Originally Posted By Doobie This topic is for discussion of the April 8th Designer Times by Bob Gurr at: <a href="News-ID108270.asp" target="_blank">http://LaughingPlace.com/News-ID108270.asp</a>.
Originally Posted By Nobody I'd like to make a few points: 1) Bob's articles are such a pleasure to read. They always seem to sneak up on me and I feel they are a treat each time they appear. 2) Bob's stories often include phrases like " I made a lot of drawings of this wild scheme,...". I know it may not be practical or possible, but it would sure be nice if some of these drawings would accompany the articles. So, along those lines, how about throwing us a bone. If you could provide the patent number for the "WedLift", wo could all go check it out for ourselves. Anyway, thanks again for the fun.
Originally Posted By Westsider Bob Gurr<<"Anyway, enough grumpy digression. I missed the old "just do it" Walt days and wondered how the heck we all got so much done so fast and it all worked.....long before we got organized." This basic premise always astounds me, and it's part of the reason I enjoy Mr. Gurr's articles so much. But Mr. Gurr wasn't alone in the "Just Do It" era, and it seems as though Walt had plenty of other WED guys coming up with crazy schemes overnight, and then building them the next day. Rolly Crump's explanation of how he literally built the Tiki Room and modeled all of the figures for the show and the lanai in just a matter of months is a perfect example. Years before computers and focus groups and endless meetings and Powerpoint presentations, Rolly was just up on a scaffold carving out Tiki heads for the bird show Walt wanted open that summer at Disneyland. And Bob Gurr falls right into this same amazing category. You need a new rocket ride vehicle? Sketch it out, find the parts in a catalog or scavenge them off of a late model Chevrolet or Plymouth, have the staff shop fabricate anything you can't buy, then build the thing and go on to the next crazy idea. How is it that we have all of the vast resources and technology of the 21st century at our fingertips, and Disneyland can't figure out a way to replace the aging Monorail cars that currently creak along the beamway? Bob Gurr built an entire Monorail fleet in under a year, and then redesigned them and rebuilt entirely new fleets later in the 1960's in a timeframe measured in months. Disneyland can't even get a new Monorail built for the 50th, two years away. I've seen the masses of TDA workers milling about in the yellow building, going to meetings and emailing things and photocopying Powerpoint presentations and pouring over spreadsheets and figures on video screens in conference rooms. ANd I imagine there are hundreds more just like them doing this silly stuff up at the WDI offices in Glendale. Meanwhile, there are far too few Bob Gurr's left who are actually down in the shop building something or trying to fix something. Amazing times we live in. Thanks for the reality check Mr. Gurr!
Originally Posted By arstogas >>>How is it that we have all of the vast resources and technology of the 21st century at our fingertips, and Disneyland can't figure out a way to replace the aging Monorail cars that currently creak along the beamway?<<< I know it's a rhetorical question, but a small comment, at least, is almost irresistible... For my own part, when presented with a design challenge - designing and building a set, or a series of sets for some purpose, either filmic or environmental, I found that people are so entrenched with compartmentalizing and assigning/parceling out tasks to such a micro-degree that it's a miracle anything gets done, and so more often than not, I'd just go ahead and speed through to construction, right after I had a design that satisfied me. I'd bring on a couple of trusted artisans or construction people, and give very clear instructions or printed directions, and then we'd just go to town. The problem is, and I know you know this - you said as much in your last paragraph - that corporations have TOO many people who have to justify their positions now, with input, with advice, with some cost assignment study. Were a true visionary to come in, he'd find someone who really KNEW engineering AND safety, and could inspire wholesale devotion in a core staff, and this would become a very trusted and "freed" component of WDI or on-property staff. The budget cutting and the streamlining is being done in the wrong place, altogether. Pooh, for instance, should have cost all of five to ten million. Period. To pay what they did is simply obscenely ridiculous. If grading the floor and so forth represented certain challenges, it should have been RE-evaluated from a creative challenge perspective, to integrate the challenge into the show experience.
Originally Posted By Nobody Dave, Of course not. I just often seem to finish one of Bob's stories wanting more information.
Originally Posted By jazzfan4 Bob: Since I worke for a Government contractor I know all about overhead waste. Working at WDI must be like working for Boeing or Lockheed Martin now, Walt would not like to wait, but with the Trial lawyers ruling CA he'd be at their mercey with out the tons of paper work. Still when I begin looking at something new with my hobby I can just go build it and then make it work. I can't pay the bills that way though. Keep me dreaming Bob.
Originally Posted By magic19 Bob stated: "Anyway, enough grumpy digression. I missed the old "just do it" Walt days and wondered how the heck we all got so much done so fast and it all worked.....long before we got organized." It seems like a Skunk Works is needed again for the Disney Theme Parks. Just like Lockheed's famed aerospace unit that gave us the SR-71 and F-117, etc. without the beauracracy. It would be great to see a dozen Bob Gurr types put in charge of specific things to accomplish and then watch the magic happen, and happen fast.
Originally Posted By FigmentMI I'd be interested in hearing if any of those outside transportation projects actually came to fruition. Did they all die on the vine? When did Disney stop pursuing these types of projects? This article definitely left me wanting to know more. Even if I never find out though, I truly appreciate all the writing Bob Gurr has done! There's never been a dull article. -Figment
Originally Posted By MouseBear Salutations Bob, Another interesting article! It would be interesting to get a list of all the different transportation systems Disney has used. It sure seems like the Company has moved people using just about every possible method. MB
Originally Posted By arstogas >>>I truly appreciate all the writing Bob Gurr has done! There's never been a dull article.<<< Ditto.
