Tron at park closing?

[Gentry2004]

I apologize if there is already a thread on this and I missed it. We are going to be at MK in early Nov during the week where there are no parties (between Halloween and the beginning of the Christmas parties.) Is it possible to get in the Tron standby line shortly before park closing, or do they close the standby line for Tron earlier than other rides? Has anyone done this and can comment on how it worked? I am aware the ride is popular in the dark which is why I am asking. Is there a better time to ride Tron standby? I am loathe to do it at park opening and waste all those other short lines waiting for Tron.

TIA.

 

[Mle8308]

We got in line for Tron about 15 minutes before fireworks and it was about a 20 minute wait. The line was just outside the outside queue. We got off just after the fireworks ended and close to park close, the line was HUGE. It stretched all the way down past the Tron sign. It was posted at 100 minutes. I have heard they do close the line prior to park close if it is too long, however I believe this is only on party nights. I would recommend going on it during fireworks.

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

I checked the Touring Plans stats a few nights ago just for an example. Just before closing time, the posted wait for Tron hit 170 minutes while the actual wait was reported at 37 minutes.

Having a posted wait at 4x the actual wait is very common late at night on the headliners. I’m sure the posted wait had the desired effect, which is to discourage late riders and funnel them toward the gift shops and eventually the exits.

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

I’ve been watching Tron evening wait times recently and there is a noticeable fork in the road about two hours before closing time. The posted wait begins to increase dramatically while the actual reported wait decreases at about the same rate.

For the last two nights, Tron has ended the evening with a posted wait of 70 and an actual wait of 15 then a posted wait of 130 and an actual wait of 35 the next night.

 

[Lesverts]

I’ve been watching Tron evening wait times recently and there is a noticeable fork in the road about two hours before closing time. The posted wait begins to increase dramatically while the actual reported wait decreases at about the same rate.

For the last two nights, Tron has ended the evening with a posted wait of 70 and an actual wait of 15 then a posted wait of 130 and an actual wait of 35 the next night.

When I was there in August during a party - the posted wait was like 75 minutes (during a party) they weren't playing the pre-show to keep guests moving. Typical Disney.

 

[CarolynFH]

I’ve been watching Tron evening wait times recently and there is a noticeable fork in the road about two hours before closing time. The posted wait begins to increase dramatically while the actual reported wait decreases at about the same rate.

For the last two nights, Tron has ended the evening with a posted wait of 70 and an actual wait of 15 then a posted wait of 130 and an actual wait of 35 the next night.

Disney intentionally inflates the posted wait time to discourage guests from getting in line at the end of the day. It’s interesting to speculate how long the actual waits would be near closing if they didn’t!

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

Disney intentionally inflates the posted wait time to discourage guests from getting in line at the end of the day. It’s interesting to speculate how long the actual waits would be near closing if they didn’t!

Yes, the process is called Line Stacking and it works very well in discouraging late riders.

There was considerable speculation here that Tron would break the mold and have longer actual waits in the evening. Fortunately, it has behaved like all the other headliners since it was removed from Virtual Queue earlier this year.

Posting a wait that’s about 4x the actual wait always seems to do the trick.

 

[Gentry2004]

Prior to our most recent trip, we never had kids old enough to stay until this end. So this was our first time getting in line at the end of the night and it worked amazingly well at most parks. Remy and Frozen seem to be the only ones that don’t dip as much for actual waits at the end of the night.

 

[billlaurie]

We got in line at 10:45 pm with a posted wait of 60 minutes. We were off in less than 15 minutes. People were jumping back in the line to ride again!

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

We got in line at 10:45 pm with a posted wait of 60 minutes. We were off in less than 15 minutes. People were jumping back in the line to ride again!

This is the kind of report that we expect to see. There was lots of speculation on here that Tron would always be very crowded after dark and would never have actual wait times of 20 minutes or less.

The evidence over the past several weeks and months indicates that Tron is behaving just like any of the other headliners in the parks.

 

[kylenne]

Prior to our most recent trip, we never had kids old enough to stay until this end. So this was our first time getting in line at the end of the night and it worked amazingly well at most parks. Remy and Frozen seem to be the only ones that don’t dip as much for actual waits at the end of the night.

wrt Remy and Frozen I’ve noticed they tend to behave more like the other headliners during EEH, barring one of them going down. I’ve had much more success hopping in line for them at the end of EEH vs normal park close.

 

[bama_ed]

I rode TRON on Thursday Nov 7 and got in line right at 8pm (closing at 9pm).

The app wait time said 55 minutes. I walked nearly all the way into the standby queue where the CM combines SB and LL (hardly any riders like me in either line). It was 20 minutes from that point to when I sat down in a vehicle seat.

More proof that, yeah, definitely over-stated.

Bama Ed

 

[hes122]

The time stamp on my photo of Tron just before the queue was 9:18 (park was closing at 10 that day). As I was walking that way I saw the posted wait time was 80 minutes. When I got up to the top of the "hill" it was obvious the wait was not going to be 80 minutes based on previous experiences riding. The time stamp on my ride photo was 9:51. I was out of the locker area by 9:56 and was tempted to hop back in line to ride again but decided I was too tired after having walked almost 20,000 steps by that point.

