How Do You Feel About Rides Being Fastpass Only?

How Do You Feel About Rides Being Fastpass Only?

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Disney’s FastPass is a big topic of discussion in our house. We typically go to Disney a few times every year so we talk about FastPasses a lot. I was very skeptical and a little scared when they announced the changes to FastPass a while back. I loved the machines where you could just pop in your park ticket and it spit out that paper ticket telling you when to come back. It was easy, it worked and it was basically unlimited.

Disney started testing the magic bands in 2013 and finally they changed the way we use FastPass. Gone were the days of the paper tickets. It was determined that the magic bands would hold only 3 FastPasses per day. This frustrated us because we use a ton of FastPasses when we go. Luckily, they did change that later to 3 FastPasses and then you could add extra after those were used. This was still kind of a pain because you couldn’t add them from the ride or the app, but from a kiosk in the park which you had to find or ask a cast member where it was. At least these extra FastPasses eased me a little, but not completely. I could still see the problems with this system, which for me is pretty big. When you reach the “60 days to your vacation” point, (if you book a resort hotel stay and purchase tickets) you can start to lock in your FastPasses for your vacation online. If you only purchase tickets you can lock in your FastPasses 30 days before your arrival. The problem? Well, some of the times aren’t available because everyone who has reached the 60 day point or closer has booked that time. 

Today, I read that Disney would start a new test in Hollywood Studios. They are going to make Toy Story Mania a FastPass only ride for a short amount of time. I’m not really sure what Disney hopes to accomplish in this test unless they are looking to make all the rides a reservation only. Since the new FastPass has been under way, we have experienced longer wait times in the FastPass line making it not so fast after all. During our last trip to Disney we found the stand by line shorter than the FastPass line and we ended up just skipping our FastPass and using the stand by instead. I do understand that Toy Story Mania has one of the biggest/longest lines in the parks. I’ve only been on that ride twice in the 10+ years I’ve been to Disney World. I do hope that Disney doesn’t make some of these rides reservation only because there are still things we have yet to take part in because we haven’t been able to lock in a FastPass online. I would also miss playing with the bee’s in the standby line of the Winnie the Pooh ride. Just remember, book early and as soon as possible and we’ll all have fun together.