Shiny New Optimized Touring Plans!
The new UI for Optimized Touring Plans is here! This new system is a complete overhaul of how you build plans, edit, view and even print them. We’ve also added a ton of new features, including the ability to Evaluate your plan – this new option lets you check out what your predicted wait times would be for the schedule you put together. So if you know you’re going to say, do everything in the Magic Kingdom in clockwise order, just put the steps in the order you want, hit the Evaluate button and find out just how bad an idea that might be…
We’re really excited about this new system! We have some intro videos coming up soon to help you navigate the waters, but until then feel free to check it out and tell us what you think. We have a form just for that – click here to submit a bug report or give us suggestions for the next phase of development. (Two things we’re already working on – the ability to copy and delete plans will be in the next phase, coming up soon.)
WDW Plans: http://touringplans.com/walt-disney-world/touring-plans/personalized
DLR Plans: http://touringplans.com/disneyland-resort/touring-plans/personalized
Update 4/21: You can now copy premium plans into a personalized plan, where you can edit, optimize, and evaluate. Also, Rests can now have custom titles.
One week away from my WDW and beyond excited! Now is the time I am starting to “really” plan my attractions and edited my first touring plan for the Magic Kingdom and I’m trying to understand the “optimization” of the plan. It doesn’t make any sense….
– The day chosen is a Monday with EMH (yes; I know, MK is considered a park to avoid because of that but I’m going anyway).
– I’m getting into the park around 4:00 (only flight I could get, check in at resort hotel, that’s the quickest I think I can get to the park).
– My optimized plan….
1. It’s a small world (4:11 p.m.)
2. Get Fasspass for Peter Pan’s Flight (4:42 p.m.)
3. Ride Hall of Presidents (4:47 p.m.)
4. DO NOTHING UNTIL THE MAIN STREET ELECTRICAL PARADE AT 8:00 P.M.
What gives? This is an adult plan (two adults who are physically fit and walk fast with NO kids).
I understand I can add attractions, etc., however, I’m quite surprised at how the plan output has provided me with 136 minutes of free time and I just got into the park. And oh yeah, did I mention that I was excited and running on adrenaline as soon as my foot hits the Main Street pavement?
Hi Mike,
Take a look at your plan – it’s a math thing, really. If you have, say, 4 hours worth of attractions in your plan, but 7 or 8 hours of planned time to be in the park, then that extra “free” time has to go somewhere in your plan. What the optimizer has done is decided that it makes more sense to put that free time where your line waits would be longer.
As a simple example, say you want to ride Peter Pan, and at noon the wait would be 45 min, but at 3 it would only be 10. Assuming you have those “extra hours” in your plan, the optimizer will probably tell you to take a break from 12-3 and then ride Pan, as opposed to riding Pan at noon and putting all the free time at the end of your plan. It figures most people would rather relax for a few hours than stand in line for 45 min.
Of course, if you don’t want to take a break, just add more attractions to your plan, or set the finish time to earlier in the day. Hope that helps. 🙂
Thanks Sarah! I knew there had to be some logic but thought it was odd at first glance. I started with the “Late Arrival One-Day Adult” plan and deleted several attractions from that list and then realized that I could put arrival and departure times at the park too. Guess I need to add some more attractions to fill that 136 minutes of free time!
I am new to the site. I have been able to copy the premium touring plans. Is there a way to copy personal plans? I have made a couple that I am really happy with but would like a slightly different version of that includes more breaks and fewer attractions or a slower walking pace to leave room for spontaneity or expectected diversions.
Hey guys, just a note – we’re not actively monitoring this old blog post for bug reports at this time.
Please email any further issues or suggestions to webmaster@touringplans.com – we always respond to our emails, usually within 24 hours.
Thanks for adding the delete button, the touring plans are working wonderfully for me, there are still a few kinks but over all it is fabulous! Thanks
Are the plans still being updated without Optimizing?! Like with the new fastpass rules?
If you mean the premium plans, yes we update those as needed and add new plans when there’s a need as well. If you see something you disagree with or think is a bug, please let us know at webmaster@touringplans.com Thanks!
Hi! I will be in Disney Saturday morning and I can’t set a walking speed preference! No matter what, it always reverts to average. It’s very annoying. It happens on all my plans in two different browsers. Please help!
Hi Jordan, the walking preferences do work, they just don’t save their settings for future use is all. This feature will probably be added in a future update.
i do not see the evaluate or optimize plan button for the personalised plans,
Please send the URL of the plan you’re looking at to webmaster@touringplans.com for assistance. Thanks!
I like the ability to customize, but am making lots of mistakes and lots of versions of the same plan. Sure wish there was a way to delete the wrong plans. Even with renaming it’s getting hard to find the one I want…Also when I put in a dining reservation & evaluate it’s not adjusting for the time correctly. Miss the format you had back in 2010 – a little easier to use for the less “technical” visitor needing the quick plan option!
Len,
I’m trying to fine tune and finalize my personalized plans for next week. I arrive on the 6th. I made two modifications after “evaluate plan” increased several time estimates and had us arriving late for lunch. When I hit “view and print”, the map went crazy, showing Country Bear Jamboree all the way up on Main Street, as well as other bizarre placements. I know Fantasyland is in transition, but I don’t think they’ve relocated things to Tomorrowland! It’s also starting my plan with step #2, and not step #1. I think I’m done editing and I’m going with my plans the way they were before the shiny new version was implemented. I don’t need this grief when I’m leaving in 5 days. If you want to take a look, my plan number is http://touringplans.com/plans/print?id=163614
Thanks.
Dee
Well, this just keeps getting weirder. I just went back and opened the plan again, and now it’s right. It definitely changed in comparison to the printed copy that I had. It’s now starting with Step #1 and the Country Bear Jamboree is back in Adventureland. Maybe Dumbo and Barnstormer are all the way over by the Tomorrowland Speedway now? Hmmm….
Len,
Notice that the version I listed first says “print” in the URL. If you click on it, you’ll see the weird version. Now, click on this version: http://touringplans.com/plans/163614 This is the plan before I ask it to “view and print” and it’s correct. Ask it to “view and print” and it goes nuts again. There’s definitely a bug in there.
This morning, the same thing is happening with my Animal Kingdom plan.
I was playing around with the new features, but now have saved personalized plans I don’t really need. Is there a way to delete them?!
Not yet. It’s supposed to be the next phase of the update once all the bugs are worked out on Phase 1. I have the same problem. Since I couldn’t delete the plans that I don’t want, I changed the titles to “DO NOT USE”. I think I have a list of about 12 plans total, and I hate wading through them. I wish it would at least alphabetize them, so the “DO NOT USE” would be grouped together, but I think the list goes by the date that you made the plan, so they are interspersed throughout. I leave in 7 days, so I guess I’m stuck with it the way it is.
HELP!!!
Hi,
I’m trying to delete attractions on these plans and it is not allowing me to do so. Also once I optimized, the plan looked very strange and does not make sense, like lunch at 9:35 a.m. and wait times of 4254 minutes
http://touringplans.com/plans/158904
http://touringplans.com/plans/158832
http://touringplans.com/plans/158795
Thanks
Here’s a suggestion: since there are some items missing that people are making custom steps out of (most recently, Dee right above), it reminded me of some issues I had trying to make plans for my trip last month: why not make the ability to have your rest or custom step at a particular location, with or without a specific time.
Here is what I ran into: I was trying to put in my plan where I needed to be for the AK parade, in the wheelchair section next to Pizzafari, by 3:30. I tried to make it a meal break, but it screwed up Evaluating since I already had 2 other real meals in there.
Also, what if you have a situation where a family splits up, or is joining another party. They say: Let’s meet up in front of Flame Tree BBQ at 4 pm. That’s a hard time & location, but not a meal. Or if you know you want to take your rest in a certain spot, say the benched near such attraction or restaurant (or even a store?), you can put that in as a hard location & hard duration, but with an open ended start time (just like an attraction).
These would just let you fit in some other things into your plan, instead of bee-lining from attraction to restaurant to attraction, etc. And allow them to be included into the evaluate, or even optimize functions.
Probably too many variables, but I can wish. 🙂
Love you guys! Thanks for taking my call last night on WDWT podcast!
(PS I believe you had a coordinates function in the last UI version, but I never figured out how to use it)
There’s also no Town Hall Meet and Greet for the Princesses or Mickey, only the Fastpasses for both. Until it’s fixed, I’ve just been inserting a break for a certain amount of time and naming the break for whatever attraction it is. For instance, I have a break inserted for Bibbidy Bobbidy at 4:30 PM. The appointment takes 45 minutes to an hour, depending on the level of service you request. That time is now reserved and shows up in my plan as “Bibbidy Bobbidy Boutique” for 45 minutes and the notes reminding me to bring her costume and hair brush. There are ways to get around not having attractions listed in the selection menu and still have an optimized plan or one that fits your own time line.
They still haven’t added Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique as an option, or the ability to have a pre-gate opening dining option, like Crystal Palace at 8am. This makes it impossible to do an accurate touring plan.
I’m having a couple of issues with the personalized tourning plans. The particular one I’m attempting to customize is for Epcot (http://touringplans.com/plans/170056). The issues are…
1. It’s not letting me drag to reorder my steps (I’m using IE 9 browser).
2. I told it I’m entering from the back (International Gateway) but it still seems to think I’m entering from the front entrance.