 

[parasail_of_congress]

All that's happening is that the CMs stop updating the wait times before park close. So whatever time you are seeing was, at some point, a "legitimate" wait time, but they stopped updating because it was almost closing time. Maybe they overestimate some, but a bit difficult to tell unless you compare directly with the hour before close. It still serves a purpose and hopefully persuading people to not attempt to jump in line, but there isn't like an evil CM sitting there purposely updating crazy wait times to anger people.

 

[Mle8308]

All that's happening is that the CMs stop updating the wait times before park close. So whatever time you are seeing was, at some point, a "legitimate" wait time, but they stopped updating because it was almost closing time. Maybe they overestimate some, but a bit difficult to tell unless you compare directly with the hour before close. It still serves a purpose and hopefully persuading people to not attempt to jump in line, but there isn't like an evil CM sitting there purposely updating crazy wait times to anger people.

Actually, as a former park manager, I can tell you a CM (manager or coordinator, not regular CM) can manipulate the wait time. We used to do it all the time at park close to discourage people from getting into the line and it is still done. Especially if the attraction had a long cycle time (Tron does not). But again, it is done - all the time! We were "encouraged" to watch our OT budget, if the line was really long, it would take a lot longer to do closing procedures (there is a lot of work that has to be done after all the Guests exit the attraction, it isn't as simple as turning the lights off) and we would have to force extend CM's - which resulted in OT and it usually didn't make them happy either. Especially during holiday season, they want to get home to spend time with family - or get some sleep! It's not an evil CM, but it is a CM purposely over inflating the wait time to discourage people from getting in line.

 

[scrappinginontario]

All that's happening is that the CMs stop updating the wait times before park close. So whatever time you are seeing was, at some point, a "legitimate" wait time, but they stopped updating because it was almost closing time. Maybe they overestimate some, but a bit difficult to tell unless you compare directly with the hour before close. It still serves a purpose and hopefully persuading people to not attempt to jump in line, but there isn't like an evil CM sitting there purposely updating crazy wait times to anger people.

This is definitely not the case. The wait times are manually inflated just prior to park close. Just watch MDE some evenings and you'll see the wait times jump.

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

All that's happening is that the CMs stop updating the wait times before park close. So whatever time you are seeing was, at some point, a "legitimate" wait time, but they stopped updating because it was almost closing time. Maybe they overestimate some, but a bit difficult to tell unless you compare directly with the hour before close. It still serves a purpose and hopefully persuading people to not attempt to jump in line, but there isn't like an evil CM sitting there purposely updating crazy wait times to anger people.

That’s not correct. As an example, On a recent visit we rode Rise of the Resistance 3 times before the park closed. For the first two rides, the posted time was 80 minutes but it dropped to 70 minutes for the 3rd ride. The actual waits were 20, 10 and 0. The posted waits are definitely monitored at night and adjusted as necessary.

We first read about the closing processes in the 1997 Unofficial Guide and have been using it to our advantage ever since.

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

I checked the Tron stats from last night for another sample.

Over the last hour of operation, the posted wait time increased from 70 to 80 then finally 90 minutes while the actual reported wait dropped to 40.

During the busiest part of the day, the posted wait was 130 with an actual wait of 45.

 

[parasail_of_congress]

Actually, as a former park manager, I can tell you a CM (manager or coordinator, not regular CM) can manipulate the wait time. We used to do it all the time at park close to discourage people from getting into the line and it is still done. Especially if the attraction had a long cycle time (Tron does not). But again, it is done - all the time! We were "encouraged" to watch our OT budget, if the line was really long, it would take a lot longer to do closing procedures (there is a lot of work that has to be done after all the Guests exit the attraction, it isn't as simple as turning the lights off) and we would have to force extend CM's - which resulted in OT and it usually didn't make them happy either. Especially during holiday season, they want to get home to spend time with family - or get some sleep! It's not an evil CM, but it is a CM purposely over inflating the wait time to discourage people from getting in line.

If this is true, why are those "inflated" wait times not reflected on thrill-data.com? If this was a regular occurrence, I would expect to see a sharp increase at the exact same time every night before close. I guess one could argue it's difficult to compare because sometimes, the line actually is long, and other times, people are attempting to get in line just before close, which of course would make the wait times increase. Regardless, it would be easy to see the sharp increases across the board in the data, and this just doesn't seem to be the case.

If you're saying that occcasionally (maybe on more crowded days) a CM manager/coordinator might bump the wait time 10-15 minutes without any consideration of the current line status, I can believe that. It's just that people on this board act as if this is commonplace every night and every ride, and that just doesn't seem to be the case.

 

[Blue32]

Has anyone tried to do SDMT and Tron at the end of the evening without LL of any kind, standby only? If so, I am wondering what the best order would be with these two.