SSR buses

[syzslak]

How's the bus situation at SSR? Long waits? Big crowds when the parks close? Just trying to sort it out.

Thanks.

 

[ricapito]

How's the bus situation at SSR? Long waits? Big crowds when the parks close? Just trying to sort it out.

Thanks.

Sucked first week of January. Long waits and clueless drivers, stops at Blizzard Beach making things worse. Busses weren't overcrowded tho..

 

[woody64]

We were there 1/15/05 - 1/22/05 and they were no worse than OKW. We always seemed to pick the last bus though. We were tempted to j plan a "take the 1st bus" trip but everytime the first bus was the one we wanted.

 

[ErinC]

It was hit or miss last week. Sometimes we got lucky getting busses quickly. A couple of times we had to ride the OKW bus to get back. Our worst was a 40 minute wait at 11:30 pm. at Epcot. We sat through 2 OKW busses, when I finally complained to the OKW bus driver that NO SSR busses had come, she made a phone call and then offered to take us after her OKW route. We finally arrived back at SSR around 12:45. Ridiculous, since Epcot is the closest park to SSR. I'm not sure an SSR bus was ever going to come. We still enjoy the transportation by Disney, but I'm hoping the service will improve as the resort grows. Most of the busses were not crowded, so that is a plus. I just don't think they have it down to a science yet. In fact, coming home from MK at closing on Saturday night, we had a trainee bus driver. There was a veteran driver guiding him as to where he needed to stop the bus. He was having a hard time with the brakes, he about jerked us out of our seats one time! But I guess they have to learn somewhere along the way, why not try them out on the SSR guests since there are so few stops.

 

[DrTomorrow]

Spotty, as of early December. Pick-ups at the resort were no problem: quick, timely and never more than a few on the bus. Pick-ups at parks were a mixed bag: no trouble at Epcot and Studios, but 2 nights at MK closing and on early afternoon at AK we had the "well, there goes the third CBR bus" experience.

I suspect that, as SSR opens more and more buildings, the bus service will improve a bit.

IMHO - YMMV

 

[Good Ol Gal]

We were there in early Dec and had no problems at all.

The longest we waited was 20min at Epcot after Illuminations. We felt pretty lucky there.. OKW people were waiting when we got there and still waiting when we left!! YUCK!! There were only a total of 20 people getting on our SSR bus..and 6 were us!! The line for OKW was HUGE!

At SSR we never waited more than 10 mins for a bus and they weren't crowded at all. Drivers were nice.

We are worried about once they open more buildings. Will they have different routes?? Will they all run the same route, making the buses fill up by the end of the route? Add more buses?

I am stressing over a situation that is months and months away... AGH!

 

[tjkraz]

Our worst was a 40 minute wait at 11:30 pm. at Epcot. We sat through 2 OKW busses, when I finally complained to the OKW bus driver that NO SSR busses had come, she made a phone call and then offered to take us after her OKW route. We finally arrived back at SSR around 12:45. Ridiculous, since Epcot is the closest park to SSR. I'm not sure an SSR bus was ever going to come.

I thought I read that OKW and SSR often share busses at park closing times. Perhaps the driver was at fault.

We took the busses about a half-dozen times. Most were typical Disney experiences. Our longest wait was departing for MGM around 10am. Took about 20 minutes--other folks at the stop said we just missed the last one.

Another time leaving the MK around noon things appeared to be running slowly. When we arrived at the bus stop, there was already a group present. Judging by their agitated state, I'd say they had been waiting much longer. For us it was only about 10-15 minutes before the bus arrived...and in that time I didn't see multiple busses for the other resorts.

 

[DrTomorrow]

I thought I read that OKW and SSR often share busses at park closing times. [...]

Yep, we've experienced both the SSR only and SSR after all OKW stops routes - and with no obvious rhyme or reason.

 

[MikeyNS]

This may sound silly.. but in October we thought the buses were excellent and not crowded at all..

Compared to the BW buses we experienced last week (was it a week ago!? Ugh) I thought SSR was better. (Probably not the best times of year to do a comparison though.. but I was disappointed in the BW bus system!)

 

[Capn Dave]

Yep, we've experienced both the SSR only and SSR after all OKW stops routes - and with no obvious rhyme or reason.

We have experienced the same thing. The bus situation at least at SSR is really hit or miss. There doesn't seem to be any discernable schedule. If there is a schedule I wish they would post it at the bus stops and then stick to it.
We have waited up to 45 minutes at SSR for a bus after just missing our bus.
There was talk of installing monorail service out to SSR. Sounds like a great idea, especially once phase three is complete. However I doubt it will ever happen due to the huge construction expense of a monorail system.

Oh well, maybe they will figure out the bus system.

 

[kathyseb]

We stayed at SSR the week after Thanksgiving and only had one problem with the bus. That was one night at EPCOT. Two OKW buses came and still no SSR. The driver called in and a bus was there in a matter of minutes.

 

[imlazar]

How's the bus situation at SSR? Long waits? Big crowds when the parks close? Just trying to sort it out.

Thanks.

We were there 2/5-2/13 and the only time the bus was crowded was coming back on Sunday night from the Magic Kingdom after park close (7:00 PM). Other than that we waited no more than 20 minutes and the buses were generally lightly loaded.

One thing to keep in mind though, a lot of folks have figured out that they can ride the bus from an attraction to SSR as a short-cut to downtown disney, bypassing more crowded buses. So you might more crowded buses on Friday/Saturday nights.

 

[murcor]

We were at SSR Jan 13-22, 2005. Very impressed with the buses, no complaints.

 

[eileenfk]

I was there over Christmas, and thought the bus service was reasonable, considering the low volume of people.
I was often the only person on the bus. I even rode in the middle of the day (low people traffic times) and the bus was frequent enough.

- Eileen

 

[Capn Dave]

We were there 2/5-2/13 and the only time the bus was crowded was coming back on Sunday night from the Magic Kingdom after park close (7:00 PM). Other than that we waited no more than 20 minutes and the buses were generally lightly loaded.

One thing to keep in mind though, a lot of folks have figured out that they can ride the bus from an attraction to SSR as a short-cut to downtown disney, bypassing more crowded buses. So you might more crowded buses on Friday/Saturday nights.

I remember quite a few years ago that you had to stay at a Disney resort to ride the buses to the hotels or parks. I notice now that anyone can ride the buses anywhere. You could be a person with a day ticket to disney and ride the bus to SSR and DTD. In fact you wouldn't even need a park ticket.
Maybe Disney needs to start checking ID's when you board the bus to cut down on people using transportation intended for guests.

 

[DrTomorrow]

There's another thread for bus abuse concerns; currently, (almost) any park ticket includes use of ALL WDW transportation....