Own Transport v Disney Transport (for spreadsheet geeks especially)

[pad406]

So I've always wondered if there really is a time advantage of having your own car (and walking in certain cases) over using Disney transportation. Being a bit of a spreadsheet geek, I though others might like it also. Based on google maps travel times and what I could find on Disney Bus (or boat) information I designed a spreadsheet to work it out for fun. When I finished I thought that others might find it useful, amusing, utterly ridiculous, so here it is:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-z4YWTsrAc3Y29xOHFnZFEzSEk/view?usp=sharing

Basically you enter the resort you are staying it and the number of times you intend to visit each park and it should give you and idea of the travel time involved. Here's a screen shot of what it looks like:

So in this case I am staying in the Beach Club
I'm going to
Magic Kingdom 4 times
Epcot 4 times
Hollywood Studios 3 times
Animal Kingdom twice
Blizzard & Typhoon once each
Downtown Disney twice

As I'm in the Beach Club, I'll be walking to Epcot and to HS. The transfer time columns are used to allow for waiting on buses/boats (have taken a 5m average for all here) and for Own transport getting from car park to gates. So here I allowed 20m for MK (car park - TTC - gates) and 5m for AK (guess on walk from car to gate). Put in 0 for BB and TL as you just walk from car to gates, probably no real difference in walking from bus to gates. I've pretty much taken it that walking to the car is going to be pretty much the same as walking to the bus, but you can add in a few minutes to the transfer time column to allow for this if you wish.

The resort name and visits columns are formatted as dropdowns, just click into them and select what you want.

Own stands for Own Transport (car or walking)
DT for Disney Transport

 

[Shea&Van]

Pretty neat! Thanks so much for sharing this...interesting!

 

[a742246]

It looks good but I don't know how accurate it would be.

 

[pad406]

It looks good but I don't know how accurate it would be.

That's my problem. We always use the car, except for MK so am not very familiar with the buses, nor have we gone often enough and to enough resorts. I couldn't get any Disney supplied information on the bus times, I had to glean them from various places. Some I thought seemed really wild till I noticed that the bus might make one or more stops on the way, e.g., multi-resort pick up, stopping at Typhoon Lagoon or Blizzard beach on the way, etc. If I could get reasonably accurate times, updating the sheet is very easy to do. So if anybody can point me somewhere, I'll gladly do that

 

[GillianP1301]

I am a certified spreadsheet geek and I love this, thank you!

Of course there are a lot of variables that could play into this, weather, time of day, time of year, etc... But, I think it gives a pretty good representation if you're just looking for straight comparison. I compared it against my travel times on my last vacation (I always drive around WDW) and the drive times were pretty close to what I experienced (mine were consistently a bit shorter, but I was also non peak time).

 

[supersnoop]

The "Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World" has a table that maps out this exact problem. They've included parking and transit times, so they match bus to car from room to turnstile. I believe they have either a best-case or worst case column, as well as an average.

 

[pad406]

I am a certified spreadsheet geek and I love this, thank you!

Of course there are a lot of variables that could play into this, weather, time of day, time of year, etc... But, I think it gives a pretty good representation if you're just looking for straight comparison. I compared it against my travel times on my last vacation (I always drive around WDW) and the drive times were pretty close to what I experienced (mine were consistently a bit shorter, but I was also non peak time).

Thanks Gillian, good to know the driving times are reasonably ok. Though I do generally find Google Maps to be close. The buses are the difficult part in this. Boats and monorail are reasonably consistent, buses are more difficult to judge particularly as there may be stops involved.

 

[pad406]

The "Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World" has a table that maps out this exact problem. They've included parking and transit times, so they match bus to car from room to turnstile. I believe they have either a best-case or worst case column, as well as an average.

Thanks for that, but not only do they charge I'm sure it's copyrighted also

 

[supersnoop]

Thanks for that, but not only do they charge I'm sure it's copyrighted also

But well worth the price. Not to belittle your attempt, but google maps and guessing at wait times isn't going to provide much useful information. The data they've collected is what makes it worth purchasing the book. Maybe check touringplans.com; I think they're the same company. Maybe they have the times posted online somewhere.

Also, for Magic Kingdom, don't forget that you have to park at the TTC, while Disney buses drop you much closer to the front gates.

 

[pad406]

But well worth the price. Not to belittle your attempt, but google maps and guessing at wait times isn't going to provide much useful information. The data they've collected is what makes it worth purchasing the book. Maybe check touringplans.com; I think they're the same company. Maybe they have the times posted online somewhere.

Also, for Magic Kingdom, don't forget that you have to park at the TTC, while Disney buses drop you much closer to the front gates.

So here I allowed 20m for MK (car park - TTC - gates)

Exactly why I've allowed 20m there, and that's personal experience. As to google maps I have always found them to be pretty accurate. Bus times are the only ones I'd be a little concerned on and I don't think, that as a whole, they are too far out. Anyways the idea here really is to see how the resort choice affects your stay based on where you are actually going to visit and how often. Maybe Animal Kingdom is not as far out as one thought

 

[supersnoop]

Exactly why I've allowed 20m there, and that's personal experience. As to google maps I have always found them to be pretty accurate. Bus times are the only ones I'd be a little concerned on and I don't think, that as a whole, they are too far out. Anyways the idea here really is to see how the resort choice affects your stay based on where you are actually going to visit and how often. Maybe Animal Kingdom is not as far out as one thought

Generally speaking, take Disney transportation to the Magic Kingdom, and drive everywhere else. At all other parks, the time from you car to the gate is going to be shorter than the average wait time for a bus.

 

[Ladygoldenhair]

I agree with the PP, you can epwait for a bus both ways much longer then it takes to drive to the parks. Especially at night. I always take our car except for MK when staying on site. It's just faster and more convienant if we want to eat off site for dinner.

 

[Lewisc]

Maybe it's just me, I think the spreadsheet is less then worthless. It shows estimated times, to the minute, but the data used doesn't provide that kind of precision.

Google driving times don't account for traffic at park opening and closing, the time it takes to have your magic band scanned and possibly a tram from the lot to the gate.

Disney bus times are all over the place. JMO the biggest variable for buses is the number of guests with wheelchairs (or scooters). Slows loading and unloading. Disney doesn't seem to dispatch extra buses to compensate. A 15 minute wait can become a 30 minute wait. JMO but a real issue at WL where Disney frequently has one bus making a continuous loop.

That said the general rule is 20-30 minutes for and maybe 10-15 minutes if you drive. Any attempt to quantify the difference to the minute is very misleading.

Disney experimented with having the app tell you the expected wait time for the next bus. 20 minute wait walk to your car. 5 minute wait consider letting Disney drive you.

edited to add:
A better experiment. For one vacation have a family split with some waiting for Disney transporation while the others walk to their car. I have no doubt driving will save some time.

 

[pad406]

I think that the usefulness is directly related to what you want from it. If you are looking to micro-plan your travel whilst at WDW, then I'd 100% agree that it's useless. Much in the same way that looking at historical average wait times would be useless if you were to arrange an ADR based on them. If someone were to say BTMR is a 3:20 ride, the average wait time for the day I'm there is 35m and it's going to take me 10m to walk to a restaurant, therefore I'll get in line at 12:00 and still make my ADR at 1:00, it would be a silly use of average wait times.

However, if you're looking at staying in WDW and wondering based on where you stay and what parks, and how often, you are going to visit, it will, at least, give an average indication of the relative travel time per resort.

But it was only a bit of fun that I thought I'd share