Ride Wait Times Since new Fastpass?

[SandmanGStefani24]

Just wondering what people have seen since the new fastpass bands have been in use. Has it made wait times for walk up riders any different? Any trends you have seen? Thanks!

[AgentC]

Just wondering what people have seen since the new fastpass bands have been in use. Has it made wait times for walk up riders any different? Any trends you have seen? Thanks!

I've seen a few reports (by people who actually track wait time) that it has not made much of a difference on the rides that already had FP. For those rides wait times wait times were already increased by FP especially after they were all distributed.

The rides that have seen an increase are the rides that are popular like Pirates of the Caribbean. Haunted Mansion or Small World that didn't have a FP before. They are usually okay in the morning but by afternoon when the headlines have there longest wait , the waits for these rides seem to be much longer. To me at least. Haunted Mansion regularly has a 30-45 minute wait in the afternoon and POTC is often 30 minutes or more.

[mechanic]

Ive noticed increases in hm and potc also. They did have old style fp though, didnt they?
Also spaceship earth frequently has longer waits, as does the land. They seem to clear out later in the day though. Oh, barnstormer seems longer all the time too. As does space ranger spin.
Golden carousel, and teacups seem to have shorter lines.

[magicofdisney]

The biggest change I've seen is the ridiculous lines created at Spaceship Earth. That was nearly ALWAYS a walk-on and now you have lines weaving 2-3 rows deep on either side! It's craziness.

[BigRedDad]

To me, lines have gotten much longer. Crowds were not crazy when I was there in mid December, but longer than normal. When there is a 30-45 minute wait for almost everything, it is not good. Because we do not have to do "everything" while there, I zagged with my DD. We cattle herded to 7DMT (never do that again). We were on the second train. While about 10,000 people got in line for 7DMT and Anna/Elsa, we walked on to everything in Fantasyland and Tomorrowland. 7DMT, Carousel, Ariel (M&G and ride), Barnstormer, Dumbo, pin traded in the big tent, Tea Cups 2x, met Merida, Speedway 2x, Buzz 4x, Astro Orbiter, pin trading all the way while walkign around, Pooh, Peter Pan. It was only 11AM when we got done.

You need to go against the crowds in my opinion. You can do so much while others are storming the long lines.

[yankeesfan123]

I didn't notice a single issue on my trip in August!

A 15 minute wait in the middle of August for SE or 25 minutes for PoTC in August seemed normal to me.

[azcavalier]

I guess I'll just echo what others have seen. I've been to WDW three times now that FP+ has been rolled out. I've been in May, October, and January. Wait times for SSE, POTC, and HM have been much longer than normal. IASW and the Land have also had the longest wait times that we've ever experienced.

I wonder if this is what Disney planned....to increase traffic on these other rides to ease traffic on the big headliners, or if it has just been an unintended consequence.

[joonyer]

. . . . . The rides that have seen an increase are the rides that are popular like Pirates of the Caribbean. Haunted Mansion or Small World that didn't have a FP before. They are usually okay in the morning but by afternoon when the headlines have there longest wait , the waits for these rides seem to be much longer. To me at least. Haunted Mansion regularly has a 30-45 minute wait in the afternoon and POTC is often 30 minutes or more.

Just for accuracy's sake, PoTC and Haunted Mansion did have the FastPass option available under the old paper ticket FP system. The lines may be longer now, but those two attractions have had FP for years.

And so far, despite a good bit of online research, I've seen/heard nothing other than anecdotal evidence that attraction queues are significantly longer than they used to be, once overall park attendance figures are factored in.

My own anecdotal report is that when we visited WDW during this recent Christmas week, we were surprised that the FP waits were as short as they were; the longest we waited in a FP queue was less than 10 minutes.
On the other hand, we saw posted stand-by wait times for 180 minutes at 7DMT, with the line stretched out to infinity and beyond, or so it seemed.

I'd really like to see some accurate research/findings on this subject, but I seriously doubt Disney will release than kind of data anytime soon. They don't even release daily park attendance numbers.

[AgentC]

Just for accuracy's sake, PoTC and Haunted Mansion did have the FastPass option available under the old paper ticket FP system. The lines may be longer now, but those two attractions have had FP for years.

