Tuesday, January 8, 2013
IT'S A TECH WORLD, AFTER ALL: Walt Disney World is seeking to enhance the visitor experience with RFID-equipped bracelets to better track and market to each individual's preferences (including allowing the Princesses to know your daughter's name without having to ask), plus innovations like booking FastPasses and VIP seating at parades before heading to Orlando. (Y'know what I'd like? An official, reliable smartphone app tracking wait times for all the rides.)
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I was involved in a trial for this when I was down there in September. You picked a day you'd be at Magic Kingdom, and selected two choices from each of two lists of things you wanted to have a reserved time for. You then got an e-mail saying "your one-hour time slot for each of these attractions is _____."
ReplyDeleteWhen you scanned the magic card at the attraction, you were greeted by name by the attendant and then ushered into the FastPass lane. I didn't do the character greetings or parade/fireworks seating, so not sure how those worked. Also, in the interest of spreading crowds, they clearly designed it so you'd be hopscotching across the park--I had a 9-10 pass in Tomorrowland, a 10-11 in Liberty Square, a 12-1 in Fantasyland, and a 2-3 in Adventureland, which would mean that when there were longer lines, it could be tricky.
Yeah, an official app would be nice (I thought there was one for Verizon users?), but for unofficial apps, the Touring Plans Lines app is good. I found it to be really accurate both in the crowd prediction front and the wait time front. I used at both WDW and DL in 2011.
ReplyDeleteIt's was a good thing when amusement parks came to realize that their money siphons didn't hold a vacuum if you were waiting in line.
ReplyDeleteI used an app to track wait times and show times when I was there in November...it seems to have been official. Reliable? I mean it was usually fairly close. But it was interesting to see how it see-sawed so quickly. Also the group I was with was more of a "let's try to hit each of our favorite rides once" group as opposed to "let's try to hit as many rides as possible" group, so I didn't really give it a super rigorous test.
ReplyDeleteI miss the walkaround minor characters.