3. When I tried to evaluate and optimize, it put the “Leave EPCOT” step in the middle of the day! I deleted that step to try to solve that problem but not sure that’s the best answer.
I would have simply deleted this tourning plan and tried to start over but I can’t figure out where to delete a personalized touring plan.
Any help you can provide is greatly appreciated!
Eric – I moved Soarin’ to the top of the plan and it seemed to evaluate well. Can you take a look at it and see if it makes sense now?
I’ll ask Sarah to look at the Epcot Int’l Gateway question – that might be something we need to fix.
Len, it looks right now. Thanks so much for looking at it. I’d still be anxious to hear back if selecting the entry at EPCOT International Gateway (instead of the front entrance) impacts the plan.
Thanks again for such a quick response!
Currently, I am finding when I “Edit” a personalized Touring Plan, the hours seem to revert to a default setting (I am guessing the regular park hours for that day). So, if I go in to edit a description on, for example, a half day plan (where I have set the hours to 8:00 (emh day) to 13:00) the hours will default back to something like 9:00 to 21:00(this is for a Disney Hollywood Studios touring plan).
Also, any update on when the ability for users to delete tourning plans is going to be rolled out?
-Brian
Love the ability to personalize plans. We were doing one for a 6pm arrival at MK on Memorial Day weekend, and it said to get Fastpasses for Space Mountain and Winnie the Pooh (two hours apart). Is it likely that Fastpasses would still be available at that time on a peak attendance day, or is this a bug in the system?
Hi Tennessee,
If you check out the wait times on the site, you’ll see even in peak days, the FASTPASS system take a long time to run out at Magic Kingdom.
From looking at May 27th specifically, the Winnie the Pooh FASTPASS will still be available until around 9:30-10PM.
Using the Disneyland version and love create your own plan program, however, it seems the plan preferences (walk speed and minimize wait/walking) sliders are not functioning. No matter where I move the sliders, as soon as I optimize or evaluate they move back to average/balanced. Help please!
I cannot move around the steps in my plan for Hollywood Studios. It does work ok for my MK plan. I haven’t yet tried Epcot or AK. But I have tried to create a couple of different plans for HS and none of them let me move the steps around.
I am using the DLR app on my iPhone. Every time I try to add a step it takes me to the WDW homepage without adding the step. What am I doing wrong?
I have a question, when I hit Evaluate or Optimize are these based on times at the park today? Seems if I hit one of these buttons at any time during the day I get different results. For example I hit optimize and I get different times for walking/lines, etc. Sometimes something will moved on my plan.If it is real time, that makes sense.
Emailed, now posting comment here:
Love the touring plans, and trying to love the new version BUT… I am not able to move steps on any of the plans that I copy. I can add them and then do the eval and optimize. Sometimes it incorporates my new adds correctly and sometimes the computer outsmarts itself. I attached a sample I’m playing around with below. For example, it says I should leave the park, then do another ride and then take my break-time. In that same plan, I don’t trust the times. Not saying I’m smarter than the all knowing unofficial guide! but with my experience I think doing winnie the pooh would be better before break and not the carousel. Also some general suggestions: I always liked having the average weather listed on the plan and would love having that feature back. I also can’t tell if there are extra magic hours for a certain park, it lists rides at a later time but no notes on EMHs. It would be reassuring to see that listed on the plan. I’m not sure if the computer is just assigning a late time even though that ride would not be open. Thanks so much, Lisa
Magic Kingdom Entrance Edit X 09:00AM 0 0 0 11
Notes: Arrive at the entrance to the Magic Kingdom 25 minutes prior to opening. Disney transportation is almost always the best choice for Disney resort guests.
Dumbo the Flying Elephant Edit X 09:11AM 8 2 0 6
Notes: As soon as the park opens, ride Dumbo the Flying Elephant in Fantasyland.
Prince Charming Regal Carrousel Edit X 09:27AM 5 2 0 9
Notes: Enjoy Cinderella’s Carousel.
Magic Kingdom Entrance Edit X 09:43AM 0 0 0 11
Notes: Depart the Magic Kingdom.
Peter Pan’s Flight Edit X 09:54AM 12 3 0 11
Notes: Ride Peter Pan’s Flight.
Rest and Chef Mickeys Edit X 10:20AM 0 150 0 10
10:30AM for 150 minutes
** Leaving the park
it’s a small world Edit X 01:00PM
I created a custom touring plan, and I have a dining reservation at the Crystal Palace at 8:20, and the system will not let me add it, since the MK doesn’t officially open until 9. What do I do?
Hi Anne,
Why don’t you just start your touring plan at the time you expect to finish at the Crystal Palace. You can write in the reservation details in the “plan summary”. That’s what I’ve done with my reservations for Cape May Cafe and the T’Rex Cafe. That way it’s still on my plan, even though it’s not listed in the plan itself.
I don’t see the Single Rider line option for Rock-n-Roller Coaster in the plans. This obviously makes a major difference in the plans.
http://touringplans.com/plans/159179
Thanks-
Scott
Is there a plan on adapting the opening times of the parks to represent the current “rope drop” routines? For instance, if a park is letting guests in at 8:45am, the plans are still assuming we’re allowed in at 9:00am.
Thanks-
Scott
Hi,
I’m trying to delete attractions on these plans and it is not allowing me to do so. Also once I optimized, the plan looked very strange and does not make sense, like lunch at 9:35 a.m. and wait times of 4254 minutes
http://touringplans.com/plans/158904
http://touringplans.com/plans/158832
http://touringplans.com/plans/158795
Thanks
Hi,
I’m having some issues optimizing a plan for Epcot. I pretty much just copied the One Day Plan for Small Children but added a couple attractions I’d like to see (Mission: Space and Sum of All Thrills) and dinner at Garden Grill 7pm. It keeps giving me weird times for my break and then giving times at 6am the next day? http://touringplans.com/plans/158884
I’m not able to see most recent entries on this blog. Most recent i can see is from May 1st 9:28am. What am i doing wrong? Is the blog not working?
Strange, now that I sent another blog message I can see the blog entries that occured after 9:28am. Any idea why this happened?
I was told that as of March 7th Disney would start enforcing the “return window” shown on our FastPass ticket so that after that date we will not be able to use the FastPass if we arrive more than 15 minutes later than the expiration time shown on the ticket.
Is this true?
Thank you,
David
I’ve heard the same thing. If it is true, then many of the touring will need to be revised. Several of the ones that I’ve looked at have you grabbing a FP in the morning and not returning until the afternoon to use it. That’s another reason why I’ve gone the personalized route.
Are there any good Disney World blogs where we can check if this is so? (we’re going to Disney in two days)
David,
It’s true. See here:
http://blog.touringplans.com/2012/02/06/fastpass-return-time-enforcement-begins-march-7th/
I assume you consider touringplans.com to be a good WDW blog!
In addition, in response to a query I posted earlier on this blog, Len wrote:
“The FP return window printed on the FASTPASS is 60 minutes, but Disney’s policy is to allow around an 80-minute window (5 minutes before through 15 after the window).”
Sarah/Len, I’m having the same problem with very inconsistant optimizations of the same plan…
Very different optimized plans for the same park that list the attractions in very different orders.
In our case we leave tomorrow and the plans we have at hand are concerning until you assure us the bugs have been worked out and we can run our plans again with total confidence.
Thank you!!!
David
I’ve been seeing this issue to some degree even in the old UI. But it does seem worse. Often, it has me riding Soarin’ after Seas or Spaceship Earth first thing, no matter what the sliders are set on. I actually have been optimizing 6 to 7 times, writing them down in a spreadsheet, and using the best one… some of them vary quite a bit as has been mentioned.
Scott
Good morning Folks:
Any update on getting the missing attractions/shows added to the UI? Most notably, The American Adventure at Epcot WS and Fantasmic at HS.
Thanks,
-Clark
What I think you guys need is badges/titles for submitting feature requests or bugs (like Lines). Then I could strive to be things like “Master touring planner of Dinoland USA”
I would like to add Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique to my Magic Kingdom Travel Plan, but it is not in the drop down menu.
I had the same issue – a workaround until they get it fixed is to add a dining plan at Cinderella’s Royal Table and write in the notes that it is actually Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique.
‘Evaluate & Optimize Your Plan’ function is now working well for me for Epcot and Animal Kingdom – thank you very much!!!
I am, however, having a problem with the following:
When I copy the Blizzard Beach One-Day Touring Plan for Adults it doesn’t copy properly, it puts each activity as classified as a ‘Rest’ so when I go to Optimize nothing is there.
http://touringplans.com/plans/156526
Ah, I don’t think we have wait-time models for the water parks yet. 🙂
Len, mistake above… i said “Yesterday I was able to get the Arrival, Wait, Duration, Free Time, Walk Time fields to all populate. Now nothing.”
I meant to say several days ago. I believe it must have been before the implimentation of the new UI.
Ah, thanks. Hey, I’ll be in the parks this weekend (MK Saturday, Epcot Sunday). Look for people wearing red TouringPlans shirts. Would love to hear how the plans are working for you.
Looks like I’m going to miss you guys by a day. I have 6 days of touring plans that I will test and report back on this blog and share my experience of the new plans.
Now if I could only figure out which of 6 very different optimized plans I should be using for Hollywood. I am getting the same phenomena with AK. Several optimized plans, different and which one to use.
Len, we are planning to be in Epcot on Sunday so will definately keep an eye out. Hope TT being closed doesn’t throw out the lines estimates too much!
