Magic Kingdom's Inaccesibility

[ConnieB]

We generally stay offsite and drive in....never does it take us an hour to get from the front door of our vacation home to the entrance at MK. Yet another reason I prefer offsite.....plus the cheaper price (including the rental car), more space, kitchen, washer/dryer, uncrowded pool, and no waiting in line to get on a bus and then starting that hour long trek. Not to mention I really, really dislike buses.

One of the things I LOVE about Disneyland is the "hopping" takes 5 minutes to get from one park to another......no method of transportation gets you to any other park in as short of a time. We've been known to switch parks 2 or 3 times a day in DL.

 

[msmama]

At Disneyland, the walk back to the Disneyland hotel at the end of the day was LONG!! Way longer than getting to the bus stop at MK. (And while I could've taken the monorail, it's in the parks so if I were at CA, you'd have to cross back into DL and walk to tomorrowland to get the monorail which is about as long as the walk).

I'd say on average, walking from my room, to the bus stop, to a park (any park, not just MK) and to the turnstile takes on average about 45 minutes (and I've stayed at all classes of resorts). It certainly can take longer if you just miss a bus but I'm going on average.

 

[JimmyV]

I do think that the large bus depot at the front detracts from the "magic" and was not what Walt intended

Walt never intended or imagined that there would be 27,000 hotel rooms on property that were not surrounding Seven Seas Lagoon.

 

[GillianP1301]

I actually love the ferry from the TTC to MK. It really builds the anticipation and excitement and is like another attraction to us.

I don't take Disney buses, that would drive me crazy and definitely take away from the magic. The one or two times I have used the bus was enough to remind me why I rent a car.

Now, at the end of the night if I have stayed for fireworks, then I change my answer for the MK to TTC trip. I would much rather be able to just walk to my car then to be herded like cattle to the monorail/ferry.

 

[ZachnElli]

We've stayed onsite and off and we always drive and it's never taken us an hour to get inside MK. Even during peak July hours. Certainly never an hour and a half! Are you taking alot of bags that need checked?

 

[lugnut33]

I love the close proximity of everything at Disneyland. One of the big reasons why I prefer it.

We usually go to WDW though, and when we do we always rent a car and drive from our resort to all the parks except for the Magic Kingdom. Almost always take the bus, unless it's late at night then you can generally go into the MK parking lot and park right up front and walk to the TTC.

 

[g8torphan]

Love the build up....TTC to ferry and seeing the Castle in the background.


All part of the show!

It it was just plopped down near a parking lot it wouldn't feel as magical or special

 

[Magic Band Defender]

We always take the Disney busses. For the most part, we enjoy it and have good experiences.

 

[UnderTheRialto]

I find it to be a huge PITA.

 

[mickeyluv'r]

Surprised (only a tiny bit) by some of the negativity of the responses.If you want ease of getting to MK, try CR (followed by BLT). At WDW, time=money=time!
For me, it isn't so much hotels to MK that is a hassle, but rather how every pathway in the hotels (and AK) is as long as possible.
It is intentional. Check out a satellite view of Haunted Mansion/Small World and the All Stars to see why.

1. ) Long pathways =transition space. The ultimate magic is entering MK! Most guests, as you can see from many of the posts here, enjoy the journey. Imagineers talk about storytelling. Epcot feels grand because the pavilions have distance.
2.) Slowing guests down allows WDW to hold more guests.
3.) Guests tend to underestimate or ignore time under certain circumstances. Many times, I have actually tracked how long it took us to get from point A (say our hotel) to point B (say, the entrance of MK), or the time-cost of going to guest services. When I post that information, I almost always get lambasted on the DIS!

Many folks swear the walk from Epcot to HS is 10 minutes!
Many folks ignore time spent in line at Guest Services.
They also tend to completely forget how long it takes to get to MK, or to walk the WS.

It is important to note transportation times -almost any WDW point A/point B is quite variable. Disney itself advises guests to allow 90minutes to get from hotels to ADR's!

It is pretty impressive how quickly WDW does move large numbers of people, still I wonder how long it would take to evacuate MK if there was ever a major emergency.

