Great conversation. I believe there was a blog article recently that considered a few other factors.
Locals may try to get ROTR VQ’s more on Saturday and Sunday so consider HS during the weekdays. Same idea that locals like Epcot on the weekends so consider weekdays if possible.
But the bigger point remains, is Disney adjusting park availability…and if so, are they adjusting ride availability on higher capacity days.
Like you, I’m planning my third trip using TP. I’m not sure what your experience has been, but I found CL’s changed a bit even after my park selections have been locked in (due to FPP selections) – so stressing over TP’s CL predictions is probably not worth the effort… Though to be honest I plan the same way you do – and probably agonize over the same data points. I do try to use CL’s to guide my initial park selection – emphasis on “initial” because it wasn’t the most important factor (FPP availability was, at least in 2019).
In my case – I’m looking at visiting HS on August 21, 23, and/or 25 – crowd levels 7, 6, and 3 respectively. Same plan, same arrival times, each optimized. Total wait times are 326, 342, and 361 respectively. The inverse of what I would expect.
Perhaps TP expects that on higher CL days some rides are running at higher capacity? I will have to look and see where the variance is, and maybe try Evaluating the plans for each day on the other days to see why it recommends what it does.
I stressed over CLs for our preCOVID trip. At the end of the day, they are just best guesses based on data. Pretty decent guesses, but never the less guesses. And right now at sorta newly post COVID, I think the guesstimates are even more off. Have a good touring plan, RD, and it should be good.
I wrote about CLs here, if you care to read about my pre trip CLs and actual CLs: Laughing Over Stressing Over CLs.
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I’ve never actually looked at CLs at all, let alone base my park days on them. I just trust the plan.
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Me too.
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