SSR bus question

[POOH&PIGLET]

As I understand it, WDW buses do not go from the parks to Downtown Disney.
Has anyone noticed any significant usage of the SSR buses to get from the parks to Downtown Disney?
How far is it to walk from SSR to Downtown Disney?

 

[Mickeydad]

You can walk over to DTD from SSR. It's a nice 7-10 minute walk.

Mickeydad

 

[Doug7856]

As I understand it, WDW buses do not go from the parks to Downtown Disney.
Has anyone noticed any significant usage of the SSR buses to get from the parks to Downtown Disney?
How far is it to walk from SSR to Downtown Disney?

We just got back from a four night stay at SSR (WONDERFUL!!). The buses were empty for every trip. On one we met a couple of women who wanted to go from the Magic Kingdom to Downtown Disney. The bus driver from their resort (POR) told them to try the SSR bus! They were very nice and we helped them find the path to Downtown Disney, but I can confirm that they were told to use the SSR bus.

 

[SStJean]

We were at SSR from 4-Dec to 13-Dec. The busses were usually empty as others have stated. On one evening, we were returning from one of the parks, EPCOT I think, and has some people on board asking whether the bus dropped off near DTD. By their conversation, I surmise that they had been told by the Transportation folks that it was their fastest ride to DTD. Upon checkout I pulled aside a front desk manager, Jon, to let him know how unhappy I was with the bus service during our stay (30-45 min waits) and of the experience with the "hoppers". He said that he had heard complaints from other guests about the slow busses, but had not heard any complaints about people being told to get to DTD via SSR. He said he would talk to the Transportation folks to have them stop recommending this route. It's not too bad now, but I can see it becoming a problem when the other Phases are completed.

So, 2 things:

1. If you get slow service from the busses at SSR, COMPLAIN EARLY to the desk manager! The more complaints, the faster they can get it resolved.

2. If you come across people hopping the bus to get to DTD, COMPLAIN to the desk manager also!

 

[o.t.4disney]

We stayed at SSR fro 12/4-12/11.

It is much quicker to walk to and from Downtown Disney.

One morning it took over an hour to get a bus to the Magic Kingdom. There were numerous buses to every other park that were empty but the driver could not transport us. The drivers called into their dispatcher and several guest called from the bus stop to report this. On another day it took 40 minutes to get a bus from MGM to SSR.
These were our only negative experiences witht the Disney Transportation.

 

[DIZZNY]

We were at SSR over Thanksgiving week and never experienced any problems with the bus service. The max wait time was probably no more than 15 minutes to any park. We never took the bus to DTD because our walk time was less than 10 minutes. We took the boat over a couple times mainly for a change of pace but it was a 15 minute walk to the dock from our villa so walking was much faster. We actually drove over once and parked near the dock to take the boat. Once all the phases are open, the most convenient route is really going to depend on where your villa is. We never heard anyone on the bus just trying to get to DTD through the SSR bus.

Our biggest problem was trying to return to SSR from MK at about 11:00 after early opening. We rode all the rides without any waittime and abandoned the park once the crowds started building. What we didn't realize was that apparently other people rarely do this and the bus service is focused on bringing people to the parks and not back to the resorts. As the buses were dropping people off, they pulled into the closest stop available, not necessarily the one that served their resort. We waited at the SSR bus stop for 45 minutes watching bus after bus pull up and pull away to different resorts until finally one guy felt sorry for us and took us to SSR even though he was ?pop century. I feel sorry for the long wait that this may have caused at pop but after 45 minutes of waiting, we didn't feel too guilty.

 

[Mississippian]

2. If you come across people hopping the bus to get to DTD, COMPLAIN to the desk manager also!

You should get down on your hands and knees and kiss the feet of the people who are "hopping" the bus to get to DTD. Disney doesn't like running empty buses; a full bus means faster service, as Disney will add more buses to accomodate the crowds.

I'm not a DTD fan, and not a owner at SSR, but I think your logic on this issue is very poor.

 

[DrTomorrow]

You should get down on your hands and knees and kiss the feet of the people who are "hopping" the bus to get to DTD. Disney doesn't like running empty buses; a full bus means faster service, as Disney will add more buses to accomodate the crowds.

I'm not a DTD fan, and not a owner at SSR, but I think your logic on this issue is very poor.

Short-term thinking alert!!!
Yes, for now, when SSR is serving only four buildings, an extra 5 / 10 / 20 people in line won't hurt, and may - rarely - prompt another bus. However, when SSR is serving 18 buildings - upwards of 800 villas - a bunch of DTD jumpers could easily keep SSR owners/guests off the bus. I'd rather not see the SSR -> DTD crowd grow over time, and I'd like to see Disney Transportation nip this in the bud with their drivers.

If there is a legitimate un-met need for new bus routes to DTD, let WDW Transportation create them....

IMHO - YMMV

 

[tjkraz]

We took the busses maybe 8-10 times during our recent stay and only had one bad experience--about a 20 minute wait for a bus to MGM mid-morning. One of the bus drivers stopped and asked how long the group had been waiting, and then called-in to see if he could transport us. He couldn't, but the bus was only another couple minutes behind.

Another time when grabbing a bus at the Magic Kingdom, we arrived to find a group waiting that seemed to be miffed. The bus arrived within 10 minutes of us getting there, but I'm not sure how long it might have been since the last one was along.

We still much prefer to have our own car, but in terms of poor bus service, nothing compares to the time it took us an hour to get from DD to BWV.