Diagon Alley Soft Opening Watch

[Parkscope Joe]

It's sounding like all of Orlando is quieter than normal. From Touring Plans, yesterday, "Predicted crowd level of 6 for Magic Kingdom, actual crowd level was 4. Predicted level 5 for Epcot, actual crowd level was 3. Predicted 7 for DHS, actual crowd level was 6. Predicted 8 for Animal Kingdom, actual crowd level was 6." I've been seeing that same trend on Touring Plans the last couple of weeks, of Disney crowd levels lower than the Touring Plan projections. Those are fairly small crowd levels for this time of the year.

There's more than just that. TP has adjusted them UP in the spring/fall. People's plans for Orlando have changed as the climate has gotten warmer/more humid. Disney's adjusting as they're removing black out dates for CMs, and then extending hours in the spring. That being said, they saw a dip, while Uni didn't. Disney blamed it on Diagon Alley not being open yet...

 

[GAcoaster]

Softs should continue until park close.

We went today and it was a great experience. You can see they are ready for anything this week. The staff is in place and ready to roll with it, all around Universal and Citywalk they have barricades stacked and ready to setup tonight for tomorrow. They have plenty of staffing coming in early tomorrow morning and they are ready to handle the crowds if they are anywhere near what they were for part one (though they doubt it will be that crazy again).

I found it interesting that they have a HUGE queue setup for Olivanders but haven't had to use it (I think most of the people coming in for the softs were people who already had seen Hogsmeade or just decided to buy wands at the shops and bypass the show portion), but the lines for Florean Fortescque's and the Money Changer were bigger than the existing queues could hold. I'm imagining they'll put together makeshift queues overnight for those to handle the larger crowds coming tomorrow.

My prediction is tomorrow will be a BIG day, but compared to the first one it will be handled better and the crowds will be smaller overall.

- - - Updated - - -

There's more than just that. TP has adjusted them UP in the spring/fall. People's plans for Orlando have changed as the climate has gotten warmer/more humid. Disney's adjusting as they're removing black out dates for CMs, and then extending hours in the spring. That being said, they saw a dip, while Uni didn't. Disney blamed it on Diagon Alley not being open yet...

Yeah, Disney fell way short of projections for 4th of July weekend...not sure on the numbers for Universal but SeaWorld was running about what they ran last year.

 

[UNIrd]

Today isn't all THAT quiet at the parks. I saw Transformers, Despicable Me, and Rip Ride Rockit all hit 100 minutes today. IOA was quieter but FJ and Spiderman both hit 70.

 

[adjjb]

100? Wow. May be people don't realize there is a soft going on?

 

[Mad Dog]

Today isn't all THAT quiet at the parks. I saw Transformers, Despicable Me, and Rip Ride Rockit all hit 100 minutes today. IOA was quieter but FJ and Spiderman both hit 70.

Good to hear. Universal deserves to be rewarded for all of the recent expansions & new attractions.

 

[Mad Dog]

There's more than just that. TP has adjusted them UP in the spring/fall. People's plans for Orlando have changed as the climate has gotten warmer/more humid. Disney's adjusting as they're removing black out dates for CMs, and then extending hours in the spring. That being said, they saw a dip, while Uni didn't. Disney blamed it on Diagon Alley not being open yet...

Sounds like the tail (Universal) is wagging the dog (Disney) if Disney is depending on Universal's new attractions bringing tourists to Orlando.

 

[Milla4Prez66]

Today isn't all THAT quiet at the parks. I saw Transformers, Despicable Me, and Rip Ride Rockit all hit 100 minutes today. IOA was quieter but FJ and Spiderman both hit 70.

Damn, it's usually the other way around. When I went Sunday, Transformers was around 30-45 while Spidey hit 75. I'm interested to see how DA's official opening affects the wait times at both parks. IoA almost always has long lines while USF is more reasonable (except the capacity nightmare known as Minion Mayhem).

 

[PourJudgment]

"And Now His Watch is Ended"