Originally Posted By ParrotHead It's interesting to see how much energy was devoted to developing new transportation systems back in the day. Now we're in the 21st century, and what is Disney using to move its tens of thousands of guests around Walt Disney World? Buses. Ordinary, plain, noisy, smelly, cramped, expensive buses. This is progress?
Originally Posted By jonvn IF they were really the most expensive way to do it, they'd likely use something else. Busses are cheap.
Originally Posted By karlg As much as I love monorails (I own a fleet of 8 Schuco Monorails) and admire Bob Gurr and his design work, and even more as it pains me to agree with jonvn about anything, I am afraid I have to agree that WDW shows that busses are cheaper (at least in any reasonably period of time) than monorails per passenger mile, particularly if space is not at an extreme premium. Monorails are effectively "light rail" that have a limited carrying capacity. They are limited by the beam's weight capacity. Anybody that builds road will tell you that bridges are much more expensive than roadway and a monorail is effectively a continuous bridge. The only time an econmic case can be made for Monorails is when real estate is very expensive and the cost of Digging subjways or building elevated trains is very expensive. City planners have for decades looked an monorails thanks to Disney and realized that light rail or heavy rail made more economic sense. A notable exception being Las Vegas, but they were after the novelty and entertainment value more than the absolute cost efficience. WDW has to be about the worse conditions for "needing" a monorail. With all the wide open space, it is just so much cheaper to lay asphalt/concrete and run busses on them. I do wonder if Rail could be more effective in the long haul. The big problem would be building bridges to get rail over or under the roads. All the above said, I do wish Disney would look at modernizing their transporations system. They, more than a city, could justify putting in a modern transportation system into WDW to improve the environment for their guests. A rail system would certainly be more magical than busses, particulary if the vehicles were nice to look at. I would guess that a light rail would be the way to go as distances are relatively short. As for Disneyland, they need to do something about the current Models. They are basically re-skined Mark III's from ages ago. What I would like to see them do is go Retro and back to the Mark I to Mark III styling that Bob Gurr created (they could keep the automatic doors but take the styling back to the original. This would be more in keeping with Disney trend toward "Reto-Tomarrowland/Discoverylan" and with the DCA theme. The Mark V monorails look too non-descript for me (pretty much like any subway or airport shuttle train vehicle built since 1970). Taking them back to the Mark I to III styling would keep them more timeless/fantasy.
Originally Posted By ParrotHead As a stockolder, I've not been persuaded that monorails are more expensive than buses over the long-term. I understand the expense that comes with building monorail stations and running line. But I also know that one monorail pilot can transport a lot more guests in a day than a bus driver can. Additionally, bus drivers have to be paid more. Then there are the liability issues that come from traffic accidents on buses. And outside of all of this, you have the factors that are tougher to measure but should still be considered. The "magic factor", for instance. Adding new monorails is, in a sense, like adding a new attraction to the resort. It enhances the ambience in a way that buses just can't do. After all, anyone can ride a bus--and many people do so regularly. But how often does one get to ride a monorail? Another factor is guest satisfaction, which anyone who has waited for 30 minutes for a bus can tell you drops through the floor at times with buses. If monorails can get guests from Point A to Point B more quickly, guests will be happier--and that's worth something.
Originally Posted By arstogas I wonder though, with so many destinations within WDW that people can criss-cross in a day... knowing that even for Disney it would be unrealistic to build a Monorail system that went EVERYWHERE... Would an expansion that just allowed for the major destinations, really alleviate the traffic flow problem? You would still need a lot of buses to get people to the various moderate and economy resorts, the non-Disney owned resorts, the golf courses, Wide World of Sports and so on. Given that any monorail system that was HIGHLY inclusive of all the major resort destinations and hotels would encompass a lot of stops along the way, I wonder if guests would start to complain about how long it's taking them to get where they're going. I hate the buses. But if you're smart about which ones you're taking, they're pretty quick. With the monorails, I love the ride, but I do want to get on with my day, and there's the long ramps up to the station, the changing monorails depending on where you want to go... I think the only ideal solution is prohibitively expensive, and if Disney's going to spend serious money, let them spend it on attractions and enhancing the main destinations. I'll put up with some diesel fumes for twenty minutes.
Originally Posted By jonvn "As a stockolder, I've not been persuaded that monorails are more expensive than buses over the long-term." What does your being a stockholder have to do with it? Buses are, on their face, cheaper to build and operate. They already run on existing roads, are manufactured en masse, go anywhere you want them to go, and are flexible in case you need to change your routing. Buses are not expensive compared to other transit forms, which was your original statement. Now, if you want to then state that the show would be better with monorails, then that's something else. However, if lots of extra money gets built on a monorail that would have otherwise gone into something else, then the overall show is diminished. Monorails in general are not considered a very good transit system. They have them in Las Vegas, but that's for show. They have them in Seattle, but that was originally built for show, too. Dual track systems are much easily built, maintained, and operated. This is why nearly everywhere that a transit system is built (save the above two instances) you will see bi-rail trackage.
Originally Posted By crapshoot <<. They have them in Las Vegas, but that's for show.>> Monorails are no longer for show in Las Vegas. But they fit into KarlG's model in that there is limited space, real estate is very expensive and going undergroung is prohibitively expensive. And they will indeed aid in the reduction of traffic congestion.
Originally Posted By jonvn They were originally put in pretty much for show. If you want a practical transit system, you do not use monorail. Otherwise, I don't see real estate being that expensive, nor going underground being any more expensive in vegas than anywhere else. Additionally, if these things were true, you would normally build up an elevated bi-rail track system. I assume that when people say "monorail" they actuall just mean some sort of elevated train, and not really an actual monorail.
