Monorail Expansion

[G2-4T]

What is the cost of all of those busses and bus drivers? Also, you cannot factor the cost of guest satisfaction.

I hate the busses. They cram you in, they compete with tourist traffic. They are very unreliable and not Disney. Buses do not comply with Disney's philosophy of Environmentality.

You said it! They are not Disney at all, you can hop a transit bus at home any time [well, if you are in a city] - they are not a unique experiance. And as for environmentally friendly, I was a bit amazed their new fleets are not CNG or another alt. fuel. Straight diesel is not environmentally friendly no matter what the gov't says [it is only good for their pockets]. It is better than everyone driving their own cars but nowhere as good as today's alt fuels.

Thanks for the numbers - that is about what I had expected to see...

And a big thanks from all for slowing for Illuminations, etc. - we appreciate even if management is off their rockers. Interesting that they would care about "on time" when they don't even publish schedules.

rdeacon - sorry for the SAT/ACT flashbacks

[vfxpro]

What is the cost of all of those busses and bus drivers? Also, you cannot factor the cost of guest satisfaction.

I hate the busses. They cram you in, they compete with tourist traffic. They are very unreliable and not Disney. Buses do not comply with Disney's philosophy of Environmentality.

You said it! They are not Disney at all, you can hop a transit bus at home any time [well, if you are in a city] - they are not a unique experiance. And as for environmentally friendly, I was a bit amazed their new fleets are not CNG or another alt. fuel. Straight diesel is not environmentally friendly no matter what the gov't says [it is only good for their pockets]. It is better than everyone driving their own cars but nowhere as good as today's alt fuels.

Thanks for the numbers - that is about what I had expected to see...

And a big thanks from all for slowing for Illuminations, etc. - we appreciate even if management is off their rockers. Interesting that they would care about "on time" when they don't even publish schedules.

rdeacon - sorry for the SAT/ACT flashbacks

No they don't publish numbers, however here are the 'suggested' beam times:

Express 8 - 10 Minute Cycle Time Per Train

Resort 12 - 14 Minute Cycle Time Per Train

Epcot 15 - 17 Minute Cycle Time Per Train


These are not mandatory, but depending on who is in charge of Central command that day it feels more than a suggestion. I can get you around any of the 3 beams faster than most pilots, that's why they made me an exit driver. If I am Driving Express during Wishes I will slow down and announce it, same with Epcot and Illuminations.

[vfxpro]

One thing we haven't mentioned is WDW history. It may suggest a monrail expansion / upgrade. Let me explain. The Mark IV monorails received a console upgrade just a few years prior to the Mark VI trains coming out. Right now as I type the Mark VI consoles are all being replaced with Win2K consoles. Perhaps this means the Mark VIII trains are on their way. You never know. If it were up to me, WDW would have a massive TTC where you board either monorails or wedways. There would be a monorail line to Epcot - MGM, Animal Kingdom and Downtown Disney. From each monorail station there is an adjacent wedway station that takes you to/thru various resort hotels.

[vfxpro]

WAY TOO EXPENSIVE! the monorail is the most expensive "ride" on Disney Property. For the price of expanding the monorail to Disney MGM Studios, They were able to build Animal Kingdom.

Umm... The proposed Monorail Expansion was slated between $150 - $300 Million. I don't now how expensive Animal Kingdom was, but I'm fairly certain it was far more expensive than that. If EPCOT was over a billion dollars, I'd be shocked that DAK was built for anything less than 700 Million.

[vfxpro]

What is the cost of all of those busses and bus drivers? Also, you cannot factor the cost of guest satisfaction.

Well, as far as I know the cost of the bus drivers and just regular upkeep of the buses and also gas I guess is alot less than building all new monorail stations and tracks and trains.

That is true just about anywhere you find monorail systems. It is usually when they look at hidden costs, such as environmental cost, guest satisfaction cost, and increased guest traffic in certain areas to name a few, when it becomes worthwhile. Also, organizations are more likely to build a project like a monorail when they are thinking long term. Disney has shown us repeatedly that they are only looking at the bottom line right now. Think of it this way. What is the cost of the monorail expansion and increased operating cost over 50 years? Compare that to all of the costs of operating all of those busses over the same 50 years. I would put money on the monorail being considerably cheaper.

The monorail is cheaper, considerably cheaper. WDI and other third party companies have done numerous reports about this. When was the last time you heard about a monorail crashing into a minivan on world drive? There have been rumors of expansions costing as much as $750 million. Think about it, under Eisner's regime they can fund the majority of Project 5th Gate with that. The current Disney administration does not care what the guests think. Sure they may have some people from Research asking questions, but did you know that Disney was considering bringing back the monorail tickets?? Instead of issuing limited edition monorail pins or some other way of generating capital to fund the transportation infrastructure, they thought why not charge the guests? You've got to understand what the current mindset of the company is. It used to be Imagineering was in charge. Now they have bean counters in charge of them. I call them budgeteers. Don't for one minute think that the fast pass was designed to help you avoid long lines. It was designed to get you to buy food and merchandise instead of wasting time in lines. Attractions are the only thing at the Disney Parks that does not generate capital. If it were up to Eisner there would be no more attraction additions. I'm not just Eisner bashing, take a look around the parks now. In front of, around and even at the end of all attractions are what?? SHOPS. I don't think Uncle Walt would be too terribly thrilled.

