What is was like before covid

[margot31]

Obviously, we don't know how it look when it opens under COVID restrictions, nor after restrictions are lifted all together, but I can say that DLR feels like it just gets busier as time goes on. Even times that used to be "off season" often have special events happening.

I watched Disney World and that happen. About 5 years ago my husband and I went the first part of Dec as it was the time to go....and when we moved back to FL I noticed more and more that there was no real down time but just really heavy times like food and wine festival you don't go to epcot on the weekends.

 

[downinit]

Obviously, we don't know how it look when it opens under COVID restrictions, nor after restrictions are lifted all together, but I can say that DLR feels like it just gets busier as time goes on. Even times that used to be "off season" often have special events happening.

This is definitely one of the big problems with the flex pass. Before, there were certain weekends that were not as busy, especially certain blackout Saturdays. But the flex pass allowed Disney to pack in more people on those slow days by allowing more people to use their pass when the park was not traditionally busy. Since the whole flex pass thing came about, there really is not a slow time anymore. They also brought back multiple day discounted tickets for SoCal residents, which also led to more severe crowding across the board, including blackout days. Before COVID hit, I was seriously considering just letting my AP go and taking more trips to HK and Tokyo Disney (I was already going about once a year). The park was simply getting too crowded to be enjoyable for me. We shall see how everything ends up post-COVID, but I do not expect any significant improvements.

 

[margot31]

This is definitely one of the big problems with the flex pass. Before, there were certain weekends that were not as busy, especially certain blackout Saturdays. But the flex pass allowed Disney to pack in more people on those slow days by allowing more people to use their pass when the park was not traditionally busy. Since the whole flex pass thing came about, there really is not a slow time anymore. They also brought back multiple day discounted tickets for SoCal residents, which also led to more severe crowding across the board, including blackout days. Before COVID hit, I was seriously considering just letting my AP go and taking more trips to HK and Tokyo Disney (I was already going about once a year). The park was simply getting too crowded to be enjoyable for me. We shall see how everything ends up post-COVID, but I do not expect any significant improvements.

Thanks. This is why I wanted to know what the past looked like. I am brand new to DL. We were AP holders when we lived in FL and had very little blockout dates with a exception of major holiday time. Now that we have school aged kids this also becomes a little trickier to attend and mentally prepare ourselves....hell we are doing that now in Oahu now that the tourist are coming back. We were enjoying our peace and quiet for a while.

 

[kristensideaoffun]

This is definitely one of the big problems with the flex pass. Before, there were certain weekends that were not as busy, especially certain blackout Saturdays. But the flex pass allowed Disney to pack in more people on those slow days by allowing more people to use their pass when the park was not traditionally busy. Since the whole flex pass thing came about, there really is not a slow time anymore. They also brought back multiple day discounted tickets for SoCal residents, which also led to more severe crowding across the board, including blackout days. Before COVID hit, I was seriously considering just letting my AP go and taking more trips to HK and Tokyo Disney (I was already going about once a year). The park was simply getting too crowded to be enjoyable for me. We shall see how everything ends up post-COVID, but I do not expect any significant improvements.

The Flex pass was only introduced 9 months before COVID hit and the parks closed. And the 6 months after the Flex pass was introduced was the first 6 months Galaxy’s Edge was open, which felt to me like some of the slowest days I had seen in the parks in years.

We had the old SoCal passes that we kept renewing for a number of years because they stopped selling them. We got sick of the crowds when we went to DLR with our SoCal passes, so we upgraded to Signatures in 2017. We then let our Signature passes expire in the Fall of 2018 because we didn’t get the slow days we thought we’d get with a higher level pass. We missed DLR so we ended up coming back on day tickets and used those to upgrade to Flex passes in the first few weeks they were offered. I personally didn’t see a huge difference in crowds after the Flex was introduced. DLR had already found ways to pack people in during “slow” times with local discount tickets, Food and Wine festival, expanding times for holiday decorations/events, etc.

 

[Skyegirl1999]

The Flex pass was only introduced 9 months before COVID hit and the parks closed.