Andrew
Hi Len,
Regarding the Personalized Touring Plans I’ve created, when I click enable Optimize and Evaluate nothing happens. Is the system not working, or am I doing something wrong? Yesterday I was able to get the Arrival, Wait, Duration, Free Time, Walk Time fields to all populate. Now nothing. One of the url’s we’re having trouble with is http://touringplans.com/plans/155910#
An idea: can I access the ‘old interface’ so we can have the functionality of schedule and optimize? We’re visiting Disney this coming Thursday thru Sunday so I’m nervous the new UI for Optimized Touring Plans won’t be running or functioning properly by then.
Thank you for your help, much appreciated!
David
Hi David – that plan had a step for Sunshine Seasons dining, but no time or duration, that’s why it wasn’t optimizing. I saw that you already had a step for lunch, so I deleted the Sunshine Seasons step assuming you didn’t realize it had copied over. The plan optimizes now. Are there any other plans you’re having problems with? If so let me know the urls and I’ll check those out as well. Thanks!
The new version is nice because it gives you times based on the order you input, and it still gives the option to optimize too. This is nice because you can check your own version against times to see if you are on track. However, I have noticed that there are few kinks.
Towne Sq Mickey and Minnie Meet and Greet is not listed an attraction. The FASTPASS is listed as an option, but the actual attraction is not. When you choose the FASTPASS booth the program can’t evaluate or optimize because the actual attraction is not listed.
Tinker Bell’s Nook is also not listed as an attraction. It was listed- and even optimized with it- on the original.
Main Street Electric Light Parade is not listed as an attraction. Related to parades, there is no ‘afternoon parade’ option. You have to choose the name of the parade.
Also, Tomorrowland Terrace Noodle Station is not listed as a dining option.
We leave in 8 days- so I am hoping you can fix these soon so we can leave with plans in hand!
Hey Julie – can you let us know the date on which you’re optimizing your plan (or provide the URL)? The parade won’t be listed if it’s not being offered on your date of visit.
Regarding the Tomorrowland Terrace Noodle Station, we can look at adding it, but I don’t think it’s open often enough to rely on it.
URL is 155950; date I’m looking for the Main Street Electrical Parade is for 5/11.
I’m also looking for the afternoon parade on 5/10- URL is 155937.
Will the missing attractions be added?
I really need so help. You guys are doing yeomen’s work taking care of all the micro / macro tweaks always associated with a major site upgrade, but I’d like to ask of two wimple things can be addressed before the start of the work week.
1.) Still don’t have the The American Adventure listed in Epcot attractions (See this plan: http://touringplans.com/plans/147872) – you’ll note I have inserted a “faux break” at the time we would like to experience that land in the World Showcase
2.) In this same plan (http://touringplans.com/plans/147872) I can’t get the start time for Illuminations to change for 9:23 to the accurate 9 p.m. – Weird, right?
Any chance these are on today’s :fix list?
Thanks,
– Clark
Are you using optimize or evaluate? Just checking, I don’t want to mess up your order by optimizing if you have it planned out.
Evaluating. Thanks 🙂
Ah, ok I just looked at this – the problem is that the times you have scheduled are impossible according to the optimizer. When you evaluate your Rose and Crown step, even though you have it set for 7:45, your arrival time isn’t until 7:51 – that combined with the 75 min duration and the other walk/wait times makes it 9:23 by the time you get to the central waypoint we have in the system for watching Illuminations. The system doesn’t know that you want to watch from Rose and Crown.
My suggestion would be to delete the Illuminations step and just put a note in your Rose and Crown step that you should watch from there.
Got it. That makes perfect sense and should work. Thanks, Sarah.
Now, how do you suggest I work in the American Adventure Show? It’s still not on the attractions of shows list. You’ll note I try to work it ion with a “faux break” but I have no idea whether that will work of not once at Epcot.
Many thanks
Hi Sarah, everything is working wonderfully for my TPs now. Thank you!!! I LOVE the Evaluate enhancement! Only one small thing – not sure if it’s a bug or my misunderstanding. Can you tell me why my plan shows 20 minutes of free time after Pinocchio (and 5 minutes after Pirate’s Lair)? I thought it might be waiting until my FP is ready but only 5 minutes of wait time is needed for that (and zero if DL really lets us use our FP 5 minutes earlier than our stated window time). Thanks! Jeanne P.S. I Evaluate my plan, not Optimize, if that matters…
Sorry, thought I included my URL: 150354. Also have an extra 5 minutes of free time after Innoventions in 150371. And 5 after Monsters Inc and 17 after Turtle Talk in 151160. Thanks!!
Ah, I’ll have to look at this. Thanks Jeanne for providing the URL.
Hi Len, any news on the unnecessary free times? It seems to be linked to when an attraction is ridden using a FP. (The unneccessary free time always occurs before the FP redemption, even thought it’s not needed to hit the window). Thanks!
Regarding the Personalized Touring Plans I’ve created: When I click enable Optimize and Evaluate nothing happens. Is the system not working, or am I doing something wrong? Yesterday I was able to get the Arrival, Wait, Duration, Free Time, Walk Time fields to all populate. Now nothing. Please advise.
Thank you,
David
Hi David, what’s the url of the plan you’re having trouble with? I’ll check it out.
Hi Sarah,
So one of the url’s we’re having trouble with is http://touringplans.com/plans/155910#
The Pptimization and Evaluate function not working at all.
An idea: can I access the old interface so we can schedule/optimize our plans? Problem is we’re visiting Disney this coming week (Thurs, Fri, Sat and Sun), so we are nervous the site upgrade won’t be running or functioning properly without flaws by then. Thoughts?
Thank you for your help, much appreciated!
David E.
See below note – this is working now. 🙂
I created a personal plan and optimized it 6 times with no changes and am getting very different results. The 1st 4 attractions for each of the 6 optimizations are as follows:
1-
Toy Story Mania
Movie Ride
Star Tours FP
One Man’s Dream
now I took above plan and optimized it and received the following results
2-
Toy Story
Disney Jr.
Tower of Terror FP
Studio Backlot Tour
now I took above plan and optimized it and received the following results
3-
Toy Story
Tower of T. FP
Disney JR
Tower of Terror
now I took above plan and optimized it and received the following results
4-
Streets of America
Toy Story FP
Muppets 3D
Voyage Little Mermaid
now I took above plan and optimized it and received the following results
5-
Tower of Terror
Studio Backlot Tour
Streets of America
Great Movie Ride
now I took above plan and optimized it and received the following results
6-
Star Tours
Toy Story FP
Studio Backlot Tour
Disney Jr
Start time, end times, sliders the same. Why am I getting different results? Should’t all 6 optimizations withe the exact attractions provide me the identical plan?
attached in the plan from the # 6 optimization. I overwrote the same plan all 6 times.
http://touringplans.com/plans/152330
Hey Carl, Len is taking a look at the plan to see what’s going on. Thanks!
Tks S. Hope for a fix soon. I’m off in 7 days
Hey Carl-
Thanks for the details; they’re very helpful.
The current touring plan optimizer program starts off with a random version of your attractions, and attempts to find an optimized version from there. Because of that randomness, this version of the program may produce two plans that are equivalent, but whose attractions are in slightly different orders.
That being said, your larger point is that if I run the same attractions through the optimizer twice, the second touring plan should be at least as good as the first. That’s currently not the case, but I think we know how to fix that. Let me talk to Sarah on Monday about doing it.
We’d done something similar to this in the last version of the optimizer, but not yet in this version. Thanks for the reminder.
Len
Tks Len/Sarah, Can you let me know when you’ve done a fix so I can run my plans one final time before I leave. Having 6 different plans is totally confusing and not sure which one to go with. If no fix is done soon, would you recommend that I create a brand new plan and go with the 1st optimize and do not perform any further optimizations? tks
Just thought I’d share that I can see the same thing with: 157750. Every time I Optimize I get a different answer. And in fact it seems to get progressively worse. I jotted down the Line/Free/Walk times for several and it went: 107/5/55, 109/17/46, 111/12/50, 120/15/46, 109/31/50… If you add those up, the number keeps getting higher (and the Busy is the same throughout). It finally got a better one after about 8 tries, I think. Actually I guess if you subtract out the unnecessary Wait times some of them were better, but many were worse… Thanks for all of the great work…
Sarah/Len, Any update of a fix for the very inconsistant optimizations of the same plan some have been experiencing? I can’t deal with 6 different optimized plans for the same park that list the attractions in very different orders.
Precise optimizations is crucial needless to say. I leave in a few days and the plans I have at hand are totally suspect until you give the green light that indicates the bugs have been worked out and i can run my plans again with total confidence. thanks both
Fix should be live no later than Thursday morning (5/3).
With this new version of the optimizer, if you run the same plan more than once, every subsequent plan should be at least as good as the first.
Carl, great job explaining this. I’ll also note that Sarah did a great job getting this into production quickly.
Len
Oh, Carl – also meant to say that this should alleviate a lot of the variation in plans you see when submitting multiple times.
Totally awsome Len and Sarah. This was a BIGGIE.
Thanks
by Len Testa on May 1st, 2012 at 10:50 am EDT Fix should be live no later than Thursday morning (5/3).
Hi Len/Sarah. maybe I’m a bit early. I ran an optimization on 1 plan AK 4 times and I get mixed results still. Kindly advise tks
Lots of bug fixes tonight! Evaluate and Optimize should be *much* smoother now, and should tell you when there’s a problem much more often. I think this will be a big help.
