Disney World Crowd Report – June 22 to 28, 2014

The lucky number on Sunday was ‘6’, with all parks hitting a level ‘6’ except for The Studios. Star Tours was the big surprise on Sunday with an average wait time of 16 minutes (predicted 26). A 16 minute average posted time at Star Tours represents a ‘1’ on our scale. Star Tours continues to operate at a capacity higher than its demand.

Monday’s crowds were lower than expected except for Magic Kingdom. Our estimates at Magic Kingdom continue to perform very well with no predictions missing by more than two index levels (only Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and Peter Pan’s Flight missed by two). Although Animal Kingdom was not as bad as predicted it was still the busiest park.

Crowds went up a notch as predicted on Tuesday. Epcot was the most crowded with Test Track reaching an average posted time of 103 minutes. Perhaps even more telling is Spaceship Earth’s average posted time of 31 minutes, a definite ’10’ out of ’10’ for that attraction.

We correctly predicted another crowd level ‘9’ on Wednesday, this time at Animal Kingdom. Kali River Rapids had an average posted time of 65 minutes, a ’10’ on its scale while Expedition Everest stayed about average at 33 minutes. Dinosaur was very busy at a 41-minute average posted time. Star Tours continues to underwhelm with an average wait of 20 minutes, the lowest of the headliners by 40 minutes.

Slightly smaller crowds on Thursday although no park dipped below the average, ’5’. Pirates of the Caribbean reached an average posted wait of 34 minutes which is as crowded as it gets for that attraction while most other Magic Kingdom attractions stayed closer to the park wide level, ‘6’.

Toy Story Mania (81 minutes, predicted 106) and Tower of Terror (50 minutes, predicted 79) put The Studios crowd level two lower than expected although our estimates for Great Movie Ride and Star Tours were within one minute of their predicted average. Animal Kingdom wasn’t so bad either where the highest average wait was 54 minutes at Kali River Rapids.

Lower crowds than expected at every park except Magic Kingdom. The first time of the week we missed a crowd level by 3 index points (Studios and Animal Kingdom). Epcot’s numbers were only slightly lower than predicted with only Soarin’ and Test Track missing by more than 20 minutes.