Monorail - Why no expansion?

[tp1830]

I might argue that there is no ROI.

Resorts on the monorail line charge a premium for the service...which i might assume is directly related to some money going from the resort to the monorail maintenance.

 

[JimmyV]

The current problems with the monorail is that the trains are... old.

This does seem to be a source of many problems. The original monorail trains were out of service within 20 years of use. The current monorail trains are coming up on 30 years of use. At some point, you have to stop applying duct tape and chicken wire and spend money on new rolling stock.

 

[Bluegrrl]

They have toyed with light rail in the past, which would have been neat. But look at our stupid state - our praying mantis looking governer turned down free $$ from the state for light rail (a little ot, sorry). And when Florida was thinking about light rail as well, Disney nixed it because it was planned to stop at Universal and Busch Gardens.

 

[redsbe]

Guests to WDW are not visiting to experience the monorail, to drive increase in guests and spending any investment is going to be where people will use and be attracted to it - within the parks. Not on a novelty form of low capacity transportation.

 

[OKW Lover]

Resorts on the monorail line charge a premium for the service

I've found prices at the Contemporary and the Poly to be very similar to what I find at BW/BC/YC when comparing the same room type and dates.

 

[joe1946]

 

[JimmyV]

I've found prices at the Contemporary and the Poly to be very similar to what I find at BW/BC/YC when comparing the same room type and dates.

So maybe the embedded cost of transportation on Friendship Boats equals that of a monorail? J/K. I am certain that Disney does not factor monorail costs into the rates charged at the GF/CR/Poly. Convenience and desirability? Absolutely. But not the cost of the service itself.

 

[hakepb]

I went to a Disney Institute program 7ish years ago and someone asked that question. The group leader (lifelong Disney employee) said it cost approx. $1 million per mile to add on.

I thought the $1million/mile was the orginal construction cost.
Add in inflation, and costs would be much, much larger.

I still shudder to think about the fuel and pollution caused by all the busses and think there should be a more Eco-friendly option.

 

[RedAngie]

Those estimates are extraordinarily low. A very conservative estimate of the capital cost of construction would be 4-5 times that amount per mile.

In addition to the extremely high costs, the monorail has very little ability to increase capacity during peak times--you can fairly easily add a few dozen more buses to the system; not so with monorail trains or cars--and you're also in trouble if the monorail breaks down (not uncommon). SO it winds up being a very unflexible form of transportation.

Yep. According to 1960s thinking, most U.S. cities were supposed to have extensive monorail systems in place by the 1980s. But the costs, limitations, and other problems showed the idea was not practical.

Disney should be able to build a monorail for much lower per mile than that Las Vegas one. Disney already owns the land. A large part of LV's cost was land acquisition and easements. But still too expensive.

 

[sunshine1]

I am sure i heard one of the monorail staff say a while back that Disney could build a fourth park for the amount of money that would cost to extend the monorail.

Dont know if that true but thats what they said.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

View attachment 161840

And Vegas isn't a swamp!

 

[Robo]

I still shudder to think about the fuel and pollution caused by all the busses and think there should be a more Eco-friendly option.

No boo-hoos from me.
There are two kinds of efficiency.

One, the cost of the transportation conveyance.
Two, the availability of the transportation.

If they built monorail lines to DHS and DAK,
where would the hubs be on the opposite end of line from the parks?

How would guests at:
All Star x3,
Animal Kingdom Lodge,
Art of Animation,
Caribbean Beach,
Coronado Springs,
Ft. Wilderness,
Old Key West,
Pop Century,
Port Orleans x2,
Wilderness Lodge,
Saratoga Springs
Beach Club,
Yacht Club,
Boardwalk,
get to those hubs without the use of buses?

It would be a gargantuan task to handle more guests on the monorails, if
they all had to "connect" at some point (which they would.)

Here's just one way it might work:
Who (at the Grand Floridian) would want to ride the loop (MK stop/ Contemporary stop) to TTC,
disembark, walk to Epcot train,
ride to Epcot station,
disembark, walk to DHS train,
ride to DHS station,
disembark, walk to DAK train,
ride to DAK station.
How long would THAT trip take?
How many trains would that involve to carry the traffic?
Efficient? Well...

 

[hakepb]

Let's not pretend that busses are "cheap"
A good public bus costs about $1million ... That need to be replaced more often than monorails. (Although they probably get nearly 2 million miles out of a bus)

It's just the new resort budget planning would rather buy (10) $1 million busses than $100million + on a monorail...cheaper but not really cheap.

 

[Robo]

Let's not pretend that busses are "cheap"
A good public bus costs about $1million ... That need to be replaced more often than monorails. (Although they probably get nearly 2 million miles out of a bus)

It's just the new resort budget planning would rather buy (10) $1 million busses than $100million + on a monorail...cheaper but not really cheap.

But, much more efficient.
Buses are infinitely more flexible.

You're not putting all of your needs on one fixed track.
If a monorail breaks down, all the trains on that loop are out of business.
Guests are stranded 25 feet in the air, in a metal and glass tube, without air conditioning.
If a bus breaks down, you just send another bus.

If a resort or two has a lot of guests that need to go to Epcot at X time on Thursday for a "music thing,"
just send extra buses to that/those resort(s.)

If DAK has thousands of extra guests leaving at 11:30PM after the last show of RoL (if only!!)
send extra buses.

 

[Ellwood970]

Hell, I wish they would bring back the sky buckets that took you from tomorrow land to frontier land. Could you imagine how much time that would shave off your park touring?

It would take one to two hours at least from the day to go both ways that's how long the lines always were

 

[SgtTibbs]

Fine, the Monorail while cool is largely impractical on a larger scale. OK. So let's blue sky. How would you revolutionize moving a daily hoard of people between parks, hotels and other sites?

I like the idea of thousands of self driving cars. Hop in, tap your destination on a touch screen and off you go. It would be the perfect proof of concept for the idea, a limited controlled environment, very much in keeping with the EPCOT ideals and way cool.

 

[Robo]

I am sure i heard one of the monorail staff say a while back that Disney could build a fourth park for the amount of money that would cost to extend the monorail.

Dont know if that true but thats what they said.

Disney already built a fourth park.

 

[hakepb]

Actually, I think the biggest monorail problem is (lack of) speed.
A viable, alternate transportation system in WDW would need to use speeds of 70+mph to be a worthwhile selling point to guests

 

[zaccaglin]

The estimated cost of a monorail expansion is $6 to $10 million per mile, plus exorbitant maintenance costs every year. Just take a minute to do the math on that.

Plus another 80 million each per train to support the system.

I went to a Disney Institute program 7ish years ago and someone asked that question. The group leader (lifelong Disney employee) said it cost approx. $1 million per mile to add on.

That was the cost when they expanded to Epcot in 82. And it was just for the beams. Not the extra trains needed to support a larger system.

 

[k5thbeatle]

They have toyed with light rail in the past, which would have been neat. But look at our stupid state - our praying mantis looking governer turned down free $$ from the state for light rail (a little ot, sorry). And when Florida was thinking about light rail as well, Disney nixed it because it was planned to stop at Universal and Busch Gardens.

You might want to do a little research on where that "free $$" was coming from. Not exactly "free".