Also fixed the date format validation issue for new plans, and a few other annoying glitches around. I put the code in place for World of Color fastpass – the forecasts have to run which takes a while, but depending on when your date for your plan is you’ll be able to evaluate with it between now and tomorrow night. It will give you a return time of 15 min before the showtime the engine believes you’ll be assigned to.
I’m still working on some of the attractions not showing, that will be fixed soon. Also, I see a few people asking about delete – that is coming, but it’s part of phase two which means “sometime after I finish making sure phase one is running as smoothly as I can make it”!
Thanks for all the comments and especially for the bug reports on the form!
Is there any way that you could enable deleting of personalized plans. I’m up to about a dozen and it’s getting to be a pain wading through my unwanted versions.
BTW, I love the new optimized plans and that you can now evaluate a modified plan. I don’t always agree with the optimized plans, and having the ability to still get the time breakdowns doing it “my way” is awesome! Great job!
Hi Dee, I have a pile of plans I’d like to delete as well. For me its not a biggie. I just rename them something obvious that wouldn’t confuse me with my latest and greatest plans.
I am interested with your findings as to why you don’t always agree using the optimization option to create your plans. I put a lot of confidence using the optimizatoion button but now you have me thinking. Can you share your experience? tks
Dee,
I think Sarah mentioned further up that deleting plans won’t be coming until phase 2. Just an FYI. I like Carl’s idea of renaming the plans though. I think I’ll have to give that a shot.
Sarah,
I’m still having the issue with Evaluate deleting FP booth steps. http://touringplans.com/plans/152520
I keep trying to add a trip to the FP Booth for Tower of Terror. It allows me to add it, but deletes the step when I evaluate my plan.
It stayed this time. I’ll let you know if it happens again!
And it broke again. 🙂 Tower of Terror FP is now gone.
Ok, we’re working on a solution here – Len found an engine bug doing this earlier, not sure if the fix is on the site yet. Thanks!
So far, it hasn’t…but I’ll keep an eye out. Thanks!
Sarah-
Any update on this? It’s still happening.
I Know you have more important issues to fix Sarah, but when you get a moment can you define very relaxed, relaxed, average and fast. Is fast at a slow jog? tks
Checking on the speeds – I know we test walking times, not sure what the official description is. Optimizing probably won’t change too much in that time but it’s nice to check, especially since you have your “backups” printed out in case you decide you liked your original plan better. 🙂 If you have a smart phone, you can use Lines to optimize right in the parks – that’s where you’ll see bigger changes, as it checks who is in the park, what the current reported as well as predicted wait times are, and you can complete steps and modify your starting location on the fly.
If you can, I recommend optimizing in the parks whenever you’ve been in a location for a long time, just to check for unexpected line surges nothing can predict, such as can happen during a storm or if a ride breaks down. It’s also great for providing a little spontaneity in your plan, like a quick shopping trip or extra snack. 🙂
Wonderful idea Sarah. I was going to go down with plans printed back home a few days prior to getting to the parks. Never though about optimizing while in the park during a break to see if anything has changed.
Go Sarah go!
It must be a nightmare having to adjust compensation factors and all the variables that exist. Maybe one day when the dust settles, you’ll explain how you adjust and calculate the walking speeds. I have long legs, some have short, distances from 1 attraction to the other differ…How do you do it?
I’ll be down there in a little over a week for 6 days testing out the plans and so, so anxious to test the accuracies of it all.I printed all my plans now, would you suggest I optimize once more and print prior to leaving?
Ok, I just fixed several problems with Evaluate and I adding a bunch of warnings if your plan is not ready to Optimize/Evaluate – checking that you have an attraction step if you have a related fastpass step, for example.
I also worked on the sliders – they’re working now, but I think I need to adjust the numbers on them slightly so expect more changes there tomorrow.
Please note that the World of Color Fastpass booth is requiring some special code that I’m not quite done with yet – it works differently from every other booth. I expect to have this done at some point tomorrow as well. Until then plans with this step will not Evaluate as the system doesn’t yet have forecasts ready.
Thanks!
Thanks Sarah!
It seems like the sliders still aren’t working… at least they seem to revert back to defaults after optimizing is done. I tested in IE8 and Chrome.
Thanks-
Scott
They do revert to defaults when done, but they are sending different values now based on what they are at when you optimize. I may need to tweak the values sent however if you’re not seeing a difference, I’ll take a look and see.
Thanks- it would be great if there was some way to know that the plan you’re looking at was produced with a specific slider combination. For instance, by looking at the resulting plan, I can’t determine what the sliders were set for when I optimized.
Scott
Also- I still see World Showcase related steps in my plans before 11 am… sometimes Maelstrom, sometimes a pavilion.
Thanks!!!
SCOTT
I can’t seem to find MSEP on the list of attractions/shows. I would like to add it to my MK TP. I tried adding a break and that messed the TP up… Please advise.
Please let me know the url of the plan so I can help – also, how did it “mess up”? Did you get an error message?
Fixed a bug with opening plans – if you were having trouble this morning, try again it should be up now. Thanks!
I’ll go through here this afternoon and answer specific questions, working on several things for an update now.
Thank you. Can you please (Pretty please) put adding The American Adventure to the Epcot attractions list at the top of your afternoon “bug fix” list? 🙂
Clark, did you try and recreate a new plan to see if its there? I just created a new one and it’s appears as it should.
It’s there I believe – check under “T” – I’m going to change the sort order to make things more clear there, most people don’t look under “The”.
Is it just me, or are others having trouble opening plans created yesterday or prior?
It’s working great for me planning a Disneyland trip. I really like the evaluate plan option.
However, every time I click to view and print, it changes my times. Times change both at the top and throughout my plan. Sometimes if I try again and again and again, eventually I can get the times to show up correctly to print. Mostly, I lose my times and it’s no good to print it because the entire timeline for the day is incorrect.
I love all the upgrades and new options. I hate to complain, but I invest a lot of energy in my plans and want to print them!
This is now fixed. 🙂
I am having the same problem. I get what I think is a good touring plan and then decide to add an attraction or lunch. Then I ‘Evaluate’ and everything changes. And it doesn’t change for the good. I’m trying to get good plans and it is not working. Someone please HELP>
Can we please (PLEASE, Pretty Please) get The American Adventure added to the Epcot attractions or Shows drop down list. Right now, I am being forced to schedule a “break” at the time we would like to see it – less than, well….Optimal.
I also know from previous post that it apparent does show in some drop down, but not others. Just so you know I am not “Nutz”, here’s the touring plan # in question: http://touringplans.com/plans/147872
It’s available for me. Bizarre why it does not show for you. Your being forced to schedule a break?
Carl: Yeah . I know. Bizarre. And “forced” was probably a bad word choice. I am using the “break” function to carve out 30 minutes for The American Adventure because I can’t add it with the “attraction” function.
Anyone know of ETA on when this issue will be resolved?
Hey Griswold, How do you know 30 minutes is sufficient or too much? Without the right estimate, it could knock your plan off either way by several minutes. Then, what are you going to do? Kidding
BTW, after all these years, your finally planning on seeing a real park?
See below, but I am going to work on attractions not appearing tomorrow – I’ve been focusing on making sure what appears optimizes and evaluates correctly first. Thanks!
Can you please add Kidcot stops and character meet and greets to the attraction list in the Epcot plans that include small children?
Status
What’s the Titus of fixing he optimize feature for Epcot?
It should be working fine Jon. Are you getting an error? If so, please post the url so I can take a look. Thanks.
I too would like to either delete plans or be able to take them completely back to start to input my attractions instead of having to delete out the steps and then re-add different steps.
Love the ability to customize! Can’t wait to use it for my October trip.
How can I delete my personalized plans. I have several that I can’t use because they are riddled with bugs. Thank you.
I am not able to evaluate my MK Touring Plan. Optimize works but I want to be able to change one thing and then evaluate and it won’t do anything! Thanks! http://touringplans.com/plans/146661 Lori-Dee
This plan has a fastpass booth but no matching attraction. Evaluate won’t work in that case. I’ve added an error message for that.
Good Afternoon,
I have two minor issues with one of my plans, http://touringplans.com/plans/153297#. First, I am attempting to remove an attraction (the parade) with no luck. The page will display “Data Change!” but nothing happens. Do I need to create a whole new plan just to get rid of it?
Secondly, if attractions are added, you can not prioritize if the plan has already been “Evaluated.”
Please advise.
Thank you, Jen
Hi Jennifer,
I was able to remove the parade on your plan. Could you tell me what operating system and browser you are using?
I’m not sure I understand your second issue – are you saying you cannot move the steps?
I believe the problem is probably a browser issue – if you are using IE 6 or lower, or an older version of Safari, updating your browser to the newest version or changing to a different browser will probably solve your issue.
The times for my MK days on is completely out of order: http://touringplans.com/plans/87714
My MK day 2 does not give me any times when I click evaluate: http://touringplans.com/plans/81691
I’ve completed my HS and AK plans including evaluating and they are fine. So, I know I’m doing it correctly.
My epcot plan that I created before the evaluate option was added is completely gone. I submitted that problem with the form for the link above. Should I do the same for these 2 as well?
Bug reports in the form are always good and preferable! I may not respond to all of them, but I will read and check on every one. Thanks!
