This past week has been a unique experience for Disneyland Resort castmembers and guests alike. In spite of new attractions and a mega-sized new land, wait times throughout the resort have been downright blissful.
Every day in July is “Peak” pricing. That’s $45 more than “Value” season. There are several plausible reasons for the soft attendance: blockouts for Cast Members and lower tiered Annual Passholders, fear of overcrowding, tepid reviews of the new land, and perceived higher prices for resort admission during the “Peak Season”.
With prices at their highest and guest attendance at its lowest, what’s Disney to do? DISCOUNT! This last week, Disney announced a “Bring a Friend” promotion for Annual Passholders, offering them one-day park hopper tickets to bring a friend for just $99 (another $99 for themselves if they are blocked out). The park also lifted Castmember blockouts. The Disney Parks Blog has begun promoting that wait times are low, and the Disneyland Today Twitter account has started retweeting guest comments about the short wait times.
If you aren’t blocked out or are trying to figure out a date for your next trip, right now is a great time to visit, particularly if you know a Passholder who wants to visit with you and can get you one of those $99 park hoppers. We haven’t seen crowd levels like this since before 2005! But with all the discounting and playing around with blockouts, these conditions won’t last forever.
But today isn’t all about crowds, or the lack thereof. This update also brings news and photos from the opening of a new parking structure, launch of a renewed attraction on Pixar Pier, the return of an old parade, the cancelation of another, and the first wave of a frightfully fun Haunted Mansion 50th anniversary celebration.
Let’s see what’s new at Disneyland . . .
Pixar Pal’s Parking Structure Now Open.
As of June 30th, the Pixar Pal’s Parking Structure is now open and being fully utilized by Disneyland. The added 6500 spaces have been in dire need for decades! Perhaps the most important thing to guests is the new dedicated security screening and fully covered tram loading area.
The old tram loading plaza is currently being reworked and landscaped. When it is complete, trams will drop you off here. So, guests will wait and load inside, and then be dropped off closer to the escalators at the end of the day.
The new security area is covered and has an airport sort of vibe.
Once you are parked, you’ll be directed to the large, covered and well-integrated security screening and loading area.
Pixar Pier Celebrates One Year
One Year and one Emotional Whirlwind now spinning guests.
The revamped Flik’s Flyers, now Emotional Whirlwind, is helping guests explore their feelings. The entire area is themed to Pixar’s Inside Out. This is the final attraction promised for the Pier to open.
Pixar Pier opened in June of 2018 after just 6 months of construction. But it took a complete 12 months longer to finally finish the land.
Are you a fan of Pixar Pier? If may not be as elaborately themed as other lands, but for a space smaller than Galaxy’s Edge, it packs in a lot of attractions for all ages (a coaster, a carousel, a dark ride shooter, a Ferris wheel, carnival games, and a spinner), has great entertainment, wandering Pixar characters, a table service restaurant and lounge, lots of creative outdoor vending and two on-theme shops. If you think about it, that’s a lot of things to do in one small space, even if they aren’t the height of Disney design and storytelling.
Dusty takes us on a tour of Pixar Pier with lots of commentary on what has changed and been added since the land opened last June and speculation on its potential expansion:
Now Swirling Guests – Inside Out: Emotional Whirlwind
This new addition is a great fit for the area that was once home to the Maliboomer. It should be popular with both kids and adults. If the ride seems familiar, it’s a reskinned and rethemed version of the Bug’s Land spinner, Flik’s Flyers. You’ll note that they added a lot of new music, details, audio dialogue from the Emotions, and some kinetic energy with spinning details on the sign and light up memory bubbles on the back wall. There’s a lot going on. As an upgrade to the area, themed benches and fences have been added, as well as a pink and purple color scheme.
Dusty also takes us to the ribbon cutting for the Emotional Whirlwind and brings us along for a ride:
Speaking of Dusty, happy birthday to our fearless leader! He spends his days and most of his nights pulling together content for all of you to read when you wake up. He’s an unsung soldier for the fan community, and does tremendous charity work on behalf of Walt Disney’s legacy (saving Walt’s birthplace, running Dick Van Dyke’s foundation for the performing arts, and taking care of the last surviving home Walt Disney lived in), he also spends a lot of time and money supporting charities that aid the homeless, CHOC Children’s Hospital, and a number of other organizations. Dusty has trouble saying no, especially for causes he cares about, and often stretches himself a little too thin as a result. But we say, Happy Birthday to the sweetest boss and friend we could ever have hoped for. And we are sure to hear some funderful (that needs to be a word) things this week as he landed in Orlando last night and will be sharing his adventures on our Facebook Page and Facebook Group. Follow along and let him know you appreciate him as much as I do.
Main Street Electrical Parade Returns
Those who follow MiceChat daily heard it here first: the famous Main Street Electrical Parade will return to Disneyland starting August 2nd and run through at least September. Will you make a special arrangement to watch this classic? Or has its magic burned out for you?
Soundsational Parade Goes Back Into Storage
But Disney giveth and Disney taketh away. . . because the last performance of Soundsational will be on Disneyland’s birthday, July 17th. I wonder if there will be no day time parade for the park for the rest of the summer…
And there has been no word at all on Paint the Night. There was a time when the Disney Parks had daytime and nighttime parades. While not everyone stops to watch, they add color, energy, music, and gives everyone a chance to see some entertainment that doesn’t require you to wait a long time in line (if you don’t mind standing behind those who show up early for a curbside spot).
Did Disney get it right? Is the Main Street Electrical Parade all you expect from the parade department at Disneyland? Do you miss Paint the Night? Should Soundsational be replaced? Are parades even important any more? We’d really like to hear your thoughts.
New to Us
Disney Gallery Celebrates 50 years of the Haunted Mansion.
The Disney Gallery made room for 999 happy haunts this week, showcasing the art and magic that is the Haunted Mansion. You will find some unique art and original props in this exhibit; If you love the Mansion, this will be a must do for you.
Star Wars and Weekend Crowd Levels
As we stated earlier, crowds have been fantastically low for the resort. Below is what last Saturday’s afternoon crowds looked like. The weekdays were much more lightly attended, but event Saturday felt like the offseason. It should be a very positive experience for most patrons, compared to previous years with wall-to-wall creeps, ‘ahem’ I mean, guests.
Smugglers Run was averaging about 45 – 70 minutes wait times mid-day. The rest of the park was delightfully low on the wait times.
Smuggler’s Run Extended Queue is unpleasant. It’s just shipping crates and very little shade. The hot summer to come is going to make this a terrible place to wait. Luckily, This space is mostly needed just in the early morning, when guests flock to Galaxy’s Edge for the shortest line. Little do they realize that the first hour or two is when the lines are their worst! Waits frequently drop all the way down to the half hour range later in the day.
Now, here are the crowds around the rest of the park, you could walk around with easy and wait times were very low for a Saturday, in June…
That’s all for today, folks. What are your thoughts on parades, new rides and parking, and the crowd levels in and around Disneyland? Join the discussion below!
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