Real closing time/end of ride lines

[palmtreelover08]

Hello-
When do they cut off the end of the line for rides? For example- Epcot closes at 9:00. Soarin' has a posted wait time of 50 minutes. Can people get in line until 9- or do cast members try and judge the last ride to be at park closing and hope for the best? If people could still get in line at say 8:50- then guests would be in the park well after closing. Thanks in advance.

 

[LBIJim]

Hello-
When do they cut off the end of the line for rides? For example- Epcot closes at 9:00. Soarin' has a posted wait time of 50 minutes. Can people get in line until 9- or do cast members try and judge the last ride to be at park closing and hope for the best? If people could still get in line at say 8:50- then guests would be in the park well after closing. Thanks in advance.

Generally, they close the entrance to the rides at park closing time. Yes, you can enter a 50 minute standby line to Soarin' at 8:59 pm.

However, I'm sure Disney reserves the right to close lines earlier if conditions warrant it.

 

[palmtreelover08]

Wow- ok- thanks- helps with planning

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

Disney does not close the attraction lines early. At Epcot for example, lines are open until straight up 9 pm regardless of the length of the queue.

However, they do often greatly exaggerate the wait time to discourage late arrivals. In your example, a posted wait of 50 minutes would generally mean an actual wait of 10-15 minutes. It is not uncommon to see a posted wait of 4 times the actual wait late in the evening.

You can use this info to your advantage and get in some really short lines late at night, while other guests shake their heads and just head to the exits and/or shops.

 

[preemiemama]

We did exactly this in July and only waited 10-15 mins. It was great!

 

[meljean]

We did this with toy story mania. We got in line less than 10 minutes before park close and it said 60 min. wait. We waited 15 min. I understand why they do that and we were so glad we did it one more time.

 

[DOOM1001]

We did this with toy story mania. We got in line less than 10 minutes before park close and it said 60 min. wait. We waited 15 min. I understand why they do that and we were so glad we did it one more time.

You pretty much can't believe wait times at the end of the night,it's happened to me a bunch of times they'll post long wait times so people don't make the line and go home.

 

[CAL2]

great question, good to know will try this when we go

cal

 

[Toffeewoffy]

Ah, so that'll explain the 60 minute queue for Peter Pan at midnight back in February ...

... at least I hope that was the reason - it was EMH until 2am that night.

 

[palmtreelover08]

Great info. Thanks!

 

[Lilliputian]

They don't just exaggerate the wait times--they also "stack" the lines so that it looks like the waits are long. For example, on TSMM, they might keep people from going inside so that people are visibly lined up outside, making it look like the line is really long. In reality, they just keep people outside for a while, and then they let most of those people go in to a mostly empty queue. Then a few minutes later, they let more of the outside people inside.

 

[WEDWDW]

The only exception I have ever seen to this "rule" was a recent report that they are "closing" the TSMM line during PM EMH early enough for the line to be through riding by the end of PM EMH.