In your far from infinite wisdom, UOR has cut back hours from what they were a couple weeks ago. This is unfortunate because our family, longtime fans of your parks, have never seen UOR in the dark. We will be there again(!) in May and were planning to do one evening there this trip.
But, alas…IOA closes by 7 and USF closes at 6. Even if we hopped into a line right at 7, we would be done and off the ride before sunset.
What’s the deal? Why, when it is getting darker later, you are closing earlier? It makes no sense, especially when you have been seeing quite large crowds. I implore you to reconsider!
You could lament about Day Light Savings time instead since that is the current reason sunset falls after park closure. Sen. Rubio of FL and someone else proposed, unsuccessfully, to abolish said laws. Anyway, you might actually be able to get some traction w/ that endeavor since most ppl HATE changing their clocks 2x a year
There was a similar proposal to stop the nonsense in Texas a few years ago. It looked like it might pass. Then during the debate someone said, “Do we really want Texans to have to choose between church and football?” That put the kabash on it. What is particularly galling is that churches would have setup “football fellowship” after the services. The game would have been digitally recorded and watched after the game. Those who hate football would be idle hands that the church could have used. I’ve mentioned this idea to several priests and ministers and their eyes gleamed at the idea.
If any of the top 3-4 biggest states got rid of the silliness. I think the rest of the US would follow quickly.
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Washington state has talked about ending it but staying on daylight savings time rather than standard time. I would prefer daylight savings time personally. I hate that it’s dark before 5:00 in the winter.
To @ryan1’s original point, it’s too bad they are cutting back hours for your trip. I wonder if they are anticipating lower crowd levels at that time? I love being in the parks at night. They come alive in a totally different way. I suppose it’s all about $$ and the bottom line. Still disappointing.
100%–we live in a state that is the very beginning of a new time zone (sounds like you do, too) and it truly stinks when it is dark by 5:00 when going to standard time combined with shorter days in late fall thru winter—we want daylight savings year round!
Yeah this is the optimistic take and I tend to think it’s accurate. A bad sign if you want to see attractions at night, but a good sign if you want to ride a lot of rides in the daytime!
RE: daylight saving time, we don’t observe it in AZ and it is lovely! I just wish everyone else would sit still in their time zones. It’s confusing to try to remember if we’re on CA time or mountain time, or if we are 2 or 3 hours behind Eastern.
Unless you are a tourist. From memory, this is what I read and I experienced. "AZ doesn’t observe Daylight Savings Time. Except for the Navajo who do. Except for those that don’t. So, if the Navajo are running your tour, call them the day before and ask what time they think it is at that moment. " Those slot cave tours were totally worth it, though.
I have a really strong internal clock. I feel like crap for a week after every time change. One of the benefits of working from home is that I just ignored it until I naturally drifted into it. I don’t use an alarm clock.
There’s several reasons: guests arriving early and building up traffic on I-4 so the parks have to open early, not wanting to pay multiple full shifts, and the biggest: COVID.
From 2016 till 2020 hours we’re getting better, with most closures around 7 or later with 8 or 9 on weekends.
Not giving an excuse but trying to put it in a historical perspective.
What is interesting is that in recent years, UOR introduced a couple of nighttime shows. The projections on the castle, plus the water show on the lagoon at Universal. We’ve never seen either. But with them closing when they are, they pretty much aren’t doing any nighttime shows. Regardless, we’d love to see Universal at night. Some of our favorite memories at WDW (including DS), as well as other amusement parks are those we have after dark. Just isn’t going to happen at UOR I guess.
In April and May 2019, USF and IOA were open til 9:00pm on most weekdays. (Some IOA days closed at 8)
I am also disappointed. Look at all the on-site folks that planned to take a PM break and go back in the evening. I assumed the spring breaks hours would stick. They must have had multiple shifts then?
We won’t be on-site, but that was our plan. We had a reservation for dinner at Olivia’s at 5:05 pm, and then we planned to head back into the parks to experience the night for a bit.
Since that won’t be happening, I’ve managed to change our 5:05 pm ADR to a 7:55 pm instead.
UOR has had its share of early closings in the past and they were getting better. Pulling my hours article from May 2019 it looks like most closings were at least 8 or 9pm pre-pandemic.
So I hope, along with you, that they go back to the late park closings.
In April and May 2019, USF and IOA were open til 9:00pm on most weekdays. (Some IOA days closed at 8)
I assumed the spring breaks hours would stick. They must have had multiple shifts then?