Personally I would get rid of the busses completely, except for holidays and max attendance (phase closings) of the park. If the company would only listen to the EPCOT FILM there would be no infrastructure problems.

[CDAbleson]

To let you guys know, there are a few companies from the midwest/west working on various PeopleMover proposals for WDW...This is all in the early stage, but some of the usages have been identified in the above postings....I guess we can all hope for more monorails!

[G2-4T]

Thanks as always for the monorail insiders view there vfx...

As for companies working on the Peoplemover ideas, if it is Taxi2000 or their midwestern rivals good luck, talk about hostile and wacko companies [not just my opinion on that either, that is sort of the general take from the transit/transporation engineering folks - but that has already been covered somewhere in here I think]. With any luck they are real companies and can get something together. Mix TTA style trains on short trips with long-haul interpark monorails and they could have a futuristic and progressive system. It would be cool to actually copy the TTA and put it to work around the resort - the covered system might be tough but a enclosed car would fix that. The line is almost never down for service, you have to like that if you are running things.... And it can actually do higher speeds than what it does in Tomorrowland. So many things to contemplate.

So has anyone mapped out potential routes? If there is a good electronic WDW resort map available to download it would be interesting to try. Sort of what subway fans do in NYC, imagining the best possibilities for expansion and put it on paper [or computer bytes]

[Club33Hopeful]

The current Mark VI fleet is very expensive to maintain because they do not make parts for the trains anymore.

Thanks for all the info vfxpro. Its nice to have other insiders on here. Too bad I have been away for a week and missed much of this discussion as it was in progress.

If your comment above is true, then Bombardier will have a lot of explaining to do to the Las Vegas Monorail authorities that purchased 9 brand-new Mark VI monorails last year. As far as I know, the Mark VII is still in design phase, and they are still making VI trains and parts. I believe Las Vegas has a contract with Bombardier that gaurantees parts for somewhere on the order of twenty years.

[vfxpro]

The current Mark VI fleet is very expensive to maintain because they do not make parts for the trains anymore.

Thanks for all the info vfxpro. Its nice to have other insiders on here. Too bad I have been away for a week and missed much of this discussion as it was in progress.

If your comment above is true, then Bombardier will have a lot of explaining to do to the Las Vegas Monorail authorities that purchased 9 brand-new Mark VI monorails last year. As far as I know, the Mark VII is still in design phase, and they are still making VI trains and parts. I believe Las Vegas has a contract with Bombardier that gaurantees parts for somewhere on the order of twenty years.

Actually the Las Vegas has a contract for the M6 monorail, not Mark VI. At least that's what the shop guys are telling me. Believe it or not, the M6 and Mark VI are 2 different designs.

[G2-4T]

I believe the big difference is the driverless option that Vegas went for as opposed to the driver versions WDW uses - right? I could tell you stories from our experiances with BBD and their LRT unit. Needless to say they aren't great - the cars ride well but man, talk about some strange hassles and mostly from BBD, not necessarily the cars themselves [though they definately had to be broken in]. Hopefully management is shaping up there...

[Club33Hopeful]

Actually the Las Vegas has a contract for the M6 monorail, not Mark VI. At least that's what the shop guys are telling me. Believe it or not, the M6 and Mark VI are 2 different designs.

Well,it is my understanding that WDW has the Mark VI and LV has the MVI. Different yes, but no more different than a Boeing 737-400 and a 737-900. Different models, but share a common framework a large percentage of parts. I defer to your knowledge, as I do not work directly with the monorails. I could have been fed a line of bull.

[Club33Hopeful]

Please ignore my previous post about LV purchasing 9 Mark VI trains. It should say 9 MVI trains for a total of 36 MVI train cars.

[G2-4T]

That is just what I heard in the transit world Club33 - and really good analogy too. Just have to hope MarkVII is better, the LV ones have been troublesome from the start [losing wheels isn't a good thing!] and have been in and out of service a lot if I remember right - anyone out there from LV and ridden them? Would be curious to get a comparision...

[Club33Hopeful]

Yeah, wheels falling off is a bit of a problem.

[vfxpro]

Actually the Las Vegas has a contract for the M6 monorail, not Mark VI. At least that's what the shop guys are telling me. Believe it or not, the M6 and Mark VI are 2 different designs.

Well,it is my understanding that WDW has the Mark VI and LV has the MVI. Different yes, but no more different than a Boeing 737-400 and a 737-900. Different models, but share a common framework a large percentage of parts. I defer to your knowledge, as I do not work directly with the monorails. I could have been fed a line of bull.

Well I know Disney is cheap and they feed both Cast Members and Guests total B.S. However, having worked at Monorails for a considerable amount of time and never seeing new parts ever arrive, I have to believe that the Mark VI trains are on thier own. I've had Bombardier employees ride up front with me and tell me the same thing. We are constantly gutting one train to fix another. Our shop guys are always trying to band aid the problems. If there are new parts available, and the Mark VI trains are still under contract, than Disney is shadier than I ever thought possible.