Yeah, I was going to say this - the Flex hadn't even been around a full year, and summer of 2019, after in was introduced, was basically gloriously empty. People who say that there "weren't any slow days" for the past few years are simply incorrect, honestly - the slow days weren't necessarily when people expected them to be, but they certainly existed.

But as to the OP, I haven't commented on this thread because how it was before is so utterly and completely irrelevant now. It has no bearing. We may as well discuss crowd patterns at DL in Shanghai or Paris.

I mean, I'm someone who tracked Maxpass/Fastpass return times for ages - meaning that above my personal, anecdotal DL experiences of about 6-8 trips per month, I had a LOT of data that showed crowd patterns and behavior. But... whatever they're going to with AP/"memberships" is going to rewrite the book on Disneyland crowd behavior. "How it was before Covid" is now a closed chapter. Onto the next one!

 

[downinit]

The Flex pass was only introduced 9 months before COVID hit and the parks closed. And the 6 months after the Flex pass was introduced was the first 6 months Galaxy’s Edge was open, which felt to me like some of the slowest days I had seen in the parks in years.

We had the old SoCal passes that we kept renewing for a number of years because they stopped selling them. We got sick of the crowds when we went to DLR with our SoCal passes, so we upgraded to Signatures in 2017. We then let our Signature passes expire in the Fall of 2018 because we didn’t get the slow days we thought we’d get with a higher level pass. We missed DLR so we ended up coming back on day tickets and used those to upgrade to Flex passes in the first few weeks they were offered. I personally didn’t see a huge difference in crowds after the Flex was introduced. DLR had already found ways to pack people in during “slow” times with local discount tickets, Food and Wine festival, expanding times for holiday decorations/events, etc.

Except that from your description, it does not sound like you were not actually there for more than a handful of the blackout days that I was there for after the Fall of 2018, so you really can't comment on the crowds on those days, just like I cannot comment on weekdays. I visited 2-4 times a month on weekends and holidays, and while there was a slight slowdown at the launch of GE, it was not to last. Disney just put out another promotion for cheap resident tickets and the crowds took off again. Of course, if you do not have a standard 9-5 job, taking advantage of weekday visits might make a pass more ideal.

 

[Lumpy1106]

OP - great question now that there are currently no AP's. We were APs holders for a couple of years then stopped renewing them when it got to be a forced march. We have a free Sunday? APs not blacked out? I guess we better go (sigh). Not only that but we'd go on a Friday night, or 1/2 a day on Sunday and call that a "day". we weren't getting our full value out of the "day" and weren't enjoying it. After we stopped renewing, we got in the habit of following the blackout dates and going when the APs could not (save major holidays). The other exception is you need to know when the 2-fer ticket specials expired because the people who bought those tickets would forget until the last minute that they still had a day in the parks. The day those tickets expired was ALWAYS far more crowded than was any fun at all.

Now though? No APs, no ticket specials...no idea. I'm going to guess that the more expensive days will still be the less crowded days and, IMHO, probably a more enjoyable day - if not the better value. As long as there is the need for park reservations that will give you an idea, though I'm going to say that the park capacity is still going to keep things pretty uncrowded. Having gone to WDW when it first reopened I will say that the reduced ride capacity and no shows seemingly gums things up, but not having fastpasses really keeps the standby line moving, so its a bit of a wash. You do hear people clamoring for the FPs to return but I have yet to see the reports of the true mob-scenes that some pre-covid days were.

 

[kristensideaoffun]

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[ninergrl6]

Also, you would be surprised at how busy a Monday could be. It was not unusual for Mondays to be busier than weekend days.

Seconding this! The most crowded days I experienced in 2018 and 2019 were Mondays in March during the DCA Food and Wine Festival, much more crowded than the preceding Saturdays and Sundays. I was shocked.

On the other hand, I went Tues-Thurs the last week of June 2019 and walked on almost every ride. That was right after SWGE opened and I thought it would be a madhouse, but everything was so calm and easy, possibly because many locals were blacked out at the time.