may not open? Local AP's will certainly stand by the entrance for hours, if they have any inkling it may soft open. Also expect that if it does soft open, it won't take long for the local AP's to descend on the park shortly. Twitter and Facebook will get the word out immediately.
What potential visitors should understand is how the local base works. They crave anything new and this is the end of a massive project and you can bet the almost 1 million pass holders will try and get into to see this the first moment they can. Last summer the grand opening of Star Tours was crazy and that was only 1 ride. This will be 2 new lands (Carsland and BVS.)
Personally, I can't wait to see what DCA looks like without construction walls. I don't remember what it looks like without them.

 

[skiingfast]

So skiing fast would your advice be to go the week of the opening if we want to go on these attractions? Do you think the lines of the other attractions will be about the same in both weeks if they don't soft open Cars or the Matterhorn?

I'm not sure what you mean about "same in both weeks".

While soft opening may help, probably only if they are really a pre official opening not a regular soft opening. Like Carmatts said a soft opening will be unnanounced and only a few hours long. While I agree once open it will be all over twittter and people will show up, but that doesn't mean it will still be open. For soft openings to help these attractions will have to be open most of a day for several days including weekends to let a lot of people ride so they don't feel the need to go when it officially opens.

Look at last year.

Little Mermaid was open on and off for a week, then on opening day it had a 4 hour plus line that over flowed it's queue and was in the whole of Paradise Park, which fits 4,000 viewers for WoC in just the viewing spots not the access spots. In a day the wait was down to an hour, and within a week settled into 20-30 minutes long at worst for the rest of summer. What helped Little Mermaid relax quickly was it has high rider capacity and not a E-ticket.

Star Tours was also open for a while, and had an AP preview. Then when it officially opened, FP was distributed in an hour and the line was several hours long wrapping its way down to the end of Main Street and back and all over the hub. Star Tours then fell to multihour waits, much better than several but still really long. FP would go in a couple then a few hours. It was a popular E-Ticket with only good capacity.

This year it's likely that if they don't have huge soft openings, and by this I mean allowing 10,000 riders per days on 10 or 15 days it won't help.

On opening day expect a line at the DCA gates of 10,000 people, that go strait to RSR. In the park RSR appears to have a long queue and decent overflow queue set up, think of it as like Indiana Jones. While this should work fine mid summer with luck or at least by the fall, in the opening day and perhaps a couple months I think the queue is going to go down the crossroad in the warf area. While opening day will be crazy the line may still die down to a long 3 or 4 hour wait. RSR is looking to be a super great E-ticket attraction, think Indiana Jones or Splash Mountain, very nice without great capacity. FP will probably be like ST gone in an hour or a few hours.

LFT and MJJ have a bigger problem, low capacity. So while not nearly as popular there lines will be slow. Maters Junkyard Jamboree has ok ride capcity because it has two ride systems, it's a side by side attraction. So set 1 and set 2 should load alright, moving the line better. Lugi's Flying Tires will probably load awful. We've all been on bumbper cars, it takes a while for people to get to the last open car and then to check the seatbelts in the randomly placed vehicles. In just some speculation this attraction may have a very novel loading sytem, but I have seen no direct evidence that it will. With low capacities and not being great attractions, it's kind of a mix of what will happen. They will probably never have a under 30 minute wait all Summer and it may take a while to knock the wait to under an hour.

 

[Dexican]

What I am saying would you go the week before the opening and risk it being soft opened or go the week it opens and make sure to ride it? So do you think with these massive crowds that week 15-21st other attractions not named Matterhorn or Cars Land will still be long waits or about normal?

 

[skiingfast]

What I am saying would you go the week before the opening and risk it being soft opened or go the week it opens and make sure to ride it? So do you think with these massive crowds that week 15-21st other attractions not named Matterhorn or Cars Land will still be long waits or about normal?

If you go the week before there is no guarentee of a soft opening, you could miss it all together. If you are local and can casually go to the park just stick in the area and ask every hour or two if it will be open. If you are making a rare trip to DL you won't want to do that, but may want to watch some fan site and apps for news so you could run over.

When it opens I imagine, since most visitors will have a one day one park ticket, DCA will all be busy, but in a day or two it will only be slightly busier, and only Cars Land will still be solidly busy. On opening day DL may be looking light with many people in DCA or on the Matterhorn, but should be back to normal in a day.

 

[Dexican]

Thanks for your insight!

 

[iujen94]

Little Mermaid was open on and off for a week, then on opening day it had a 4 hour plus line that over flowed it's queue and was in the whole of Paradise Park, which fits 4,000 viewers for WoC in just the viewing spots not the access spots. In a day the wait was down to an hour, and within a week settled into 20-30 minutes long at worst for the rest of summer. What helped Little Mermaid relax quickly was it has high rider capacity and not a E-ticket.

Star Tours was also open for a while, and had an AP preview. Then when it officially opened, FP was distributed in an hour and the line was several hours long wrapping its way down to the end of Main Street and back and all over the hub. Star Tours then fell to multihour waits, much better than several but still really long. FP would go in a couple then a few hours. It was a popular E-Ticket with only good capacity.

Not meaning to hijack OP's thread, but what is an "E-Ticket"? I haven't heard that term before?

Thanks!

 

[jennabennabofenna]

How do you guys think the crowds will be? Obviously it'll be packed but middle of the summer packed? Also, do you think the opening of Cars land may make other rides and attractions lines shorter or will it all be packed? Sorry if I've confused you just looking for the dates we are wanting to go. We want to either go the 6th through the 13th or the 15th-21st but we want to do Cars land and the Matterhorn. Would it be pretty risky to go the week before?

Im sure it will be packed. Probably at both parks. Its packed anyways during summer, so the opening of Carsland is going to make it even more busy.

We are going the 20th-23rd. Im prepared for some craziness.. im just hoping is not too hot. (im praying for weather in the high 70s low 80s )

 

[skiingfast]

Not meaning to hijack OP's thread, but what is an "E-Ticket"? I haven't heard that term before?

It means one of the best attractions, such as Splash, Soarin, TSMM, HM. One with long lines that everyone wants to ride over and over again.

If you want the history of how the term came about: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E_ticket