New Monorail Spurs?

[GhostHost999]

Hey Folks,

Anyone hear anything about plans to put new monorail spurs out to MGM and the Animal Kingdom?

It seems silly that Disney would only connect two out of four parks.

I mean yeah it would cost $$ to do, but there has to be a cash reserve *somewhere* plus they'd save $$ on fuel for all those buses.

Maybe it's just a pipe dream ,but I'd like to see it.

[JPL]

Monorail expansion although a popular thing amongst fans is highly unlikely due to the cost of it. I think every regualr visitor to WDW would love the idea but it's not a revenue source for the company. Believe me if it was cheaper than running buses it would have been done along time ago. I would expect to see a more affordable rail system built long before any monorail expansion.

[RBrooksC]

This is an on-going discussion in the Rumors section.

[Young@Heart]

I'd sure like to see it, but then, I doubt it would be profitable to Disney to put them in. I don't think things are too terrible they way they are now, though. Adding monorail accessability to those parks would probably make parking at TTC impossible.

[DizneyRox]

I'd sure like to see it, but then, I doubt it would be profitable to Disney to put them in. I don't think things are too terrible they way they are now, though. Adding monorail accessability to those parks would probably make parking at TTC impossible.
Profitable? Unless they start to charge for the use of the monorail, it's an expense on the books. The monorail, no matter how you slice it, doesn't generate the company one dime of revenue.

Nobody plans a trip to Disney just to ride the monorail. If they discontinued running the monorail entirely, I don't believe even one person would cancel their trip to WDW.

Until they can justify some sort of RIO for the monorail system, I don't expect them to do anything else to the line at least in terms of expansion. They may be some train upgrades but only because it will be cheaper to do get now cars than it would be to maintain the existing fleet over the long run.

[Mousemates]

Disneyrox: Profitable? Unless they start to charge for the use of the monorail, it's an expense on the books. The monorail, no matter how you slice it, doesn't generate the company one dime of revenue.

Nobody plans a trip to Disney just to ride the monorail. If they discontinued running the monorail entirely, I don't believe even one person would cancel their trip to WDW.

While I understand your line of reasoning, and agree in a very direct "trace the dollars" sense, indirectly I think the monorail is actually an income producer for the parks for the following reasons.

#1 While I might be an oddball, the monorail to me actually is an intrinsic part of the disney experience and riding it is something we actually look forward to doing. Its part of what makes disney "disney." And as a child who visited disney first in 1974, the monorail was actually what I most looked forward to riding. And it is something that still contributes to our overall enjoyment level of the parks. (We still are willing to wait to ride up front once each trip to WDW :smile: ).

You know in a "trace the dollars to an attraction" sense, none of the attractions on their own would stand up to a strict "prove the revenue"test. By that I mean, you can't race revenue to any particular attraction since they are all included in the ticket price. Furthermore, most folks would continue to visit the park even if an attraction (any one attraction) disappeared (as was proven by the demise of the sentimentally popular rides Mister Toad and 20,000 leagues).

SO while the monorail doesn't directly produce dollars and people might not discontinue Disney visits without it, I think its wrong to say that it has no revenue generating merit. It might actually be as important to some folk's "disney experience" as BTM, Dumbo, or IASW.

#2 I think the monorail does directly generate dollars for the three resorts on its path. I don't believe the rooms at the CR, Poly or GF would fill as quickly or could command the rack rates they charge without the monorail feature.

[Mackflava99]

Well my assumption if that the attractions themselves may not be enought o warrant not going- but select groups of them will- If i found out Splash, Space,and thunder mountain were all closed- i might not go to MK-
Maybe maybe not-

The monorail is pretty important- BUT its very expensive to keep up and also there are alot of issues with rain and lightning.

In reality- YES it should go to all 4 parks- but to get it to Ak would be alot of monorail track..

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One note- if AK didnt have everest- would it lose 50% of its traffic?

