Minnie Vans?

[kcbutterfly]

We are thinking of taking a Minnie Van from AKL to the Poly for dinner at Kona. How convenient/quick is it to use the Minnie Van service? What has your experience been with using a Minnie Van? Any info. is greatly appreciated! Thanks.

 

[queendarvet]

we were just at Kidani and tried to get a minnie van for a brunch reservation at the Contemporary. It was taking a while for a minnie van to pick up so I asked the person at valet and she told me because Kidani is so far out that it can take a while for a minnie van to pick up and suggested we try for UberXL or LyftXL (we had 5 people). It took about 6 mins for a lyftXL to appear. It was also a bit cheaper than a minnie van.

 

[TOBS2010]

The Uber and Lyft XL's only downfall is if you need two carseats.

 

[joelkfla]

Don't look for "LyftXL" in the app; there's no such thing. It's called "Lyft Plus".

 

[Betsy82]

We waited about 5 minutes in April, but we were at the Polynesian. We took it to Blizzard Beach.

 

[AngiTN]

It's varied for us. Sometimes we've gotten matched up with them fairly quickly, just as quick as a Lyft/Uber could show.
Other times, we never got matched with one at all.
Last trip we tried to call for one to go to MK one morning, at park opening. Tried once and no luck, timed out. Tried again and got matched.
We pretty much only use them to/from MK now. Really no reason (for us) to use them anywhere else. There's no benefit

 

[ParrotBill]

we were just at Kidani and tried to get a minnie van for a brunch reservation at the Contemporary. It was taking a while for a minnie van to pick up so I asked the person at valet and she told me because Kidani is so far out that it can take a while for a minnie van to pick up and suggested we try for UberXL or LyftXL (we had 5 people). It took about 6 mins for a lyftXL to appear. It was also a bit cheaper than a minnie van.

Did you use the Lyft App to request the Minnie Van, and did it take a long time to get a response or did you get a response with a long ETA to pickup? What was the pickup time given and what was your expectation?

I am going to post a brief update on Minnie Van use as a new post in a few minutes.

 

[queendarvet]

Did you use the Lyft App to request the Minnie Van, and did it take a long time to get a response or did you get a response with a long ETA to pickup? What was the pickup time given and what was your expectation?

I am going to post a brief update on Minnie Van use as a new post in a few minutes.

I did use the lyft app to call the minnie van and was unable to get a response. I was worried about missing our reservation time so I used Lyft to get a lyft plus. It took about 10 mins to be picked up.

 

[disneyag]

Where does the Minnie Van drop you off if you are going to MK?

 

[joelkfla]

Where does the Minnie Van drop you off if you are going to MK?

At the bus stops. It's closer than many of the resort buses.

 

[OrangeCountyCommuter]

Personally I wasn't impressed. I will stick to cheaper, faster options. (Pay more receive less... uh no!)

 

[JimMIA]

It was taking a while for a minnie van to pick up so I asked the person at valet and she told me because Kidani is so far out that it can take a while for a minnie van to pick up and suggested we try for UberXL or LyftXL (we had 5 people). It took about 6 mins for a lyftXL to appear. It was also a bit cheaper than a minnie van.

First of all, you should have received an ETA estimate from Lyft before you ordered the MinnieVan. And second, you should be able to see the MinnieVan's progress toward you on the app, so you should have a pretty good idea how long it will take.

The only issue with following the progress is that sometimes the companies add rides "to the queue" for the driver to do after dropping off their current passenger.

Uber asks the driver if we want the additional ride, and the rider is notified that the driver will be completing a dropoff close by prior to coming to them.

Lyft doesn't give the driver any choice, although we can cancel the pickup if we don't want to do it. I don't know whether Lyft notifies the rider of the prior dropoff or not.

With Lyft, you can also call the driver; with Uber, you can call or text and they are in the process of rolling out a "chat" capability as well. I won't be "chatting" (or texting) unless I'm waiting at a traffic light...

 

[JimMIA]

The Uber and Lyft XL's only downfall is if you need two carseats.

Uber has some X vehicles and some XL vehicles, in the Orlando market only, with ONE child seat. Lyft does not offer child seats.

 

[AngiTN]

Where does the Minnie Van drop you off if you are going to MK?

Bus stop #11

 

[AngiTN]

First of all, you should have received an ETA estimate from Lyft before you ordered the MinnieVan. And second, you should be able to see the MinnieVan's progress toward you on the app, so you should have a pretty good idea how long it will take.