Pirates of the Caribbean and The Haunted Mansion did both have paper Fast Pass at one time but it had been discontinued. Neither ride was a FP ride at the time FP+ was implemented.

I can't find exact dates but there are references in 2011 to the new interactive queue at the Haunted Mansion that mention it did not have Fast Pass as well as mentions in 2012 that FP+ was adding Fast Pass back to the Haunted Mansion after not having it for several years.

One site did an analysis of wait times back in March of 2014. He compared wait times for the first 65 days of 2013 to the first 65 of 2014. I have no idea how accurate it is

[joonyer]

Pirates of the Caribbean and The Haunted Mansion did both have paper Fast Pass at one time but it had been discontinued. Neither ride was a FP ride at the time FP+ was implemented.

I can't find exact dates but there are references in 2011 to the new interactive queue at the Haunted Mansion that mention it did not have Fast Pass as well as mentions in 2012 that FP+ was adding Fast Pass back to the Haunted Mansion after not having it for several years.

Thanks for the correction. I just knew we had used FP on those two attractions on many of our past trips. I did not realize they had been discontinued for a time.

[Maddie]

The biggest change I've seen is the ridiculous lines created at Spaceship Earth. That was nearly ALWAYS a walk-on and now you have lines weaving 2-3 rows deep on either side! It's craziness.

I was just there and Spaceship earth had one of the longest lines in the park! So unusual!!

[AgentC]

Thanks for the correction. I just knew we had used FP on those two attractions on many of our past trips. I did not realize they had been discontinued for a time.

It was a weird thing. They just disappeared in between two of our trips. My guess would be they weren't needed. One strange thing I have noticed is that The Haunted Mansion's wait time was increasing before FP+. I think part of the increase is just the crowd levels.

[AgentC]

I was just there and Spaceship earth had one of the longest lines in the park! So unusual!!

I think the Spaceship Earth increase is a combination of FP+, the lack of EPCOT attractions and its location at the front of the park.

[TheGarretts]

The stand-by lines seemed to be pretty much in line what I remember from past trips, when crowd size was considered, some eticket might have even been a little better. The crowd was larger in Dec than we had seen in the past, but again the wait times were in line with the crowd.
The only issues we had with the FP+ was the need to plan so far in advance, and the inability to schedule more in other parks once we used the ones we had.

[WDWgoofy]

The 3 FastPast+ selections are terrific. Everything else requires significantly longer waits then in the past.

Obviously from my view, FP+ is a major failure as currently designed.

[LVT]

It would be nice to see the gate numbers. The economy has been doing better and maybe a lot more people stopped delaying their trips. It seems more crowded with every visit.

[ibelieveindisneymagic]

When we were there in August, wait times seemed pretty usual. Except (as others have said) for HM and IASW ... HM I can kinda get, it is a cool ride, but there is no way I'd wait too long for IASW, FP+ or not.

We were braced for the worst, but it was comparable to the other August trips we've taken.

[texas211]

The biggest change I've seen is the ridiculous lines created at Spaceship Earth. That was nearly ALWAYS a walk-on and now you have lines weaving 2-3 rows deep on either side! It's craziness.

When I first saw that, I thought DIsney End Times had begun.. Now you must wait for every ride, which is too bad. Hopefully having a wait time, will keep the ride around longer (rides I love like Living w/ the Land, etc).

Now if there is a line for Figment, I will assume rapture is on its way.

[Aurora]

Our last trip was before FP+ was implemented, and lines for all attractions were significantly longer than we had experienced in the past during the same time of year.

IMHO it's a coincidence that FP+ was implemented at the same time that more people are vacationing in the parks. More people make for longer wait times across the board.

It does seem to be harder than it used to be to predict crowd levels based on the time of year. I've seen reports from this past Christmas season, traditionally one of the most crowded times of year, that people were pleasantly surprised this year with wait times. So who knows?

[CaptSmee]

I'm currently there right now & this is the 1st time I've seen it but several times the FP+ line has been longer than the standby line & they were boarded in conjunction to us (meaning not made to wait)
There also is lines that didn't used to exist a la Figment