[TheRustyScupper]

1) Building more monorail lines are not in the offing.
2) They are too costly.
3) But, the main reason is that they are not cost-justifiable.
. . . they generate no added revenue *
. . . they actually cost parks more money when guests park hop
. . . they are a capital drain, especially during down times
. . . they are not as capacity flexible as using buses

* Disney is a business. If the monorails added revenue, then they MIGHT be considered. But, since they would not add significant (if any) new revenue let alone net profit, the cost is a waste of investment capital.

[dteed]

Love to see it but I don't expect to see it.

[FTDW Poly 08]

While I agree with most of what is said in this thread, Mousemates is one smart cookie. We, for instance, will be staying at the Poly next week. If our family (2, 6, 8 year old kids) have an enjoyable experience, we'll be more likely to go back to WDW. From what I understand, the monorail is part of what will make our experience more enjoyable.

[Polynesian Dweller]

While I agree with most of what is said in this thread, Mousemates is one smart cookie. We, for instance, will be staying at the Poly next week. If our family (2, 6, 8 year old kids) have an enjoyable experience, we'll be more likely to go back to WDW. From what I understand, the monorail is part of what will make our experience more enjoyable.

It can be a part of that, but in the 18 years we've been to the Poly we've used the resort monorail no more than about 8 times. We prefer the resort launch. The monorail to Epcot is a feature of course and that one and the close access to the Poly is a big part of the vacation. Regardless however, that is still indirect not direct money maker. Direct is only when you actually pay a fare.

Monorails to the other parks are unlikely, especially AK. Its a long distance from any other park so extremely expensive. DHS is not as close to the monorail as it might seem. Its still a good distance from the front of Epcot to DHS.

But what might make sense, especially for DHS is an LRT system. From The international Gateway to DHS is closer and perhaps at some point cost justifiable.

[Young@Heart]

Profitable? Unless they start to charge for the use of the monorail, it's an expense on the books. The monorail, no matter how you slice it, doesn't generate the company one dime of revenue.



:mickey: Hence the wording "I doubt it would be profitable. :mickey: Sorry if this word-choice was wrong.

With the future of oil so uncertain right now, alternative energy sources and mass public transportation is being looked at everywhere.

[ParkMan]

I think that the monorails have not expanded, but not just for cost reasons.

In the early days of WDW, the resorts were closely grouped by the MK, but were too far away to reasonably walk.

Now, parks and resorts and spread all over the place. Forgetting the cost of expansion for a moment, the number of routes needed now for the monorail would be significantly higher. Imagine being at Port Orleans and needing to get to all the parks. You'd need 4 monorails, or some single monorails and some transfer stations. If you start introducing transfer stations, you then add more time onto a journey to get from your resort to a park. If someone could take a 20 minute bus ride or a 30-40 minute monorail ride, I expect people would choose the bus.

I think there is room at WDW for some monorail expansion. I for one would like to see all deluxe hotels on a monorail. Imagine a route that put the Epcot deluxe hotels on a loop and then went AK to AKL to DHS and back to the Epcot area.

[Jasper]

I agree that additional monorail is so expensive that we are unlikely to see any expansion in the near future.

I also agree that the monorail is an experience that, at least in the United States, is pretty unique.

I would also go on to say that when Walt and Roy Disney decided to go ahead with the monorail when they were first building WDW that it was not cost effective nor did it show any direct return on investment. The reason they did it was because it was unique and they were men of enough vision to know that it would fascinate people coming to their parks.

With all three of these points in mind I would say that if the leadership of the Disney Company are people of vision and if they feel pressured by other companies to do something "big and unique" then we might some day see a monorail expansion. But just as a solution to high fuel costs I doubt we are at a high enough point where the monorail becomes financially feasible. Just my two cents worth!

[PAYROLL PRINCESS]

While it would be nice, wasn't there just an article about how many million it would cost, something like $40 million?
And I was waiting for someone to say about it running through the black triangle on the Swan & Dolphin. That's another old rumor.

