Originally Posted By trekkeruss Sadly, I am nowhere near DL, so an AP is not an option. The upside is, being in the Washington D.C. area, there are plenty of free museums and other entertaining and cultural events. Can't wait for the Cherry Blossom Festival in a couple of weeks!
Originally Posted By SleepingBeauty82 I've never been to D.C. but it's on my list! Gotta remember the country offers much more then Disney! LOL.
Originally Posted By WorldDisney Yeah, D.C. is great for free stuff lol. I spent maybe $30 for 5 days (staying with friends) just going in and out of all the Smithsonians. Amazing deal if you are a museum nut like me. Add to seeing all the mounuments and government buildings, all free and its an amazing deal. As for DL, wow you guys are making me homesick . With the recession plus grad school, I dont have money to do ANYTHING anymore. I would give anything to have spend $20 a month basically to go to DL every freaking day for an AP. Hell, for that I would just buy the best one. That freaking deal is nuts lol. But its a looong way from Australia .
Originally Posted By WorldDisney OOPs, the beginning sentence came out wrong. The Smithsonians are free of course like I said. The $30 part was transportation and cheap fast food at the time.
Originally Posted By fkurucz <<Amen Roger Rabbit. If we were really in a recession we'd be noticing much smaller crowds at Disneyland. People still flock to the park as if they had money to burn. Must not be TOO bad.>> Ask your friendly neighborhood car dealers about what they think of the economy. TP2000 is quite right. With a SoCal AP DL is a bargain. Remember, just because the parks are crowded doesn't mean that the customers (and let's not kid ourselves into thinking that we are considered "guests") are spending money they way the might have in the past.
Originally Posted By bean I know everyone hates crowds but its better to have a two full parks then have attendance issues to the point that people need to be let go or budgets drastically cut. At the moment the Anaheim resort seems to be irding the recession muhc better than WDW. I prefer it that way because it lets Burbank know tha there is huge potential for Anaheims growth.
Originally Posted By bean by teh way i said two full parks because even DCA has been quite busy. look at these numbers, not bad for an off season. Whether parts of it be because of the 2fer or not it is still guests spending money and adding revenue to the resort ImagineerWarrior posted an attendance figure of March 15 of 27,000+ . and its been pretty consistant for several weeks.
Originally Posted By WorldDisney Great points Bean!! With the downturn everywhere, the crowds are telling Disney their employees are still very much needed and that adding future additions are still worth building. Even if most of them got in there (and we know this is true for DCA ) on a discount/free basis, at least they are paying for souvineers and food and most important keep that persons job who is making the food or selling the souvineers to them. That's most important, especially now.
Originally Posted By SleepingBeauty82 I think it's definitely showing Disney that their employees are warranted. In fact yesterday we were...oh where were we? In line for something. I think maybe Pirates or Thunder and there was one girl trying to load both lines on all the trains. There were a fair amount of people in the park yesterday and I thought "Why doesn't she have more help?" Also at the coffee cart on Main Street in the evening there was ONE guy and he had a LONG line. I think with the promotions going on, more help is warranted.
Originally Posted By bean not sure about the weekdays but the last couple days the resort has been extremely busy. DCA closed at 10pm last night and the park was still very busy.
Originally Posted By SleepingBeauty82 I was there last Wednesday and I would compare it to a busy Friday. Fastpasses for Soarin were gone by noon (we waited about 30 minutes for it instead of getting a pass) and it was pretty full of people. Lines weren't as bad as they would be during the weekend though. I was told AZ was on Spring Break last week. That probably attributed to the crowds. Spring Break at the park lasts until the end of April (according to a cast member I talked to running the Matterhorn) so it'll probably be crowded until then. With a little break till Memorial Day...then Grad Night and summer.
Originally Posted By Linda1633 I was at DLR from Sunday the 15 to the morning of Tuesday the 17th. DCA was so busy on Sunday I didn't not even try to go into Disneyland. A cast member I spoke to on Monday said that Sunday was much busier than they had planned. When I left Tuesday about 10:15 AM the lines entering both parks were basically meeting in the middle of the plaza. The bag check line on the Harbor Blvd side was stretching to the shuttle parking lot.
Originally Posted By MomluvsDisney I was there this weekend, and it rained in the maorning on Sunday, so the park was not crowded until the late afternoon, and even then it wasnt to bad. God Love the Rain!!
Originally Posted By Marlin Perkins It is my personal opinion that Disney should do away with AP's, especially for locals. I know, boo...hiss.
Originally Posted By WorldDisney ^^Well maybe but will never happen. Its obvious the AP's are now the lifeblood of the park or they wouldnt be bending over backwards for everyone to have one now. I mean as a local, you can litterally pay for one monthly for about $11 a month. Thats just nuts lol.
Originally Posted By MomluvsDisney Actually the So Cal pass would be abolut 5 bucks a month...amazing...
Originally Posted By WorldDisney Oh right, I forgot that you have to put a 'down payment' down of a one day park ticket first. Factored in the entire ticket as a 12 month plan, zero down and how my rough estimate came about . But lol, when you put it THAT way thats even crazier!! I suspect Disney has kind of run into a wall now. They built the AP program up through the years to shore up extra capital and consistent revenue in the high and low season that they just saw the $$ signs and expanded this thing to the point people were buying them up like hotcakes. Of course when the economy falters and the non-AP people can no longer afford to $70 for a day at the park, they fall on the APs again. But when those people stop buying those or simply coming less (who was consistently coming high or low season before) whats the next step besides just deep discounting all around? The park lives and dies by APers now and I'm betting about 80% of the people on these boards alone either has an AP or had it at least once in the past. In a few years, I'm suspecting the one day ticket will be practically ignored completely by most falling into one digit sales a week, especially the locals. I mean, why spend $70 for one park, one day when a down payment will get you in both parks on the same day and a $5 a month will get you in another 100+ somthing days through out the year. Only people who goes once a year and/or live too far away will have a hard time turning down that simple math and logic.
Originally Posted By MomluvsDisney ^^^Intertesing thought...depends on how much longer they offer the "Monthly Payment" method.
Originally Posted By SleepingBeauty82 One thing about the SoCal APs though, is that with the cheapest version you can't get in on weekends at all and with the better one you can't get in on SATURDAYS at all and you're blocked for half the summer. So half the summer crowds, all Saturday crowds and half of the Sunday crowds are NOT due to local AP holders. I used to be one and we upgraded to Deluxe so we could go on some Saturdays and we weren't blocked out of a month in the summer. Doing away with the local passes may make somewhat of a dent but I'm willing to be the Premium and Deluxe passes are the ones causing the crowds. Don't take them away though, cause I have one. LOL.
