Universal Orlando Resort Misc Refurbs

[Skubersky]

You are right it does not entitle you to ride everything. I never said it did. Again, the consumer is looking for value for their money. That is the consumers right to look for that. If a place does not give them the value they expect for their money they will not return. My sister will not return for a long time. If other people feel they did not get to do enough for the money they spent because of high wait times, they may also feel the same way and not return. You and I could care less if those people don't return, but I imagine Universal does care. So if they can do something to allow people to ride a few more rides during their time at the park so that people then feel like they got a good value for their money, then they should do this.

My sister complains about a lot of stuff, so yes, she can be difficult. Her complaints I normally ignore, but in this case I actually saw her point. She spent almost $400 for the two of them for 2 days and after leaving the park on the 1st day she had done 5 things. If you say $200 for each day that is $40 a "thing". Luckily the second day did go better for her and she got to do more things since it was further away from the minor holiday weekend. But she still probably won't go back for awhile. My BIL got to experience HP and so they will skip Universal for awhile and do Disney next trip down.

Why is it as a consumer people can stop going to Disney because they feel the value is not there because nothing new is being built, but when a consumer doesn't want to go to Universal because they feel the value isn't there in the quantity of things they got to experience all the sudden they are whiners and should go walk around Epcot? When people stop going to Disney because there is nothing new, I think it is a pretty valid reason. If they don't go to DHS because there are hardly any rides to go on, I think it is a valid reason. But I also think if someone doesn't get to do that many rides because of long waits, they also have a valid reason. Every consumer is different and Universal and Disney are out to get as many returning customers as possible. So if they can do something (i.e. Disney actually planning to build new things) to get people to return, they will.

I'm curious why you think your sister experienced so many more attractions at Disney than Uni. Did she prebook FastPass+, or arrive earlier at Disney? With a good touring plan (shameless plug) it's equally possible to see 10+ attractions on a busy day in either resort.

 

[Fatality]

I'm curious why you think your sister experienced so many more attractions at Disney than Uni. Did she prebook FastPass+, or arrive earlier at Disney? With a good touring plan (shameless plug) it's equally possible to see 10+ attractions on a busy day in either resort.

I am remarkably perturbed sometimes by how little people claim to do.

If doing everything is what needs to happen for value to be acheieved you show at rope drop, you hightail, you don't eat, and you single rider when possible.

Sure, you may not enjoy that but it's doing everything so that's value.

 

[Mad Dog]

I'm curious why you think your sister experienced so many more attractions at Disney than Uni. Did she prebook FastPass+, or arrive earlier at Disney? With a good touring plan (shameless plug) it's equally possible to see 10+ attractions on a busy day in either resort.

Yeah, I didn't understand that either. We did two day trips to Universal(while staying on site at Disney) that same Columbus Day weekend and we were able to do as many, if not more attractions, than we did at Disney. Now, of course, we didn't even bother to try Despicable Me's line, and we did arrive around 10:00 in the morning rather than mid afternoon.

 

[IzzyB]

I'm curious why you think your sister experienced so many more attractions at Disney than Uni. Did she prebook FastPass+, or arrive earlier at Disney? With a good touring plan (shameless plug) it's equally possible to see 10+ attractions on a busy day in either resort.

My sister was not with us at MK, I was using that as a one for one, because both weekends were minor holidays. One being MLK and the other being Columbus day weekend. So the parks are going to be heavier than a normal weekend because of people getting those holidays off and school being out. But they are not going to be summer, spring break, or Christmas level crowds. We did fast passes the day of at MK. We decided to go out to the parks around 4 PM and my husband made dinner while I worked to get us fast passes. So we had fast passes to Space Mountain, Pooh, and Peter Pan. We ended up not using Peter Pan as we decided to do the Mine Train right before closing. We arrived at the park around 6 PM and left right around or a little before midnight. We started with our Pooh fast pass, then did Tea Cups, Carousal, Little Mermaid, Dumbo (we did the play area because my daughter wanted to), then we did space mountain. My husband did it once with a fast pass and got a child swap, I did it with fast pass with my 5 yo and got a child swap. We then watched the fireworks on the bridge and then my husband went on space mountain with my 5 yo using one of the child swap passes (we ended up with one left because we wanted to go see the parade). We then got a snack, relaxed, watched the celebration thing, and then watched the parade. We did this all at the funnel cake/waffle place. Then we went over did the mine train with child swap so that both of us could do this with our 5 yo. We were originally going to do Peter Pan and then do Mine train right at closing but someone gave us a couple fast passes, so we skipped Peter Pan and decided to do the Mine Train twice (once with each of us) and leave a little earlier since it was starting to rain.