 

[kelleybean]

I don't like the multiple steps to get to MK either. I hate struggling for a tram when I get there in the morning (because so many people are trying to get on), then the extra step of waiting for a monorail. And when we leave it always feels like we either just missed a tram or sit there for a while to wait for it to fill up. That is one of my preferences about Universal's system. Even though the parking garage is ridiculously far away from the parks, at least we are moving.

If DS6 were writing this, however, he would probably say that the tram and the monorail are two of his favorite rides. For whatever reason he loves the tram. DH and I used to joke that we should have just saved $ on the AP's and just spent our weekends in the parking lot.

 

[kaetra]

I used to love the buses. I'm over them now. Way over.

It's not so bad at POP, but after our last trip at POFQ we waited over an hour for an MK bus EVERY time we tried to use it - both to and from MK. We missed rope drop. We stood in POFQ bus stop line at MK forever and there's no where to sit after a long day except on the ground. The kid kept saying "why don't we just drive mom?". I should have listened to her.

Also they should put benches along the sides of the bus stop queues. Or better yet make the whole queue a slide down bench switchback. That would be so nice. Being able to sit after walking all day is just common sense. Especially since you might very well be standing on your bus ride back to the resort!

 

[mylittlebuttercup]

Are you driving or using Disney transportation? I feel like Disney transportation is much quicker than driving in the case of MK because you don't have to worry about parking, taking the boat/monorail, etc. We have never had 1.5 hours like you mentioned to get back to our hotel room. When we stayed at the values, we typically waited for a bus 0-20 minutes (unless we left right at park close, then occasionally longer), and the bus ride took maybe twenty minutes. Walking to and from the bus stops adds a few minutes. So usually we reached our destination within 30-50 minutes depending upon if we had to wait for a bus.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

Surprised (only a tiny bit) by some of the negativity of the responses.If you want ease of getting to MK, try CR (followed by BLT). At WDW, time=money=time!
For me, it isn't so much hotels to MK that is a hassle, but rather how every pathway in the hotels (and AK) is as long as possible.
It is intentional. Check out a satellite view of Haunted Mansion/Small World and the All Stars to see why.

1. ) Long pathways =transition space. The ultimate magic is entering MK! Most guests, as you can see from many of the posts here, enjoy the journey. Imagineers talk about storytelling. Epcot feels grand because the pavilions have distance.
2.) Slowing guests down allows WDW to hold more guests.
3.) Guests tend to underestimate or ignore time under certain circumstances. Many times, I have actually tracked how long it took us to get from point A (say our hotel) to point B (say, the entrance of MK), or the time-cost of going to guest services. When I post that information, I almost always get lambasted on the DIS!

Many folks swear the walk from Epcot to HS is 10 minutes!
Many folks ignore time spent in line at Guest Services.
They also tend to completely forget how long it takes to get to MK, or to walk the WS.

It is important to note transportation times -almost any WDW point A/point B is quite variable. Disney itself advises guests to allow 90minutes to get from hotels to ADR's!

It is pretty impressive how quickly WDW does move large numbers of people, still I wonder how long it would take to evacuate MK if there was ever a major emergency.

My understanding is that 9/11 was an evacuation and it was pretty swift and managed well.

 

[cakebaker]

It's not so bad at POP, but after our last trip at POFQ we waited over an hour for an MK bus EVERY time we tried to use it - both to and from MK.

We have a max wait of 30 minutes before we call someone. I believe the last time we did this was at the MK, called our resort and they transferred us to transportation. Within 5 minutes, a bus showed up. There's never a reason for it to take an hour and what bad luck you must've had to have it happen every time you got on one!

We haven't had to call often, just a handful of times, but it's very effective and cures the problem quickly. There is no way I would stand and wait for a bus for an hour. We do however always make note of the time we arrive at the bus stop. We find so many times, people complaining about slow service and its' been 5 minutes. Waiting often seems longer than it really is, so we always want to make sure we really have a valid complaint before we call.