(both of the above plans should be working now, also)
The epcot plan is still missing. I had used the report bug form for it, but have not heard back. Can you please check on it as my trip is just a few weeks away. Thanks so much. http://touringplans.com/plans/147127
I know it explains on Touring plans but I still don’t get the difference between Evaluate and Optimize the plans, I am being stupid, I’m sure, but it sounds like the same thing to me.
I had the same question but was afraid to ask. Looks like we are 2 stupids. Perhaps someone here can explain the difference
“Optimize” uses the software to suggest the most efficent way to tour the park, based on the attractions you want to see, the breaks you want to take, and the meals you want to eat. Eventually, the sliders will play into this as well.
“Evaluate” allows you to move the steps around to your liking and see how efficient it is.
Maybe the optimize feature tells you to ride Space Mountain first, but you are desparately wanting to fastpass it right away and go to Dumbo. You can adjust the steps and hit “evaluate”, and it will let you know what that order looks like.
Does that make sense?
Scott
It sure does make sense now that you explained it! What a great idea for the evaluate button, TP gets better and better! THANKS!
I thought I posted this earlier but cannot find my post. So here it is again, sorry if it is out there.
These have been my issues, most probably have already been posted
1. Countries not listed in Epcot
2. Slider bars not working, in my IE version at home the slider moves, but not at work, don’t think it really works after optimizing.
3. Funny thing also sometimes when I change my plan to less walking, the plan takes less time to finish, it is only a couple of minutes difference, but still you would think less walking would take longer for touring than average walking. This I noticed on the old way, but haven’t tested it on the new way.
4. The option to drag a ride from one time to another does not work (not sure if this is only when I am work with the version of IE we have here, will have to try it at home)
5. The wait times to me seem off also. There is always a wait time. For example if you could get on the Mad Tea Party right away, there is still a wait time for unloading and loading. You are never going to get right on ride and the ride will start, there is always that waiting for unloading and loading, unless you are the first person in the morning to get on that ride, but you will still have to wait for loading of other people. Another good example is Astro Orbitor, when I optimized it had wait time is 1 min and the ride is 2 minutes. Don’t even think that is possible, because of riding up in the elevator, then there is always a line to wait for the current ride to stop and unload. I don’t know — you guys are the experts, but it seems that load (or unloading) times are not included.
6. Can not delete plans.
7. After you hit the option to print, there is no way to go back to previous page.
I LOVE LOVE LOVE TP!!!!!!!! I cannot wait to go in October to test out this new optimizing option.
Oh sure now I see my post a few up, I APOLGIZE!
I am having much of the exact same issues. I go in less than 2 weeks and I hope most of the bugs have been sorted out by then. My 6 days of plans that I worked on will probably have to be done over just prior to arriving at the park.
I’m sure the software developers are working hard with fixes. I wish they would keep us informed of the latest developments so we can further test when the fixes have been put in place…
I’m sure they are working hard at getting everything fixed, must crazy!
I second the “delete plans” motion 🙂
Donna (and Carl) – Working on sliders and missing attractions. If you’re using IE 6 or before, an upgrade should fix any problems with dragging. I believe the load time is included in the duration, but I’ll check with Len on that. Delete is part of phase two, and for now just hit the “back” button when done printing – we may do something different with this down the road. Thanks for all your input!
I am sure this has been asked. I have an ADR at Askerhus that starts pre-RD. I can’t change the time to show that we will be in the park before it opens. Obviously I can remove the ADR but, we will be starting in a different part of Epcot. Would that affect the “optimization” of my TP?
I am curious about this too. I have a pre-RopeDrop ADR at Crystal Palace that I wanted to enter on my custom touring plan but the system said I couldn’t be there before 9am (official opening) Other than that issue the changes seem pretty cool 🙂
Checking with Len on this. Thanks!
I’m still having issues with ‘Evaluate’ on plan http://touringplans.com/plans/152372
Plus, most of the time if I try to drag Tom Sawyer Island anywhere it crashes IE.
Also, I just noticed when I create a new plan and use the calendar to select a day the numbers are in the wrong order so it will not accept it. I don’t seem to remember it doing that yesterday.
I have noticed the same with the date formating as well. It was fine yesterday.
Date formatting should be fixed now. If you’re using IE 6, an upgrade should fix the problem of dragging. Checking on the plan. Thanks!
Is it just me or was it decided not to include these in the new touring plans? 4 pavilions are not available in the “attractions to visit” in the Epcot plans. I understand that it’s almost impossible to determine an average time for the visit to these attractions as so many variables exist, but perhaps they should be listed anyways but noted that chosing these attractions will not be included in the plans for this reason. I would then be able to put a note for myself in the available planning notes box, that time permitting, I should include these as part my itenerary time permitting.
If these 4 pavilions do not appear on the “attractions to visit” plan, I would never know that these attractions actually existed and perhaps not consider extra time to see these attractions.Furthermore, I can’t help but think what else was not included in the “attractions to visit” list in the other parks.
What else might I miss? Just saying.
Will be looking at missing attractions tomorrow. Thanks!
Hello, Here are the issues I have as of 4-23 – most of them mentioned above
1. Countries in Epcot are not listed just the attractions (i.e. Maelstrom, but not Norway)
2. Also after optimizing, the bar for walking speed always default backs to average, Also on my interent explorer at work the bar does not even move, though the words change from average walking to minimize walking.
3. Funny thing also sometimes when I change my plan to less walking, the plan takes less time to finish, it is only a couple of minutes difference, but still you would think less walking would take longer for touring than average walking. This I noticed on the old way, but haven’t tested it on the new way.
4. The option to drag a ride from one time to another does not work with my version of IE at work, home it works fine,
5. The wait times to me seem off also. There is always a wait time. For example if you could get on the Mad Tea Party right away, there is still a wait time for unloading and loading. You are never going to get right on ride and the ride will start, there is always that waiting for unloading and loading, unless you are the first person in the morning to get on that ride, but you will still have to wait for loading of other people. Another good example is Astro Orbitor, when I optimized it had wait time is 1 min and the ride is 2 minutes. Don’t even think that is possible, because of riding up in the elevator, then there is always a line to wait for the current ride to stop and unload. I don’t know — you guys are the experts, but it seems that load (or unloading) times are not included.
On old IE version when I optimize sometimes put my dinner reservations at odd time, like I had 4:30 ressie and it put it at 8:30.
I took the old Halloween party touring plan and saved it as my own. Will only optimize up to 7:00 when the official park hours end, I understand this is probably just not updated.
I REALLY LOVE TOURING PLANS!!!! I could play with it all day testing out different scenarios! lol
Every time I optimize my plans the time of my ADR is not at the time I set it for. An example is Yak & Yeti lunch set for 12pm and the duration is 60 minutes. The TP has me going to the resturant at 11:42am. http://touringplans.com/plans/143283 This is not the only TP that I have had an issue with. Others have me going to eat hours after the time I put in… Please advise.
I noticed that too, for a quick fix, I just set my time to 12:15 and cut the minutes down to 45.
I have encountered three problems with the personalized Disneyland touring plans.
First, when I try to set Magic Morning hours for August 21, I get an error saying that the plan cannot start before the opening time of the park. This may be because the hours for this date haven’t been released by Disney. However if this is the case, it should not be an option for the user.
Second, when I optimize the plan for April 24, the 12:30pm lunch break that I scheduled for gets changed to 9:20am.
Finally, I am not able to delete existing personalized plans.
These should all be fixed except delete, which is part of phase two and will be coming soon. Thanks!
Two Things:
1) This is worth the subscription to touringplans. The data on the optimized plans is incredible. I’m so psyched to get back to Florida this summer and try it out.
2) Last summer, my family went to the Magic Kingdom during an extra magic hours morning, and half of the park wasn’t open until 10. Is that common or was that a unique day at the park? I ask, because the custom touring plans don’t appear to take that into account.
Hi Rob,
It is a normal thing. Only some of the attractions are open for morning EMH. You can find the list at http://allears.net/tp/emhour.htm#newatt (or probably somewhere on this site too)
I pasted it here for convenience:
Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin
Prince Charming Regal Carrousel
Dumbo the Flying Elephant
“it’s a small world”
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
Mickey’s PhilharMagic
Peter Pan’s Flight
Space Mountain
Stitch’s Great Escape!
Tomorrowland Speedway
I have a couple of plans (http://touringplans.com/plans/152573# is an example) where I can’t delete steps. I click the X but it just takes me back to the top of the page.
Also, on that plan above, we have Crystal Palace reservations for before park opening (8:05am). It won’t let me set my start time before park opening so it’s forcing my reservation to actually start at 9am which pushes everything else in the plan out incorrectly. Would you just recommend not adding pre-opening meals to the plan?
Hi Michael, what operating system and browser are you using? The site needs a version of Internet Explorer greater than 6 if you’re using that browser, so an upgrade should fix the delete issue. We’re looking at the pre-open meals. Thanks!
I have been unable to add a meal to a touring plan. I have tried a couple of different plans for MK and it allows me to add attractions and reorder, but when I attempted to add a meal it can not seem to calculate.
Do you have a url I can check out? Also, I’ve added more error checking which may help solve the issue. Thanks!
Yes, it seems to have resolved. Linked one to my name in OP. But I have since been able to evaluate or optimize. Thanks.
I can add Jungle Cruise FP Booth to my plan, but every time I evaluate it, the FP booth disappears. I’ve tried this several times since last week.
http://touringplans.com/plans/152502
Also, an option to delete plans would be nice as well. I have several “tests” that I would like to remove to clean up the clutter.