At universal we got there around 11 AM and the wait time app I discovered sucked. So the wait times didn't match up and we ended up all over the place in those parks. So I am sure that didn't help matters much. But we did Gringotts and explored the stores, did MIB, got counter service food, transformers, and HE both ways. To be honest we could have gotten one more ride in, but my sister was tired and so we skipped doing DM right at closing. I have to say the wait time app is better at Disney. It actually matches the wait times at the entrance, for some reason the wait times at the entrance were way off what the app says. So I used the Disney wait time app on Saturday at MK and was able to navigate to lower waiting rides in between our fast passes.

I think the other reason you can ride more at MK is the longer hours. With MK being open until midnight one can go later in the day and really benefit from the lower crowds. Where the day we went to Uni the park was closing at 7 PM so you can't really do that late at night thing. I am hoping that when Uni does their 3rd gate they make it so they can grow it into a park that has extended hours with quality night time shows/fireworks. My family has never been a rope drop type of family, so Universal is a harder park to navigate on busy days. But I can't imagine I am the only family out there that prefers night time park going than daytime park going. The lights, the no sun, etc to me make parks so much better at night.

I am remarkably perturbed sometimes by how little people claim to do.

If doing everything is what needs to happen for value to be acheieved you show at rope drop, you hightail, you don't eat, and you single rider when possible.

Sure, you may not enjoy that but it's doing everything so that's value.

She didn't want to do everything, but she surely wanted to do more than 5 rides in 8 hours. Why does everything have to be taken to extremes with you?

Also, single rider doesn't work when you have a 4 year old with you. If we could have done single rider we would have been able to do more. But families with children can't utilize those lines which is why those lines are so short.

Yeah, I didn't understand that either. We did two day trips to Universal(while staying on site at Disney) that same Columbus Day weekend and we were able to do as many, if not more attractions, than we did at Disney. Now, of course, we didn't even bother to try Despicable Me's line, and we did arrive around 10:00 in the morning rather than mid afternoon.

Me and you had this discussion I believe the biggest difference was you being there a little earlier than us and you being able to utilize single rider lines, which we could not. I am not saying everyone would have our experience, however, if we did, I am sure others do also. So if Universal can add just a couple queue less lines then I think they could really help out families who can't use single rider. I think my example was probably on the extreme side of things because I tried and failed at using the app to figure out where to go next and if we had realized it would be that busy I think we would have tried to go earlier.

 

[Fatality]

To prove your sister's ridiculousness and because it's the Internet. #yolo

 

[IzzyB]

I will also say this, from my descriptions it is pretty obvious I know how to move around the Disney parks much better than Universal. I used to know how to navigate Universal, but with kids and not having single rider, I have struggled to figure out the best way to navigate those parks. My plan is just go on the least busy days So I am sure with better planning we could have ridden more. My point in all this was there are probably families out there that don't know how to navigate the park and can't use single rider lines. So if Universal can do something for those families to get a couple more rides in their day, I think it would give more value to their ticket price that people pay. If they can do this they may get some return visitors that they may have not gotten before. I see no harm in trying to do something like that and I am not sure why there is so much anger or hate around this idea.

 

[Mad Dog]

One good point here that Izzy made that I have to agree with, is that Universal, now that their attendance is trending much higher, needs to start keeping at least one of the parks (hopefully alternating them) open later during the year. This 6 and 7 and 8 pm stuff just doesn't cut it. Especially now with all the on site hotel rooms. Heck, our small regional park, Kennywood, stays open until 10 or 11 most every night.

 

[IzzyB]

One good point here that Izzy made that I have to agree with, is that Universal, now that their attendance is trending much higher, needs to start keeping at least one of the parks (hopefully alternating them) open later during the year. This 6 and 7 and 8 pm stuff just doesn't cut it. Especially now with all the on site hotel rooms. Heck, our small regional park, Kennywood, stays open until 10 or 11 most every night.

YES!!! If they would keep one of the parks open until 11 PM I think this would greatly help families like mine. If the park that day had been open until 11 PM then I would have had zero complaints and so would my sister. We would have stopped, gotten dinner, relaxed, and then been able to ride 3 or 4 more things. If I had to decide between queue less lines and the park staying open later it would be park staying open later by a mile.

 

[WAJAS]

YES!!! If they would keep one of the parks open until 11 PM I think this would greatly help families like mine. If the park that day had been open until 11 PM then I would have had zero complaints and so would my sister. We would have stopped, gotten dinner, relaxed, and then been able to ride 3 or 4 more things. If I had to decide between queue less lines and the park staying open later it would be park staying open later by a mile.

It is sad but most likely true that we won't be getting a late closing time throughout the year until the next set of spectaculars / parades arrives. I don't see that happening till at least summer 2017.

