Need POP vs ASMo comparison help!

[Melissa R]

We have a trip coming up in Sept, and I'm starting to wonder if I should make a resort change. It's me, DH, and two sons ages 7 and 2. We stayed at ASMovies last year in Toy Story and LOVED it. We had excellent bus service, no parking problems, and I felt like our room was very close to the food court/bus area. Since it was such a successful trip, I booked the same resort.

Tonight at dinner, DS7 asked if we can stay at Pop Century. (I guess he's been watching that planning DVD too much!) The trip is all about making the kids happy, so I'm thinking about calling tomorrow to see if we can change to POP. However, I have a few concerns and wonder if any POP vets can help. (Especially looking for some people who have stayed at both POP and ASMo!)

- Buses - Last year, we rarely rode on a crowded bus, and we almost never had to wait for a second bus to come because a bus didn't have room for us. I'm concerned that the fact that POP is a much larger capacity resort would mean more crowded buses. I've also read of long lines at park closing with 2 hour waits....are people exaggerating? I'd just die if we were standing in a line for 2 hours and looked over at the AS line and it was short!

- Bus stops - I've also read that the POP bus stops are the furthest away from the park gates. Is this true?

- Resort layout - I have read that the layout of POP is better than ASMo, but I don't know how. It looks so much bigger than the AS resorts, so it seems like it'd be a longer walk to get to the food court.

- Food court - Since we've got little kids, we eat a lot of food court meals. I have read some people think the food court isn't as good as the AS. Is there really a difference? Seems to me that food court food would be fairly standard since it's all frozen, mass produced food basically.

Anything at all that will help me make a decision I won't regret would be greatly appreciated! I would love to try something new for the benefit of added fun for my son, but last year at the ASMovies was so perfect, I'm afraid that Pop Century would somehow not meet our expectations.

Thanks!

 

[bairdbeth]

I've stayed at and loved both. My DD (8) loved Pop Century and picks it over all the All Stars and the Contemporary. She loved the Pop jets and the flower showers at the pool. She was intrigued by the rubicks cube ( we bought a small one), twister and the foos ball men. We never saw huge lines for Pop, but as lines got longer, they sent more buses. I used a scooter and it was taking a while to load 2 scooters on so another bus came and took the people waiting. I like the fact that there are queus for the buses. No one can rush the bus. I always had much longer waits for All Star busses than I did for Pop. The food court is great! I think better than ASMo. My DD loved the frozen coke machines and refilled her mug often! SHe also loved the chicken nuggets and cheese fries. The have different Mom's meals each night and they are good as are the sloppy joe's. We ate at the food court almost every night. The resort is well laid out and fairly compact. Everyone's opinion is different, but ask my DD and she will tell you to try Pop Century. You can't go wrong either way.

 

[Melissa R]

Thanks, bairdbeth! Sounds like we would be ok to switch.

Bumping now in hopes of more opinions. Help, please? I want to be sure about this before switching!

 

[Deweysgirl]

Melissa R-I sent you a PM.

 

[Magic2000]

We've also stayed at both and we LOVED them both!!!

My youngest DD absolutely fell in love with AS Movies! She loved 101 Dalmations area! Every time we passed by the "TV", she would always play like she was on TV and talk with the little dog there! We had no problems with bus service; food court/bus stops were a short walk away, and our room was VERY QUIET!!

For our trip in July, we stayed at Pop Century and had a GREAT time! Food court was fine; bus service was fine (one time, we waited about 20 minutes for a bus at Epcot because we had just missed the bus); and our room was very quiet - even though we overlooked the kiddy pool area!! We were in the bldg w/Mowgli and Baloo! Also, Pop Century does not share buses!!!

We are heading back to Pop Century in December!! Have a great trip - and have fun deciding!!!

 

[Melissa R]

I guess one of my other concerns is that I know it's a bigger resort than ASMo and I don't want to be somewhere that feels that much more crowded. I know that the food court at ASMo got some long lines at peak times, so I can only imagine that the lines at the food court at Pop would be even longer since there are more people.

Does Pop feel more crowded? (And I know - we're going to WDW - there will be lines and crowds. We can handle this, but I'd rather be somewhere that feels less crowded.)

I've also heard of people complaining about "paper thin walls." Is this more of an issue at POP than at ASMo?

Another question - the AC. I've heard that it kicks off if there's no motion (at night, ex). Well, we found that our room at ASMo got warm (to us) at night - is it the same AC system, or is it even worse at POP?

Help Help Help!!!!!!

Oh, and I called CRO, and I was told that there are only 2 rooms available for our dates and our code. That's making me feel so pressured!!!!

 

[ktglads]

Well, another overlooked thing is that Pop is actually cheaper. Its not by much, but the tax at the all-star is 11.5% and Pop is 11%. You actually save $ in the less tax. Its not a significant savings but hey, its less money that you have to pay.

Personally, Pop is my first choice in values. We were there in May and it did not seem busy at all and it is a large resort. Even in the morning, the lines were never too long and it seemed that there were always tables available.

 

[ead79]

I have stayed at Pop (Dec. 2003) and All Star Music (May 2004), so I can compare those two for you if it helps at all.