Same issue is occurring on this plan when I try to add the Tower of Terror FP option. It adds the step, but after evaluating, the step disappears. http://touringplans.com/plans/152520
My guess is that when this happens the optimizer has determined that using FP isn’t worthwhile so it’s removed the step.
I’d think so too, but I’m evaluating, not optimizing, so no steps should be removed.
We found an odd bug in the optimizer that allowed this – it should be working now. Thanks!
Great to see the new enhancements. On this that is (perhaps) a quick fix would be to get the American Adventure Show added back into the list of Epcot WS Attractions. I am planning strip right now and it is “mission critical” to have that on my touring plan list.
Any chance of getting that tweak implemented soon? 🙂
Best wishes,
Clark
Clark-
I think it’s under “Entertaiment and Parades” as a show-based attraction.
Love the name-
Scott
Hi Scott:
I thought that might be the case too, but, alas, it is not. “The American Experience” is no longer listed for Epcot — anywhere 🙂
Clark-
I just tried to create an epcot plan, and found it listed… it’s called “The American Adventure” and I see it both when creating a touring plan, and also when adding an attraction.
Hope it works for you before your trip!
Scott
Scott:
This is so weird. I just tried to create a new plan given perhaps it didn’t show on my dropdown list because I was editing a plan created before the site upgrades. Strangely, creating a new plan didn’t make any difference. I’m not smart enough to know how to create/share a screen capture so you can be sure I’m not nuts. Here’s a cut & paste of he full list of WS Attractions and Shows. It just isn’t there!
Like I said, weird. If you can see it below, please tell me. Maybe I AM GOING NUTS and that’s why I don’t think I am! 🙂
Headliner Attractions &
Entertainment:
Gran Fiesta Tour Starring The Three Caballeros
Impressions de France
Maelstrom
O Canada! World Showcase
Reflections of China World Showcase
Kim Possible World Showcase Adventure
Shows, Parades
& Diversions:
IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth
Off Kilter
The British Revolution
World Showcase Players – United Kingdom
The Hat Lady at the Rose & Crown Pub
Remy Experience
Mo’Rockin
Restaurant Marrakesh Dancer & Band
Matsuriza
Miyuki
Voices of Liberty
Spirit of America Fife & Drum Corps
Sergio
The Ziti Sisters
Oktoberfest Musikanten
Mariachi Cobre
Outpost
Friendship Boats
Clark,
I had an existing epcot plan created using the new UI without The American Adventure in it, I went to Add Attraction and The American Adventure appears in the drop-down list under Entertainment and Parades. However, my list is different to yours!! Something wacky is going on, perhaps there’s a reason why some attractions are not included in the drop down?
Just to let you know, I have the same issue so you are not alone!
Thank you….at least we have that going for us! 🙂
I created a touring plan using the Ultimate Touring Plan copy and added in a lunch, dinner and pirates league and hit evaluate. I am getting numbers all over the place.
Thanks.
http://touringplans.com/plans/152384
Still having issues with validate.. Fantasmic is at 2:49pm!!
The system doesn’t think you’ll have time for everything, that’s why the wait times are crazy. I’m showing this to Len to see what he wants to do with Ultimate plans.
Great job with all the work you’ve done on these! I’m having a lot of fun planning.
As others have mentioned, I’m finding the plan below telling me to go on rides during EMH when they aren’t open. Also, I can’t delete anything from this plan.
Thanks!
http://touringplans.com/plans/150355
Hi April, are you using IE6? If so, an upgrade should fix the problem with delete. Checking on emh. Thanks!
Could you let us know when the sliders will be working. Although 4 choices to choose from exist, the total time does not change regardless of what position we choose. I believe plans as we speak are being optomized at average.
Can you confirm this. I’d like to print plans with a “very relaxed” setting for a trip very shortly.
thanks
Can you also kindly advise when the missing attractions have been added. My plans are incomplete because missing attractions I was going to include were not available.
thanks
Thanks for all your dedication working on this new release. When you have a chance, I noticed: 1) In MK, the Town Square Theater attractions (Princesses & Mickey Mouse) can be added as a fastpass booth but not as an attraction (http://touringplans.com/plans/105422); 2) Tower of Terror doesn’t have a child swap option (which is a nice addition to the program, by the way!; http://touringplans.com/plans/105443)
I have an epcot plan that has me doing several World Showcase attractions before 11AM when it optimizes.
http://touringplans.com/plans/48383
Checking on this, thanks!
http://touringplans.com/plans/151802
427 minutes free time? YIKES!!
Not sure if this will help but when I remove Reflections of Earth, I don’t get this free time anymore and things are normal. Yaaa!!! When I add it back and opt, I get the same wait time or approx.
Carl, this is just showing you that you can get everything done in your plan and still have time to spare before the first fireworks show. If you add more steps, you’ll see the free time reduce as needed. Thanks!
tks, I understand how this now works.
When I change the walking speed of a created plan from very relaxed to fast, the optimizer reduced a complete day of attractions by 1 minute.
Also when I optimize a plan with no changes, it gives me different complete times by approx. 10 minutes.hmmmm…..
Hey Carl, what’s the url? I’m working on the sliders right now, they’ll be ready soon.
I’d have to go back and find and not sure if I can as I was just experimenting but if your working on the sliders, I’m sure you will sort it out. I’ll post the URL next time I find an issue. Tks Sarah.
The Evaluate bug hitting some plans has now been fixed. All plans should be able to Evaluate and Optimize now – please let me know if you have further issues! I’ll be checking all the plans I have urls for from people.
Next: fixing the sliders, and making sure all the attractions show up correctly
After that: more performance upgrade and a few little improvements
Thanks!
I am not able to evaluate this plan http://touringplans.com/plans/147142. Am I doing something wrong or is it just still requiring some fixing up? Thanks!
Just evaluated this. 🙂
Speed has significiently improved.
When selecting attractions, it would be nice to be able to click on an attraction and a brief description of the attraction.As the variable selections do not include ie. adults with no children, the attraction list shows ALL attractions catering to walks of life. While the Prince Charming Carrousel seems obvious at to what the attraction is, the Mad Tea Party attraction title does not lend itself to a bunch of tea cups swirling around.For nubie’s, the choices are not obvious compared to seasoned visitors.
Vast improvements over the previous version. CONGRATS!! We appreciate all the hard work involved with this revision.
Thanks! This is one of the features we’re planning on adding in a future update. Appreciate the suggestion!
I would like a plan for 2 days at 1 park ie. MK. from opening to 4pm each day. I was able to do this under the old. Now I don’t see this capability. If your site slow? I find if painfully slow.
I’m trying to use EMH at Magic Kingdom (at 7am). I click the button to use the EMH and it updates my start time to 7am. When I click save, I get an error that my start time is outside park hours. Thanks!
Could you let me know the url? Thanks!
This is the URL for the plan that won’t let me use morning EMH
http://touringplans.com/plans/135200
Thanks!!
Got it. There’s a bug in emh, sorting out now. Thanks!
Sarah- thanks so much for working so hard to get these bugs out- seems like you worked all night. For a beta release, I’m amazed at your dedication to get this right so quickly!
Another thing I’ve noticed- when I optimize epcot, World Showcase attractions are often suggested 15-20 minutes before 11am…
Thanks again-
Scott
Thanks! Do you have a url we can look at?
Sure.
http://touringplans.com/plans/150675
I copied the premium plan ‘DHS One-day holiday TP for adults’. I changed the date to a random date in July, then optimized. Got a ‘server reported and error in processing’ message. By chance I noticed that two meal steps were included and in the text by each there was a note saying that they could not be optimized, I think because I hadn’t entered any times for the meals. I deleted the meal steps and then optimization worked. Perhaps the note about ‘cannot optimize this step’ could be highlighted e.g. in red text? Or, where a premium plan is copied, don’t allow optimization until meal times are added?
Great idea, Toby. We’re working on it. Thanks for the note!
No problem. I’ve just spotted some other anomalies with this optimized premium plan http://touringplans.com/plans/151217:
1. It has me riding ToT then grabbing a FP for Toy Story Mania, then riding TSM, followed by 96 minutes of free time – this free time starting at ~09:50 doesn’t seem very optimal!
2. Later, the step to ride TSM using the FP obtained earlier is scheduled at 12:08 which will be outside the 10:45-11:45 FP return window (I’m assuming the return window is 1 hour).
3. Some of the step ‘Notes’ copied from the original plan don’t make sense once it has been optimized. See steps 2, 4 & 18. (Step 18 is using a FP obtained earlier).
4. The optimizer seems to assume that it only takes 1 minute to use a FP booth. From what I understand, obtaining a FP for TSM can involve quite a queue. Do you have data for FP booth queue times?
Here’s a question/suggestion:
When I’m in a park and obtain a FP, can I enter the FP return window into Lines and optimize? If not, this would be a really cool addition as the ‘hard’ FP return window would then be integrated into the plan.
Unofficial Guide 2012 says that you can use your FP any time after your return time, up to park closing (even though the window given is an hour). I hope this is still true… Also hoping it’s still true that you can obtain another FP after your return time or 2 hours elapses, whichever is sooner, whether you’ve used your other FP or not…
When the 2012 guide went to print Disney were enforcing the FP return time window start time but not the end time. This changed on 7th March 2012, the end time is now enforced as well. See the TP blog here: http://blog.touringplans.com/2012/02/06/fastpass-return-time-enforcement-begins-march-7th/
Bummer. Any idea if this true for Disneyland too? (Which is where we are going) The blog post you sent just seems to discuss WDW with no immediate plans for DLR?