 

[Mad Dog]

We've waited this long so one more year wouldn't matter much. But I hope they do something by 2017.

 

[RevFreako]

I'm curious why you think your sister experienced so many more attractions at Disney than Uni. Did she prebook FastPass+, or arrive earlier at Disney? With a good touring plan (shameless plug) it's equally possible to see 10+ attractions on a busy day in either resort.

Where can you get one of those touring plans, Seth?

 

[Nick]

Would a queueless attraction take away the ability to re-ride more than once? I'm thinking about slow mornings before the crowds hit, how sometimes you can get right back in line and ride again. Would a queueless system prevent this?

I'm thinking that Uni would keep the current model until a ride gets to a 30-45 minute wait or so. It would make no sense to start out the day - with no one in line - as a "queueless experience".

 

[Mad Dog]

Where can you get one of those touring plans, Seth?

Seth might not be able to reply to that due to OU rules since he works for another site. The site is, appropriately enough, Touring plans.com

 

[RevFreako]

Seth might not be able to reply to that due to OU rules since he works for another site. The site is, appropriately enough, Touring plans.com

I bought the paper AND digital copies of both the WDW and Universal books, AND set up that sweet plug. Seth, if I ever meet you, you owe me lunch.

 

[UNIrd]

You also have to remember that Universal and Magic Kingdom are extremely difficult to compare. The whole USF park is practically E- and D-tickets, and a majority of them built in the last decade and still popular. MK has a lot more huge capacity, people-eaters and a lot of them have been around since the 70's. You can do a lot more there with less time, even during peak periods.

 

[*Q*]

I don't think everything using virtual queue/queueless/whatever would be a good idea, but it could be great to have a strategic select few certain attractions with it. Like Fallon would be a good candidate because I don't think there's really an opportunity for an immersive, engaging queue there. The Simpsons would be a good candidate to retrofit because that wait can be miserable.

 

[JungleSkip]

It is sad but most likely true that we won't be getting a late closing time throughout the year until the next set of spectaculars / parades arrives. I don't see that happening till at least summer 2017.

No, we won't get the late closing times throughout the year until people stay late and there's demand for them throughout the year.

Universal closes early because they have no incentive to stay open late.

 

[Mad Dog]

No, we won't get the late closing times throughout the year until people stay late and there's demand for them throughout the year.

Universal closes early because they have no incentive to stay open late.

It's kind of a vicious cycle. People don't stay late because they've been programmed over the years that the park closes early and the night time show(s) is lacking WDW type quality. The only way to change that, besides upping the evening show (s), is to gut it out for a while and stay open later for a long period of time even if they're not running a profit. Just like a regular business that closes early. If they want an evening clientele they need to extend their hours until people get accustomed to the later hours. Years of habit won't be broken over a couple of months. But, the increased number of on site hotel rooms should help attract more people in the evening. Until they opened Cabana, they really didn't have enough on site rooms to make an impact.

 

[JungleSkip]

It's kind of a vicious cycle. People don't stay late because they've been programmed over the years that the park closes early and the night time show(s) is lacking WDW type quality. The only way to change that, besides upping the evening show (s), is to gut it out for a while and stay open later for a long period of time even if they're not running a profit. Just like a regular business that closes early. If they want an evening clientele they need to extend their hours until people get accustomed to the later hours. Years of habit won't be broken over a couple of months. But, the increased number of on site hotel rooms should help attract more people in the evening. Until they opened Cabana, they really didn't have enough on site rooms to make an impact.

If the vast majority of Universal guests weren't coming for the first time now, I'd agree.

I just think Universal attracts a different kind of audience than Disney. They head out for dinner. They don't slave away at the parks for 12+ hours. Not saying Uni shouldn't have good nighttime shows, I just don't think the Uni crowd is one that wants to stay in the parks past 8-9 o'clock

 

[princeinc]

It's kind of a vicious cycle. People don't stay late because they've been programmed over the years that the park closes early and the night time show(s) is lacking WDW type quality. The only way to change that, besides upping the evening show (s), is to gut it out for a while and stay open later for a long period of time even if they're not running a profit. Just like a regular business that closes early. If they want an evening clientele they need to extend their hours until people get accustomed to the later hours. Years of habit won't be broken over a couple of months. But, the increased number of on site hotel rooms should help attract more people in the evening. Until they opened Cabana, they really didn't have enough on site rooms to make an impact.

I've ranted in this on the annual pass holder page on Facebook (along with the stupidity of not having plastic passes). I agree with you in this issue. Now that I live in Orlando, I work until 530 ish and don't even try to go Universal's direction after work. I'm used to them closing early on off season so I beeline towards the mouse house.