We preferred Pop for a few reasons, though we certainly enjoyed our stay at All Star Music. Here are a few of the things we liked a bit better about Pop:

--The food court--we felt that there was a wider variety of choices at Pop, and they were much more efficient (even when I had a special request of a philly cheesesteak with no onions)

--The theming--this is totally personal taste, but we found the theming at Pop to be much more entertaining. It was really neat to look at the shadowboxes with memorabilia from each decade in the lobby. We also liked touring the resort to see how Disney had represented each decade.

--The bus service--we loved the fact that Pop has its own bus, whereas the All Star resorts share a bus. We were there 6 days after it opened, and though the resort was crowded, we had no problems catching a bus.

Hope that helps!

 

[Melissa R]

Bumping to see if anyone else can offer me any advice on this decision!

I guess one thing I'm wondering about is that everyone mentions not having to share a bus as a major perk for Pop, but when we stayed at ASMo last year, we had GREAT bus service - we almost always had seats and only stood at park closing. Huh.

Any more input?

So far the things making me want to switch to Pop are the frozen Cokes in the refillable mugs and the popping water play area for the kids. I'm trying to decide if these are a big enough deal to switch and take a chance for.

 

[ILoveWDW2003]

Originally posted by ktglads
Well, another overlooked thing is that Pop is actually cheaper. Its not by much, but the tax at the all-star is 11.5% and Pop is 11%. You actually save $ in the less tax. Its not a significant savings but hey, its less money that you have to pay.

Actually Pop is 11.5% (as are all of the other Disney resorts), except the All-Stars which are 13%. The All-Stars are in a different county.

 

[Simba's Mom]

Originally posted by ead79

--The bus service--we loved the fact that Pop has its own bus, whereas the All Star resorts share a bus. We were there 6 days after it opened, and though the resort was crowded, we had no problems catching a bus.

Hope that helps!

I was kind of wondering the same thing, and didn't know about the All-Stars sharing buses. When I stayed at ASMusic and then at ASSports, each All Stars had its own bus. They share buses now? Is that all the time, or just certain seasons?

 

[Melissa R]

I'm also a bit confused about the bus issue being such a big deal since we had no trouble with buses last year at ASMo. I think we stood a couple of times when it was close to park opening or closing, but other than that we always had seats and rarely waited more than 5 minutes for a bus. So when I hear everyone commenting that Pop is better because of the buses, it confuses me because I've also read about 1-2 hour waits at closing with lines that stretch forever, and of having to stand a lot on the bus - not just at peak times.

Any more info on this?

 

[mmickeya]

Hi Melissa

I have been to both. I have stayed at the All Star (1997 - 2002) and at the POP in Dec '03.
Both are pretty the same. But I would return at POP for a couple of reason
1. The water "pipe"
2.I love to take a walk (not walk enough during the day ) and they made a pathway to walk near a pound.
3. The employees over there have some much pleasure. Once we are eating there and suddenly every employees stop working and begin to dance, very funny.

As for the buses, we had less problem at POP because some day or at some hour AS share buses.

I'm sure you'll be happy at either places.

 

[Magic2000]

When we stayed at the All Star Movies, it was in December (twice) and October (once). Both were relatively "low season".
In Dec, we never really shared a bus with the other resorts, or at least when we were riding.

Last Oct, we often shared buses. The buses would come to Movies and sometimes were already half full or more. A couple of times, coming back from the parks in the day, we would stop at the other two hotels first, then go to Movies. We never shared a bus at the end of the day when the parks were closing.

Sometimes we got to sit on the bus, but sometimes we stood. It wasn't that big of a deal to us. (Although after MNSSHP, my DD was SO tired!) We never waited more than about 15 minutes for a bus. At park closing, sometimes as our bus was pulling out, another bus was pulling in. Actually, I've even thought that we've had better bus service at the All Star Movies than at some of the deluxes!!

One of the things we noticed about Pop was that, even though it was the week of July 4th - bus service was EXCELLENT!!! It was nice to see an EMPTY bus pull up at the hotel - although at the times we were heading out to the parks, the lines weren't all that long. And, when we were heading back to the hotel for our mid-day break, it was nice to go straight back to the hotel!

At both resorts - we NEVER heard our neighbors!! We really didn't hear anything from the "outside", even though our room at Pop Century overlooked the kiddie pool. I was a little concerned about the AC at Pop Century too, but we did not have a problem at all! It was nice and cool in the room, even when we had been out all day. Although we kept it on 65, I don't think it really got down to 65 at night! But again, no complaints on the AC.

I don't find either hotel to be "large"! It was an easy walk to our room from the food court/bus stop area. At All Star Movies, we stayed in Love Bug once, and 101 Dalmations twice. At Pop Century, we stayed in the 60s, the bldg with Mowgli & Baloo! We did not feel crowded at all! At Pop Century, we walked up around 2:00 PM and was able to get a lounge chair around the pool. We didn't swim at all on our Dec visits to Movies, but a couple of times in Oct - again, no problem finding a lounge chair. Food court areas at both resorts were not a problem at any of our stays!

I don't think you'd be disappointed in either hotel!!! We really enjoyed the nostalgia of Pop Century! DH loved looking at all the "stuff" they had from back in the 50s, 60's, etc. We didn't find the resort to be too large! It was nice to walk around and see the different icons on the bldgs!

Hope this helps! Either way - enjoy your stay!!! Have a great trip!!!