Sorry I don’t know about DLR, I’m going to WDW.
I did some Googling and all indications are they have NOT rolled this out at DLR (yet). We go in 3 weeks so hopefully we’ll get lucky! Thanks for the heads-up and good luck…
Not true anymore!! There was an article in Wall Street Journal that they are cracking down and they are. Had a friend there and they were really strict about using a fastpass past the time
Ok, thanks for the tip! I will just plan to follow the rules 🙂
Hi Toby, we’re looking at the plan to check on the timing now, thanks! The notes aren’t automatically generated, so they’re not cleared after optimize. Some people will want to keep them and some not so there’s not a good way to automate that. You can edit the steps and delete the notes you don’t want. And yes, we assume a minute at any fp booth right now.
The FP return time feature is actually next on the list after the this is running smoothly. 🙂
Thanks!
Hey Toby:
1) The 96 minutes of free time doesn’t look obviously incorrect, given the other things you want to see. For example, the longest wait for any attraction after that free time is 13 minutes. It’s not clear to me (without changing your plan) that moving things to the morning would result in less waiting.
It’s possible the optimizer thinks that the right thing to do is to schedule your free time then, instead of later in the day.
2) The FP return window printed on the FASTPASS is 60 minutes, but Disney’s policy is to allow around an 80-minute window (5 minutes before through 15 after the window). I’ll check what we’re passing in as the value for that window, since your plan’s window should end at 12:00, not 12:08. We may have a 90-minute window set.
3) The notes aren’t adjusted based on the steps, so I’d suggest deleting any reference in notes to the relative order of steps.
4) Good idea. We can work on this.
These were great questions. Thanks very much!
Len
One thing I’ve noticed is that optimized plans have you arriving for shows pretty much at the start time of the show. For example, I just created a random plan at DHS on a random day in August (touringplans.com/plans/151212), after optimizing it has me arriving at Beauty and the Beast at 2.01pm and then waiting 1 minute for a 25 minute show. In your book and here: touringplans.com/hollywood-studios/attractions/beauty-and-the-beast-live-on-stage, you recommend arriving at this show 25-35 minutes early: “The production is so popular that you should show up 25-35 minutes early to get a seat.” This is just one example. Perhaps you could include a customisable ‘early arrival’ time ahead of shows, and default the time to that recommended in the book? Then, if I wanted to, I could tweak the early arrival time to reflect my personal preferences.
Ah, also, I have a fix for “show arrival” coming up soon. The thing I’m tweaking right now is to tell the optimizer how much time is “too much time.”
For example, say our standard advice is to get to the afternoon parade at the MK 30 minutes in advance. Is getting there 45 minutes early better or worse than getting there 15 minutes early? What if you can get an extra attraction out of the way, but you only get to the parade 15 minutes before it starts?
(If that doesn’t make sense, then it’s because I’ve only had one cup of coffee so far. 🙂 )
Anyway, I’m working on balancing out the “arrive a little early” and “arrive a little late” scenarios. Should have something out within a couple of weeks.
Len
Sounds great. Can you add a blog entry for updates like this as they come available?
Here is the TP that I seem to be having trouble evaluating http://touringplans.com/plans/147142. If it will be fixed up tomorrow then I can just wait and try again later! Thanks for everything! You must be exhausted!
Evaluate only working sometimes?
There are still some issues left with some plans evaluating. This should be fixed by end of day tomorrow.
Some plans that were failing should be starting to work now, and it’s looking good for having all plans optimizing sometime tomorrow. Thanks for your patience as we work these final things out!
Similar problems to others – yet to get any of my plans to do anything when I click evaluate or optimize
http://touringplans.com/plans/149898
http://touringplans.com/plans/149887
http://touringplans.com/plans/149908
Also finding the times are changing from one view to another, almost like they are shifting to Pacific time? Put in lunch for 12:15 and showing as 9:15.
Some of your plans are working now, the rest should be ready soon. I’ll take a look at the times, thanks.
Ok, just your middle plan left – we’re looking at it now. Thanks!
Ok, we’re generating new forecasts for the World of Color fastpass. That’ll be done tonight – until then the plan evaluates without it fine now. Thanks!
Copy now works for premium plans! You’ll be able to edit the date and change the steps, evaluate, and optimize from your new personalized plan after copying.
I’ve also changed the look of the premium plans to make this more clear, and added some back-end things to help troubleshoot plan optimizations.
Next: Working on failing plans. Make sure if you’re having problems that you post your url here or in the bug report. Thanks!
After that: Fixing the speed sliders.
Oh, also – rest steps can now have custom titles. If you add a title, you’ll no longer see “Rest” in bold for that step, you’ll see the title instead.
Evaluate doesn’t seem to be working.
Working on this now.
When did this change go into effect? I purchased a subscription based on the fact that I could change the date on a premium plan, which I could less than two weeks ago. Now it won’t work and my customized one won’t edit correctly either. We arrive at WDW in 2 days. What do you suggest? I am not going to put in steps for everything for each park when all I want is the premium ultimate plan with correct dates that I signed up for. I have tried to get help with this issue for the past four days but no luck.
Hi Leslie, I’m sorry for the trouble. The copy feature will be up very soon, and will enable you to do what you’re wanting. I’ll let you know as soon as it’s done – my plan right now is for it to be tonight, I just have to work out a few more things with the new system.
The copy feature is up and running now! Please let me know if you have any further issues. Thanks.
Still can’t use walking speeds in evaluate or optimize-not the end of the world though!
However my MK and DHS plans won’t work-please can you have a look, thank you-
http://touringplans.com/plans/146165
http://touringplans.com/plans/146870
Hi Katie, haven’t gotten to the speeds yet but should soon, I’ll post when I do. I’ll take a look at the plans, thanks!
Both of these work now. 🙂
Just to update everyone: I’m working on the failing plans now, going to install some new things to help me troubleshoot the issues. The process of checking each plan and determining failing patterns will probably take most of the day, and I should be able to start getting plans up and running late tonight.
What this means: if your plan is failing, please continue to post the links here or in the bug report. I expect to be able to fix the large majority if not all of them this weekend.
Sarah, Thank you. I hope you have an option for a plan just like the old one with no times. Because I don’t know exactly when I will be getting to the park. I want the old plans.
Dave, the old plans are still there and unchanged – they just look a little different is all. Sorry for the confusion, I’m going to get rid of the fake date in there as several people have mentioned this. You should find that there are no times for the premium plans, they are generic to any day.
Dave, the plans should look more distinctive now, and I’ve removed the dates.
I’m trying use WDW-Magic Kingdom Parents with small children plan. I’m using a mac lap top. No box is coming up to change the date. It just show todays date.
I have been trying to get it to work for two days now, since we go next week to Disneyland. A great idea (and I have used your books in the past), but it is very buggy and doesn’t look like we will be able to use the optimized touring plans for our trip since they are not functioning. Too bad, since I just subscribed to use this service for our trip. Get this message when I try to Evaluate or Optimize plans and it won’t show any wait, duration, etc info for the plans: “Server reported an error in processing. Please check your steps and try again. If you continue to see this message, please notify webmaster@touringplans.com” Also, Author’s select plan only shows today’s date and will not let you change to date you are actually going.
I’m working on the plans that are failing now, could you please post your url? Also, the premium plans cannot be optimized, they are generic plans for any day with no set times – I’m going to clear out the fake date, sorry for the confusion.
I’m using your standard touring plans – not creating my own. I can’t figure out how to change the date from today’s date to my date in May. The date section highlights when I click on it, but won’t allow me to input anything. I’ve tried explorer and google chrome. Help please.
PS. love the wait time, walk time additions!
I’m having the same issue. Any help would be great!
Looks like I’m having the same issues you are. Has anyone helped you?
Hi guys, the standard touring plan cannot be optimized. That means the date can’t be changed for them either – they’re meant to be generic for any day (I’ll clear out the fake dates shown, I know that’s confusing.)
If you want to optimize a plan, you’ll need to use either an existing personalized plan or else create a new one. We’re working on a way to copy from a premium plan – very soon that will be an option. Thanks!
Why are you making it that we can’t optimize the standard touring plans when on the old one we could? It would have the date, hours, crowd level, events etc. It was very easy to use. If I wanted to make my own plans I probably wouldn’t be paying for this site.
Lisa, before the update, you could copy the standard plans into your own new personalized plan, which you could then optimize for yourself. We are working on a way to do that here as well, which will be rolled out very soon.
I think what Lisa means is that on the old standard (non custom) touring plans you had to input your date when you went to print it. Then park hours and parade times for your date and any ride closures where noted on the plan. I really liked this feature of the old standard plan. Any way to adjust things so the regular plans still include this info?
Yes, please bring back the date feature on the standard touring plans. I created plans 2 weeks ago with our exact dates for each park and it indicated park hours, croud levels, etc for those specific dates. Then today I tried to make a few date changes to our plans and I can no longer do that. I liked the old system better.
Got it. The copy feature I’m working on right now will work in a very similar way, enabling you to personalize your own copy of the established plans. I expect to have that up and running by late tonight.
Copy feature up and running! Please let me know if there are further issues with this. Thanks!
Sarah, thank you for working so hard on these revisions! I tested several plans I’m interested in printing. The copy fuction and ability to insert my date worked great on all of them except the MK One Day Touring Plan for Parents with Small Children. I get a message saying “this change is not allowed” when I try to copy it. It must still be buggy. Thanks again for all you do!!!
