Hi!
I don’t know if it would help in my early planning but it would be a great tool for the “where the wind blows” days we try to put on our schedules.
And thanks @SteveBloom, for understanding stuff that is a great mystery to me (ZOMG numbers!) and using that to generate information I can grasp. You’re an unsung hero to the Numerically Impaired, like myself.
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I agree with most, the more information that I have, the better I can adjust my day. Eventhough our park days are set at the 60+ day mark for FP+ it would definitely help my family to adjust if needed.
Thank you all at TP for all of the info you provide! It is greatly appreciated!
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It wouldn’t change my long term planning but I can see where it could be helpful once on site. As long as it doesn’t add to much clutter to the calender.
Agree, it would not change what park I go to but it could change the order in which I tour the park and when my breaks would be
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Yes, I have noticed that in the weekly Crowd Calendar Reports that Fred posts on the Blog. I guess my question is have you developed/tested any weather adjustment models, and if so how well have the performed when run against historical data. I would think that the models would have to incorporate weather forecasts as well as past actual weather, for example the first predicted sunny day after several actual days of rain would probably be more crowded, as well as a predicted sunny day before several predicted days of rain. It would be interesting to see how far in advance you can make statistically valid weather-based adjustments.
At any rate, if you do show weather-based predictions, I would prefer to see them as secondary to the main prediction, kind of like how weather forecasts have the predicted temperature and the “real feel” temperature.
I think it’s a great idea…maybe you could leave the long range predictions as is, and add a tab for short term weather effected crowd calender.
[quote=“brklinck, post:18, topic:15219”]
Sorry, I do not like this idea at all. 10 day weather forecasts are useles[/quote]
Maybe for “ordinary” weather this is true, but forecasters are pretty good at predicting larger weather events, like tropical systems. I was rained on during an entire June trip one year because of the remnants of a tropical storm. While that didn’t ruin my vacation, it did affect crowd levels. I also find that extended weather forecasts, while not the 100% accurate that people wish them to be, are more likely to be on target than not.
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The only place I use Chrome browser is at work. I just assumed it was my company’s firewall. Thanks for the info & link.
To answer the original poser: If I lived in Florida w/an AP, this would be great. But I think FPPs & ADRs & as brklinck says, unpredictable weather, make this a dicey proposition. Would anyone actually plan their WDW vacation, then change all the plans based on an updated crowd calendar 2-5 days before? TP has said for a long time that a good TP is way more important than the crowd calendar – though the CC is a great “guide” when making one’s initial plans for what to do on what day. 
While I really appreciate & recognize the effort to “get it right”, while also acknowledging that most crowd calendar “fails” are due to weather, I think the TP team would do well to put their efforts into other endeavors… such as (ahem) returning the “single rider” option to TT, R&RCoaster, & EE. 
Thanks for asking, though.
The TP team does a great job, best at what they do.
EDIT: Having said that… if a more accurate short-term crowd calendar would simply allow one to “re-evaluate” one’s TP a day or two before to get a better idea of what to expect… then this might be worth trying if it renders a more accurate TP.
Hey @SteveBloom a question/observation: I would guess that the other reason wait time predictions might be off is when an attraction is down/out of commission for a significant period of time?
There are a lot of good opinions here - (was going to reference the users I’m stealing bits from here, then it became unwieldy to pop up and down in the thread.)
- I agree that except for extreme weather, my TP will not likely change much with my ADRs and FPP locked and loaded.
- Also, the only thing anyone can agree on about the weather is that there is a lot of it.
But as someone who did re-optimize often when flip flops were on the ground, I like the idea of seeing some info on deviation due to medium-to-extreme weather events. If I were making decisions, knowing the likely change in wait times might help me decide whether to run for cover or run to standby.
Breaking into data geek mode: When in park and making those decisions, as an Edward Tufte fan I’d love to see some form of sparkline graph that had the normal wait time over time for the park day with the possible deviations based on weather.
Maybe something along the lines of this mobile version of daily trading price sparklines shown here:
When I’m making those decisions, it is not just the next step in the TP I’m worrying about, but the next several steps until I reach a break or ADR. Seeing a visual of a grouping of times and their possible deviation would help make snap decisions easier.
…and I suppose this all pertains whether or not I’m weathering the weather.
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Really? I live on Cape Cod, and our extended forecasts suck. In fact, local merchants petitioned the Boston TV stations, asking them to stop making weekend forecasts for the Cape as they noticed that a forecast of rain would reduce their business more that actual rain. 
Similarly, we just spent a week in Maine, and the long range forecasts leading up our vacation were for rain, rain, and more rain. However, the reality was just one partly rainy day and the rest were beautiful. Maybe Orlando is more predictable, but I never make plans based on lang range forecasts. Now if I could just stop DW from looking at the and fretting…
Can’t speak for the rest of the country, but as far as NYC area is concerned, beyond 2 days is about a 75% chance of getting it right. Beyond 3 days, it’s maybe 50/50… which is worthless, really. Around here, the “5-day forecast” is a complete myth. Perhaps the closer to the ocean one gets, the more unpredictable it can be?
I agree there has to be some sort of ocean thing. I live on the north shore of Long Island, my brother is nearer the south shore. Every winter something like this occurs:
“NEWS 12 predicts 10 to 12” of snow…"
Next day…
Him: Hey, how much snow did you get? I got about 2 inches.
Me: 27 inches.
You, yes you. Exactly. Would be awesome. (And basically already exists in the wait-time-graphs-by-park section on the site, just not in the seamless format you’re showing, and not on the App).
First, Any suggestions I say are not complaints of the current site, I love TP’s focus and use of data.
The wait time charts are a useful tool, but are different in two fundamental ways from what I’m saying:
While there are helpful single attraction graphs at the top of wait time page, the full page of all attractions is a table of numbers, which are very difficult to parse with the eye when it comes to looking for larger patterns.
IMHO the real value in shorter term decisions that might be made (as with weather changes) is having an overall vision not only which individual attractions are changing, but which sections of park(s).
Turning those numbered tables into small groupings of charts would provide the info in a way more quickly consumed.
Second, the weather portion of the data doesn’t exist yet, thus the initial feeler question. My suggestion was that if they provided small charts (hopefully in mobile), including the possible deviations of expected wait times as part of those charts would be useful. And cool!
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I would not use the changes in crowd levels because I need to plan everything for WDW two or more months ahead of time. We fly in from across the country and have all our reservations made. We just go with our plans, not matter what the weather is doing. We all carry rain ponchos and do our thing.
If an attraction goes off line, it definitely can throw the rest of the day off. One thing that adds to the problem are the people who missed their FPP return window and use then anytime. Unfortunately the break downs not due to weather are random, and impossible to predict.
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I think this would great!