[Imagineer1981]

When I worked there, it was rumored at 1-2million a mile, so that adds up quickly. Also while the idea is awesome, it doesn't make sense. It would take forever if every monorail had to go through the TTC. Imagine you were in DHS and wanted to go to Epcot. Assuming the Epcot route would be expanded to be TTC/Epcot/DHS/TTC, you'd have along trip just to basically go back to were you started.

[joelkfla]

I would also go on to say that when Walt and Roy Disney decided to go ahead with the monorail when they were first building WDW that it was not cost effective nor did it show any direct return on investment. The reason they did it was because it was unique and they were men of enough vision to know that it would fascinate people coming to their parks.
That may have been a consideration, but the real reasons were:

1) Walt was fascinated with transportation, especially rail transportation. The WDW Monorail System was the next logical step from the Disneyland-Alweg Monorail, the first daily operating monorail in the U.S.

2) Walt conceived of the entire "Florida project" as a model community of the future; EPCOT Center was just the commercial and industrial center of it. The Monorail was viewed as the model of future urban transit, in conjunction with an extensive WEDway people mover network for neighborhood transit.

Seeing as current management is neither fascinated with transportation, nor particularly concerned with building experiments for the betterment of mankind, I also think an expansion is unlikely.

[Mousemates]

Seeing as current management is neither fascinated with transportation, nor particularly concerned with building experiments for the betterment of mankind, I also think an expansion is unlikely.

Yep, you are absolutely right.

Furthermore, while the original monorail did provide WDW with a distinctive icon (and in my opinion an attraction which not only brought people to WDW in general, but also significanty increased the profitability of the three monorail resorts), an additional monorail line would have only a marginal ability to attract visitors (i.e. those who want a monorail resort experience can already have one, so a new line wouldn't really offer anything new).

[Speedy1998]

You also have to remember scalabilty. It is easy to send extra buses to one of the Theme parks when it is closing. I have actually seen 4 buses being loaded for All Star Movies at the same time, and seeing two buses for one resort being loaded at the same time is something I see every trip. You can only load one Monorail at a time.

[Mickey91]

It will never happen. But I would be so excited if it did!!!:D

[MichaelMouse]

:drill::bus:I definitely think Disney should expand its monorail tracks to the Animal Kingdom and MGM from the existing Monorail hotels. In a way we do pay for the use of the Monorail by paying premium prices on staying at the GF, Poly, Cont. It's all included, just not detailed on your statement. Who do you think pays for the monorail workers? Disney could even charge for riders not staying at monorail resorts, just raise prices and do not detail what it is for. I hate the buses and yes I have been spoiled by staying at monorail resorts, even if it is two parks short of track. I tend to rent a car to avoid the sardine-like sweaty buses. :mickey:

[Imagineer1981]

:drill::bus:I definitely think Disney should expand its monorail tracks to the Animal Kingdom and MGM from the existing Monorail hotels. In a way we do pay for the use of the Monorail by paying premium prices on staying at the GF, Poly, Cont. It's all included, just not detailed on your statement. Who do you think pays for the monorail workers? Disney could even charge for riders not staying at monorail resorts, just raise prices and do not detail what it is for. I hate the buses and yes I have been spoiled by staying at monorail resorts, even if it is two parks short of track. I tend to rent a car to avoid the sardine-like sweaty buses. :mickey:

I have to agree about the car thing...I always rent to avoid the buses

[Daddy Mouse]

As much as I like the monorail it would be too costly. $150 Million per mile for constructtion. I could see Walt Disney's love for train and build a railway from the parks in the future. I'm sure the Imagineers would do an awsome job of making more than a train ride.

[MichaelMouse]

A good idea would be to offer monorail direct lines via the TTC. as they do with Epcot. The Epcot line would also stop at Hollywood Studios or as I like to call it: MGM and Animal Kingdom. And back to TTC.:thumbsup:

[dizknee531]

It will never happen. But I would be so excited if it did!!!:DI agree. Would love to see it and ride it!!! Not possible, now though. Oh well......:(