Works great. Thanks for staying up like all night!!Was able to copy and enter some of my own things. Is there a way to save my updates on the site? Is there anyway to get the parades and firework schedule also on the plan? I did try to evaluate after I put the plans together and it came up as an error but I don’t care to much about that part I just care about the steps. Thanks!!
Fixed a little bug – all premium plans should copy now. Thanks!
I hate to even tell you this Sarah because I know how hard you’ve been working! I can now copy the MK One Day Parents with Small Children plan, but the mid day break is no longer listed in the plan. It was still listed a couple of days ago so I’m not sure how it disappeared. I tried to add it back in but got an error message.
WoooHooo! Everything is working perfectly for me. Thank you so much for all the effort you’ve given this!
Two things…
1) I still can’t utilize walk speed or waiting vs. walking… it always (evaluate and optimize) reverts back to average and balance.
2) Epcot- you can’t add project tomorrow or the world showcase pavilions. You can search for them, but they aren’t in any pull-downs, and can’t be added after plans are made.
Thanks! This is great!
Scott
I haven’t gotten to the speeds yet, sorry – working on the failing plans first. Will get to them soon, and add the missing attractions from the dropdown. Thanks!
Having same issues as of 4-24-12
I’m working on this one http://touringplans.com/plans/150453# and the numbers are coming out absurd- no matter what I do. At one point I had a 1766 minute wait time for Muppets at 2:44am. Can you take a look? Thanks!
Hi Autumn, the issue here is that the optimizer doesn’t think you’ll have time to do everything on your plan. Anything with an arrival time after your finish time (or park closing) is going to have a crazy wait value to indicate that. I’m working on a way to make that more clear. Thanks!
Is there an undo option? I had my TP done on the previous system – I tried to make a change to my TP in the new system – accidentally optimized the plan instead of evaluating it -everything was reorganized and I wanted to go back to my original plan but can’t undo it! It would be nice to be able to go back!
I am also having difficulty moving things around – it will not let me drag & move an attraction (instead the whole page moves). My screen appears to have layers one on top of another (it looks strange). I am not great with computers – so I don’t know the correct terminology for what is going on! Thanks!
That is strange! Could you let me know what operation system and web browser you are using? (If you don’t know, you can email me a screen shot at sarah at touringplans and I can probably figure it out from there.) It’s possible you can fix the issue by switching to a different web browser, such as Firefox (you can download it for free online), or upgrading the one you are using (especially if you use IE). I want to make sure you can do this since there’s no “undo” option for optimizing.
Also, could you tell the url for your plan? Thanks! We’ll get this fixed.
I have a Mac & use Safari. How do you e-mail a screen shot? What is EI? Sorry not great with computers! Ha ha!
Don’t worry about the screen shot. 🙂 What I do need though is the url of the plan you’re having trouble with. Could you copy and paste the web address of the plan from your address bar in safari? It would look something like this: http://touringplans.com/plans/(some number here)
Thanks!
I have downloaded firefox as a web browser and I am able to drag & rearrange attractions now! I cannot do this in Safari. The TP that I did earlier and accidentally optimized is a mess now, I have been playing around with it – trying different things. Don’t worry about trying to fix up anything with it. I will just create a new one! Here is the url http://touringplans.com/plans/147142. Firefox seems to be working better, why doesn’t it work the same using Safari? Thanks!
I’m glad Firefox is working for you – can you give me the url of the “bad” plan too? I’d like to see what the issue is.
I just testing in Safari and it worked for me – can you check what version you were using? You can find it in the Safari menu in the About Safari option. Thanks!
I am using Safari Version 5.0.5 (6533.21.1) Don’t worry about the “bad” plan! I changed so many things I don’t even which one it is! You are extremely busy! Amazing that you can make all these adjustments and keep up with all these e-mails! Thanks for your energy!
Ah, gotcha. Thanks! Looks like it works on 5.1 – if you upgrade Safari you should be fine for future reference.
Two day premium plans now have links between the plan days. It’s at the top of the page, over the basic info box.
http://touringplans.com/plans/147254. Have been trying to optimize this and a couple of other plans but have never got it to work even once with this version. Always gives the error “Server reported an error in processing. Please check your steps and try again. If you continue to see this message, please notify webmaster@touringplans.com:
Hi, anything on this yet. I guess DLR plans are not working at all. I know you are trying to provide more features with this version but looks like the basics have stopped working 🙁
Some DLR plans are optimizing fine and some are not. I’m troubleshooting the issue now and going through each plan that is failing. I expect to have the majority if not all of them fixed this weekend.
Hi Sarah, thanks for getting this to work, I was finally able to get my DLR plans optimized. Now for the bad part
1)The evaluate option still does not work with DLR. Gives the “Server error reported….” message.
2)Adding breaks to your plan makes the time go crazy. Plan 147254, I added a 10 am break, but it shows the break at 12:15 am midnight, even though my plan has 2 hours free time.
3)The walking speed option, changes to default every time the page is refreshed, not sure if it considers it for optimizing or always goes by default.
For some reason the plans don’t like me taking breaks(20 mins) at 9 am and 12 pm :). It bunches up these breaks at 9:00 am. Plan id is 148913 and 147254.
Ok, working on a times fix. Should be done soon.
Hi, I can not seem to change the dates on the touring plans or print. Also I can only see day 1 of the 2 day happy family touring plan for MK?
Hi Krista, it sounds like you’re on a premium plan – you won’t be able to change anything on those, they’re static and meant to be generic. (You’re right the day links are missing, I’ll be adding those tonight.)
To use the new system, you’ll need to use a personalized plan you’ve already created, or start a new plan. That way you’ll be able to apply it to your specific situation.
We’ll be coming out with a copy feature to let you start from a premium plan template very soon. Thanks!
The copy feature is now working! You should be able to copy a plan and edit it as well as optimize and evaluate now.
The Good: I absolutely, positively love the new design and what you are trying to do with the personalized plan. It is going to be awesome!
The Bad: I absolutely do not love that when I go to a standard type plan (like the Magic Kingdom Two-Day Holiday Touring Plan for Parents with Small Children at http://touringplans.com/plans/25) I am immediately sent to the personalized plan program. I can deal with this, but I suggest you consider the needs of a new user to your site. He/she needs to first be introduced to something that is clear and easy to read and that helps him/her get used to this idea of a touring plan. I suspect that many a newbie will look at this first page and just be confused and overwhelmed and then go elsewhere. I suggest that when someone clicks on a standard type plan that you first present these plans like you would in your well-written book and include a convenient link that will bring you to the personalized touring plan page that you go to now when you click these links.
The Bug: Click on any two-day touring plan (like the one above) and you only get the first day. There is no button or method I can see to get to the plan for the second day.
Thanks! We’re looking at ways to make the premium plans more readable and distinctive, and I’ll be adding the day link tonight.
Premium plans should look much different now.
Thanks again for your help! The new plans are awesome and I think I have final plans for AK and EP. However, I am getting an error message when I try to optimize my MK plan. Also, I don’t see Wishes or the Evening Parade in the listings.
Sorry, forgot the URL
http://touringplans.com/plans/150285
Checked on this – you’ll need to add times and durations for your meals and rests in this plan. The Optimizer will be able to understand them that way. I’ll get Wishes sorted.
That’s weird, I did put in times and durations; maybe I didn’t save? Thanks for updating the Wishes and Parade issue!
Hi all, great to see the new UI up. We will be in WDW in just over a week.
However a couple of bugs I’m seeing – this is with a plan I had created in the old version and am now trying to re-optimise:
1) Editing general data in IE 9 doesn’t work. The box opens and you can change but when you press save the pop-up doesn’t close just becomes a box with no vertical content and just a horizontal scrollbar. You can manually close this but then have to refresh the plan and the start/end times don’t save. A fix is to use in compatability mode, but…
2) … in compatability mode the alignment of the plan step data is off – i.e. the arrival time, wait time etc is shifted left of the column headings
3) I have an ADR at 08:35 at Crystal Palace. I can’t set the plan to start earlier that 9am so it won’t schedule us to be at the restaurant until then!
Plan is http://touringplans.com/plans/109566
Let me know if you need more info or screenshots to help.
Can also offer bringing British biscuits when we come over…
Andrew,
Seems to me that if park opens at 9am, & you’re at CP at 8:35 & plan to take, say 60 minutes, simply start your plan at 9:35am & you’re golden. 🙂
Just pushed an update on editing – this should work better now. Working with Len on the meal issue.
Thanks both. As EJ says there is an obvious workaround for the meal issue but presume given it used to function it is a bug. I’ll check out the editing again and let you know what I’m seeing.
My plans are http://touringplans.com/plans/147662
http://touringplans.com/plans/147675 and then
for next day http://touringplans.com/plans/147678
http://touringplans.com/plans/147671
but I can’t get it to evaluate or optimize?
Working on this now, should have a fix this evening.
Thanks! That will be awesome!
I tried to optimse my plan http://touringplans.com/plans/147662 this morning but I still get the same error:
Server reported an error in processing. Please check your steps and try again. If you continue to see this message, please notify webmaster@touringplans.com
Is there anything I need to do? Can you delete a plan and then I can recreate it??Please Let me know, and thank you for your time!
You can certainly recreate a plan, but delete is not yet rolled out. However, I’m working on these plans now, and should have a fix this weekend. Thanks!