 

[disney world dreamer]

We are in Orlando now and having a wonderful time.

I'd consider Disneyland my home park, but we make it to FL every 3 or 4 years and enjoy ourselves here as well.

One thing that has stood out for me this trip, and I remember feeling the same way on one of our last trips, is the bottleneck and what a pain in the butt it is to get to the MK. I almost never hear anyone complain about it, which is interesting because it's been such a negative in our experience. We've stayed at POP and WBC. yestersay morning at 7am, it took just under an hour to get from my hotel to inside the gates. Last night, I'd say it was closer to an hour and a half.

Am I doing something wrong? Is that normal? Whenever I hear people mention the trek to the MK, it's always with a positive spin about how removed from reality it is, but trust me, I felt plenty of reality on the way back to the TTC tonight on a standing room only monorail with a sleeping 2 year old in a stroller.

Anyway, we like the MK, but when comparing the MK and Disneyland, the fact that you can walk to your hotel room from the main gates makes a huge difference to me.

Does the MK feel removed from reality enough for you that you don't mind the trek to get there, or did Walt miss the mark, by not allowing any parking nearby and accessibility by foot?

it sounds like you drove.
why did you drive?
its always recommended to take the bus from POP to MK because you are dropped off at the gates and not the TTC.

it never takes more than 20 minutes for me to get from POP to MK using the bus so perhaps thats why i don't complain that it takes 1-1.5hrs since it doesn't.

whether i drive or take the bus it feels magical to me when i get there and i don't care what happened between the hotel and the park.

anywhere on disney property makes me lose touch with reality for a little while and its nice to do that every once in a while.

 

[kaetra]

We have a max wait of 30 minutes before we call someone. I believe the last time we did this was at the MK, called our resort and they transferred us to transportation. Within 5 minutes, a bus showed up. There's never a reason for it to take an hour and what bad luck you must've had to have it happen every time you got on one!

We haven't had to call often, just a handful of times, but it's very effective and cures the problem quickly. There is no way I would stand and wait for a bus for an hour. We do however always make note of the time we arrive at the bus stop. We find so many times, people complaining about slow service and its' been 5 minutes. Waiting often seems longer than it really is, so we always want to make sure we really have a valid complaint before we call.

We never thought to call, we should have done that. It was a very unlucky trip for MK busses. I thought maybe it was the smaller nature of POFQ and the time of year we went. Having a car isn't that much extra $$ and it's nice to have, but I sure would prefer a well run bus system for MK due to the front door service of the bus at the park.

 

[ruthies12]

I hear ya!! We have stayed at Pop 3 times for our last 3 trips and while I loved the not having to worry about finding our way around mentality, the busses are a huge PITA! My traveling party consists of a scooter and a double stroller, so you can just imagine how much fun the busses are for us. For our next trip we are staying at Ft Wilderness campground in our camper and I couldn't be happier! We will be driving so I can pack as much as I want without any TSA to deal with and we will have our car with us. Since we can use the ferry from the campground straight to the gate at MK it will be wonderful. I plan to drive to the rest of the parks.

 

[mickeyluv'r]

We used to bus to the parks. Many times we waited 30 min for a bus to arrive.
Personally, I like the queues at the values. At the mods, folks crowd the bus when it arrives. There is little allowance to say, "Hey, I was here ahead of you." It's kind of survival of the fittest. It is really bad trying to board a bus with someone who is frail.

If you happen to try to get around during a personnel shift change, that can also be a problem. There is a shift change right around noon each day.

 

[whiporee]

Walt never intended or imagined that there would be 27,000 hotel rooms on property that were not surrounding Seven Seas Lagoon.

At the end of the day, all WDW issues come down to this -- there are more people there than the park was designed for. It can handle them, but not on the regular basis it has to now. Those 27,000 rooms are the reason.

And you're absolutely right -- Walt planned there to be a large buffer between Disney and Orlando. He didn't like the mess of 192 when it popped up, and while I'm sure he would have loved the revenue, I think he would agree the number of resorts -- and the adjustments that have been made because of them -- got out of hand in the 90s.