new blog: Reduce Theme Park Lines? Invest in New Attractions

[LeahZ]

http://blog.wdwinfo.com/2014/11/09/reduce-theme-park-lines-invest-in-new-attractions/

 

[Number Six]

What a concept

 

[ChicagoMom]

They definitely need to do something about HS. We visited HS for the first time this past trip (earlier trips were too short) and we were really disappointed. TSMM is cute but I'd never wait 2 hours in line to ride it (we had a FP) but I can understand the lines because what else are you going to do. Honestly if no changes are made to HS, I think we'll skip it entirely during future trips.

 

[BuzzinDownToDisney]

They definitely need to do something about HS. We visited HS for the first time this past trip (earlier trips were too short) and we were really disappointed. TSMM is cute but I'd never wait 2 hours in line to ride it (we had a FP) but I can understand the lines because what else are you going to do. Honestly if no changes are made to HS, I think we'll skip it entirely during future trips.

Big changes are likely on the horizon given recent closings, but it will be painful to get to the finished product. We just did our touring plans and DHS is now a 3 hour park for us instead of a full day one.

 

[Vernie822]

As a kid, my family used to spend at least a day or a day and a half there. My fiancé and I were there in September and I fully anticipated us wishing we had more time there after scheduling maybe 8 hours in the park. I was so wrong. We left by lunch! We rode a few things, saw Anna and Elsa's royal welcome, and we were done. I used to love watching all of the shows. Nothing was really enticing to us. I was really disappointed and he (a first timer) was very unimpressed.

 

[lustergirl]

Got to agree with previous posters. HS needs more to excite me on staying any length of time. I may even skip it on my next trip.

 

[Priory]

Invest in attractions? Nah. I'm sure they're working on a much better solution like planting chips in guests' heads or opening up dinining reservations when the guest is in their mother's womb.

 

[cleverclovers]

Cram more people in the parks. Lower the quality. Raise the prices. Build one, maybe two new "attractions". Repeat.

 

[alvernon90]

I know I am in the minority on this, but I'm one of the people who believes that longer waits are one of the benefits of FP+ whether intended or not -- but I believe that is what Disney wanted. It makes no sense to have a ride like Spaceship Earth as a permanent walk-on, sending out 95% of its seats to run through the attraction completely empty, while other attractions face unbearable crowds.

In an ideal world, there is no such thing as a walk-on except at the very lowest time of year, like early September. A walk-on is wasted ride capacity, which is wasted Disney money, which means our admission money is being wasted. A minimum 5 minute wait vastly reduces that waste, by ensuring a steady supply of riders to fill almost every available seat all throughout the day.

I don't know that Disney needs more attractions, but it does need to replace whatever it eliminates with something more interesting. The real complaint about the longer waits under FP+ is not that a former walk-on now has a steady 10 minute wait, but that the ride itself is not worth riding unless there is no wait. Disney need to replace the attractions recently removed, and then it needs to start replacing existing dull attractions with better ones.

If the 15 worst attractions were replaced by 15 great attractions with the exact same capacity, I doubt anyone would complain even though overall capacity has not grown.

 

[DOOM1001]

I've been saying for years that new attractions are the solution to long lines and crowding and that that's where they should be putting their money in instead of FP+.I guarantee you there's a suit at Disney that even after seeing how expensive FP+ is and how its not showing to be the solution to long lines is probably still suggesting FP+ version 2 instead of spending money on new rides.

 

[CarolynU]

That was exactly my issue with MDE and FP+ It's not the new system I didn't like per se, but just what could have been done with that money in the way of new attractions which would have given the parks a fresh and exciting feel.
I know that I've been spoilt by visiting the parks frequently and for long periods, so to me apart from the mine train nothing is new, and in fact much has been taken away, so the money that they spent on the new technology rather than rides, was to me a waste of an opportunity.
I'm not the target audience though, and the parks are heaving, so I unless Disney's bottom line is affected then I don't see why they would see huge ride investment as a priority, but I live in hope!

 

[Tomh]

Actually, I think they DO see that ride investment is necessary. I think that is why we are seeing the closures in Hollywood Studios. There is already a significant expansion in progress in Animal Kingdom, they just finished an expansion in Magic Kingdom (we won't argue how big it was lol). The only park they have left to give some love to would be Epcot, and I wouldn't be surprised to see some action starting there shortly after Avatar is finished.

 

[mom2rtk]

They don't just need new attractions, they need NET NEW ATTRACTIONS. I know they sometimes need the space for the new things, but not always. Maelstrom/Frozen is a great example of this. All that empty space in the park..... and they choose to close one of the few rides there to put in the first new ride in forever.

 

[ttintagel]

And the new attractions need to be spread out better over the four parks. Even though it's a bit out of date, Wikipedia's list of WDW attractions counts nearly twice as many attractions at the MK as at HS and AK. If you weed out the things that many people don't really consider attractions, like the now-closed American Film Institute Showcase, the imbalance is even greater.

 

[Ava]

I know I am in the minority on this, but I'm one of the people who believes that longer waits are one of the benefits of FP+ whether intended or not -- but I believe that is what Disney wanted. It makes no sense to have a ride like Spaceship Earth as a permanent walk-on, sending out 95% of its seats to run through the attraction completely empty, while other attractions face unbearable crowds.

In an ideal world, there is no such thing as a walk-on except at the very lowest time of year, like early September. A walk-on is wasted ride capacity, which is wasted Disney money, which means our admission money is being wasted. A minimum 5 minute wait vastly reduces that waste, by ensuring a steady supply of riders to fill almost every available seat all throughout the day.

I don't know that Disney needs more attractions, but it does need to replace whatever it eliminates with something more interesting. The real complaint about the longer waits under FP+ is not that a former walk-on now has a steady 10 minute wait, but that the ride itself is not worth riding unless there is no wait. Disney need to replace the attractions recently removed, and then it needs to start replacing existing dull attractions with better ones.

If the 15 worst attractions were replaced by 15 great attractions with the exact same capacity, I doubt anyone would complain even though overall capacity has not grown.

This is a really interesting theory, and likely at least partly true. Running an attraction when there are only a handful of guests riding it per hour is a huge waste of resources and manpower. When we rode Journey into Imagination on our Sept trip, we were literally the only ones on it. We walked in, rode, and got off without seeing another guest. But they still need the same number of CMs to man the attraction, and are using power to run it empty because its a continuous loading attraction. So part of the goal of FP+ was probably to encourage guests to visit less popular attractions and thereby reduce wasted resources.

It may be working for some attractions, but there are clearly still some that almost no one is visiting. These are the ones that should be targeted for a revamp or replacement.