Any update on Crowd Level predictions. Yesterday was predicted to be a 10 at HS but ended up being a 1.
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The 10 was manually set because of the opening of MMRR. The morning was definitely a 10, but the park cleared out.
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I like how this is trending over the past few days
This is an on-going frustration. Can you please do something to modify CL reporting for at least HS to account for the morning crowds as well? I find it very frustrating that a CL 10 morning could possibly be considered a CL 1 simply because the afternoon cleared out. For like four hours of the day, it was still a 10!
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Yes, the trend is looking better. Hopefully, it is because of improvements in operations and increases in capacity, not because of lower demand and crowd levels. I have to believe that even with lower crowd levels there should not be a significant decrease in demand for ROTR BG. The demand for FOP, 7DMT & SSD remains high regardless of crowd levels.
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Seems like the hours you choose for the CLs should be more park dependent. I know traditionally that people used to arrive later, which was why the mornings were easier for touring. But with HS and RotR, the morning is the most crowded time of the day. So reporting what it’s like in the afternoon isn’t necessarily that helpful.
I wonder if MMRR was taken into account in the CL yesterday.
It may take a few days (week?) to add it to the data used to calculate the CL ?
Just a thought- if they started reporting the morning waits, wouldn’t every day just be a 10 for the foreseeable future? I think it is more helpful to know what the level is for the majority of the day. Honestly, after many trips I don’t even look at the crowd levels. It really doesn’t matter to us as we have to go during busy times anyway. I see way more posts on the app (especially for Disneyland for some reason) of “it was supposed to be a 4 and it was a 9, and your app ruined my vacation” than “We knew it would be busy, planned ahead and made good choices about where to stay (somewhere with 60 day FPP), great timed ADRs, and smart FPP choices”. We just went from 12/26-1/2 and had another great trip, no worse than any other trip even though I kept hearing how awful it was going to be.
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Yeah, I’m not saying there’s any kind of easy solution. Seems like with the way things currently are you should just plan for HS to be a 10 and hopefully be pleasantly surprised.
I think the biggest issue is if you’re making a plan for a CL3 day, are the morning wait times coming from the latest insanity or the historical CL3 numbers? Because that’s going to throw your whole plan off real quick. And if you can’t force it into a CL10, it’s not going to be very useful as a planning tool.
In the first year of a new attraction, it is not included in the Crowd Level calculation. New attractions are going to have high wait times regardless of Crowd Level.
Typically Disney will schedule a new attraction opening on a low crowd level day, typically mid week. Say Wednesday March 4, 2020 or Thursday December 5, 2019. The hype will bring in the bloggers and other people who have to be first. We will inflate the predicted Crowd Level so the casual user will know to avoid the park. If we do not inflate the crowd level, will get a ton of people saying we are wrong. It’s a no win situation.
Through this weekend the Hollywood Studios Crowd Level is inflated. We expect locals and other to make a special trip for the new attraction.
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We (Touringplan staff) debated changing the time of day we use for the Crowd Level at DHS. We decided to leave it at 11 am to 5 pm. The reason we don’t use the morning wait times in the crowd level is that morning crowds are not a good indicator of the entire day.
When we made the rule, mornings were typically always low, even on crowded days. At DHS, and the virtual queue for Rise of the Resistance, it is also true that the morning craziness is not a good indicator of the overall crowd level. Regular Boarding Groups are all gone in a few minutes every day. Slinky Dog is going to hit 90 minutes by 9 am regardless of the Crowd Level.
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What is the highest number BBG that anyone has seen issued this week (not necessarily one that you got)? I’m just curious that, with the increased number of BGs getting to ride, is it possible that one day we may see BGs reopened midday or evening or (gasp!) an actual standby line.
I get what you’re saying, but if I just wanted to make a point that if I put Slinky Dog or MFSR in a HS plan and hit “Optimize”, it wants to always put it first thing in the morning, as the system is forecasting longer waits in the afternoon. It’s not necessarily a CL issue – it’s an issue with the time forecasts for mornings at HS.
I believe I have a good handle on what’s going on and how to schedule my day, but putting together a touring plan for HS at the moment doesn’t seem to get you anything close to reality.
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Rope drop wait time is a problem. The software does not know if you are at the front of the pack or a the touchstile when the park opens. With 20,000 people in the park at park opening it just makes the problem worse.
The hack that we suggest is to exclude the first attraction from your Touring Plan, and start the plan 30 minutes after park opening. Once you’re done with the rope dropped attraction re-optimize your the plan, and go from there.
I assume MMRR will be the most popular attraction to rope drop.
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Thanks for all the tips!!! I was really worried about our busing option from animal kingdom lodge. We got on a bus around 7:15. At the park by 7:30 and in the gates by 7:45 (with bags and stroller) we stood near the sci fi restaurant entrance. 5 of us all logged into the same account. My sister who had “practice” 2 times total was holding her toddler and got us boarding group 23!! And we had to deselect the toddler. We were on the ride around 9:15 am. We were all so excited!! We rode Smugglers run mid day with a 45 minute wait. And then my daughter and I did SDD at 6 after a 45 minute wait (we were the only ones left at the park by then) unfortunately the MMRRR was just too long of a wait. But my daughter really wanted to stand in the line!! It was a very very hot day and it seemed very crowded. We had lunch in the AC at backlot and did the mobile order. That was the best move we made all day! Thanks for all the help.
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Oh and we didn’t rope drop anything. By the time we got in at 7:45 everything looked crazy long and we wanted to make sure to have good reception for the boarding pass. I don’t think that mattered so much and we could have jumped in a line before getting the boarding group but that just seemed too stressful for still a very long line.
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Yes. But mornings are just as much a part of my day at the parks as the afternoons. So, the CLs are literally worthless unless they cover the whole day. I can make a Touring Plan to determine best time of day to ride. But I want to know crowd levels for the day.
I think it is a mistake. I don’t trust the CLs from TP. This helps to explain why.
Trouble this AM practicing to get a BG! For the first time ever, when I went through the process, the system told me I had to link my tickets! It would not let me proceed. We all have AP’s which are in MDE, and this message has never appeared before. The process has been going smoothly. As usual, right before I started, I signed out and back in to the app to be ready at 8:00. After getting blocked, my only option was to sign back out of the app, and start all over. No problems after that, all of our AP’s were recognized. BUT by that time, they were already in the BBG’s! Anyone else experience this today? Leaving for WDW tomorrow 
I’ve not experienced that here, but I have run into cases where the MDE app would allow me to do things up to a point, and then it would error out and force me to actually log in. It is like it “kind of” knew it was me, but when I really wanted to do something, it was like, “oh, wait…I need to be sure you are who you say, and you haven’t logged in yet!”
Not sure why this happens. Sometimes happens on the website as well. Annoying when you don’t know if it is going to happen.
One way to determine ahead of time is to go and attempt to book FPs within the app. It will block you and make you log in again.