The only issue with following the progress is that sometimes the companies add rides "to the queue" for the driver to do after dropping off their current passenger.

Uber asks the driver if we want the additional ride, and the rider is notified that the driver will be completing a dropoff close by prior to coming to them.

Lyft doesn't give the driver any choice, although we can cancel the pickup if we don't want to do it. I don't know whether Lyft notifies the rider of the prior dropoff or not.

With Lyft, you can also call the driver; with Uber, you can call or text and they are in the process of rolling out a "chat" capability as well. I won't be "chatting" (or texting) unless I'm waiting at a traffic light...

I'm not sure you understand what PP means. PP is using the phrase "pick up" but they mean "match" or "connect with a car".
The App doesn't give ETA for Minnie Vans, like it does for other classes of service.
There are man times when you select Minnie Van service and try to request one and you never get matched, or connected (or whatever phrase you want to use) with a car. It just sits there and says "searching for a ride" or "connecting" or whatever term, I can't recall now. Eventually it just stops searching, no message given, you look down and see that your search for a ride has stopped. I forget if it's 10 min, or longer. You can restart the search for a Minnie Van or switch to a different class of service and try again.

 

[JimMIA]

I'm not sure you understand what PP means. PP is using the phrase "pick up" but they mean "match" or "connect with a car".
The App doesn't give ETA for Minnie Vans, like it does for other classes of service.
There are man times when you select Minnie Van service and try to request one and you never get matched, or connected (or whatever phrase you want to use) with a car. It just sits there and says "searching for a ride" or "connecting" or whatever term, I can't recall now. Eventually it just stops searching, no message given, you look down and see that your search for a ride has stopped. I forget if it's 10 min, or longer. You can restart the search for a Minnie Van or switch to a different class of service and try again.

Hmmm...that's interesting, and obviously very different from the way both regular Lyft and Uber work. Once a MinnieVan is en route, can you see it on your app?

 

[AngiTN]

Hmmm...that's interesting, and obviously very different from the way both regular Lyft and Uber work. Once a MinnieVan is en route, can you see it on your app?

Yes. And yes, Minnie Van works completely different than traditional classes of services

 

[Collette]

I also tried to get a Minnie Van last Sunday from Kidani Village for an 11 a.m. brunch at the Contemporary. The night before when talking to a cm at the resort, he advised to start requesting at least by 10 a.m. I started at 9:30. Several times the search ended and I restarted. The person at the valet desk said that park opening is an especially busy time. I gave up at 10:15 and asked if they could call a cab. The fare was $24. So about the same cost as the Minnie Van. But not as fun. The taxi arrived quickly from AKL. I was solo this time and didn't want to take Uber or Lyft.

Since you are going for dinner, I'm thinking you might have better luck. At least once when riding the shuttle between Kidani and AKL around dinner time, I saw a Minnie Van parked at AKL waiting.

Last fall when my daughter and family were with me, we rode the Minnie Van two or three times. I don't think we waited over 5-10 minutes. At that time though, the Minnie Vans were only available to limited resorts. Everything may be different now that they service many resorts.

 

[sponica]

I'm not sure you understand what PP means. PP is using the phrase "pick up" but they mean "match" or "connect with a car".
The App doesn't give ETA for Minnie Vans, like it does for other classes of service.
There are man times when you select Minnie Van service and try to request one and you never get matched, or connected (or whatever phrase you want to use) with a car. It just sits there and says "searching for a ride" or "connecting" or whatever term, I can't recall now. Eventually it just stops searching, no message given, you look down and see that your search for a ride has stopped. I forget if it's 10 min, or longer. You can restart the search for a Minnie Van or switch to a different class of service and try again.

When I used the Minnie Van last week, it would briefly pop up with a x minutes away, but usually someone else beat us to the punch. If we weren't automatically paired, we'd cancel the request and send a new one when we saw it pop up. I think it took like 4 or 5 tries. We were trying to get to an 830 'Ohanas breakfast so it was prime minnie van time. That was the only time we used it because it was the only time we needed to use it (although we were super close to requesting one when we got stranded at the Epcot bus station for an hour by the transportation gods...)

 

[wddub2015]

Do the Minnie vans just hang out at particating resorts while they are waiting for ride requests? Or do they also hang out at the parks between rides? Thinking about trying them out to get from Animal Kingdom Park to Disney Springs.