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I will say that for FOP being such a new ride it does not see near the downtime you would except for a new ride.
 
Going to guess you mean Flight of Passage, since that's the ride near LK.
At 10:30, the line to LK is normal.
Wow! So that entire ginormous queue fills up and the line extends outside all the way to Lion King :eek:.
 


I'm confused by the line ever extending back toward Lion King. When this happens do they not have the entire queue opened up? It's the longest queue at Disney and isn't it still rumored to hold a 6 or 7 hour line, which FoP hasn't been.

So if that's the case I don't understand why they don't open up all the twists and turns of the entire line instead of stretching it out of Pandora

I think this is only an issue in the morning hours. It seems that it takes a while for the actual queue to become “saturated,” if you understand what I mean. I’ve waited in that 9:30ish 120 minutes line before and it always moves pretty steadily throughout the whole queue. If you go back later in the day, the same wait time will not be backed up out of the queue.
 
I just can't wrap my head around standing in a line for 2+ hours for any ride. I think my cut off is around 45 minutes but usually if it's more than 30, I skip it and come back another time or just don't ride if that's the only opportunity. I was frustrated the one time I got to TSMM at rope drop and thought I'd have about a 20 minute wait and about half way through the queu, apparently the ride broke down and we just stood there not moving for what seemed like forever not even knowing it was down. I think we ended up in that line for almost an hour and I almost walked out but that queu is so difficult to walk back out of I just sucked it up and went with it.
 


I just can't wrap my head around standing in a line for 2+ hours for any ride. I think my cut off is around 45 minutes but usually if it's more than 30, I skip it and come back another time or just don't ride if that's the only opportunity. I was frustrated the one time I got to TSMM at rope drop and thought I'd have about a 20 minute wait and about half way through the queu, apparently the ride broke down and we just stood there not moving for what seemed like forever not even knowing it was down. I think we ended up in that line for almost an hour and I almost walked out but that queu is so difficult to walk back out of I just sucked it up and went with it.
We waited in line last year for 7DMT for around 2 hours. We weren't able to get a FP and wanted to ride it so we made the sacrifice. We found out that we will never wait that long again for that particular ride, but I wouldn't have known that if I didn't try it first. We are going in March and I said I will wait up to 2 hours for FOP. I feel like we will be able to get everything else done in AK pretty fast with FP's. Of course, it would be nice if I could just get FP's for FOP.
 
I'm confused by the line ever extending back toward Lion King. When this happens do they not have the entire queue opened up? It's the longest queue at Disney and isn't it still rumored to hold a 6 or 7 hour line, which FoP hasn't been.

So if that's the case I don't understand why they don't open up all the twists and turns of the entire line instead of stretching it out of Pandora

I've wondered about that, too. I think it's probably two things:

1. Primarily, I think there actually are a ton more people in standby right at park opening (more than a typical mid-day), because the first 20-30 min probably have very few FP returns. I see estimates that 75-80% of spots go to FP. So...a 2000 person line at opening might be an hour wait, but a 2000 person line at noon will be a 4 hour wait. To put it another way, if the Rope drop crowd suddenly materialized at 1pm when FP was up and cooking, it might actually be a 6-7 hour wait.

2. I would not be surprised at all if Disney gradually opens the full queue to act as a deterrent. They do it all the time at the close of the day (TSMM 50 minute wait when it's actually a walk-on).
 
To respond to some of the queries above, the full queue is not used for the first couple hours that the park is open. It generally uses what would have been the single rider queue. There are various theories on why this is the case, but I've not heard any of them confirmed.
This was something of a disappointment in that the first time I rode the attraction I intentionally didn't get a FP because I wanted to see the full queue. I still haven't seen it, but on my next visit my plan is to bite the bullet and get in line about 90 minutes before park closing one evening. (I figure if I get in line too close to closing, some parts of the queue may already be closed down as part of the 'stacking' process.)
 
To respond to some of the queries above, the full queue is not used for the first couple hours that the park is open. It generally uses what would have been the single rider queue. There are various theories on why this is the case, but I've not heard any of them confirmed.
This was something of a disappointment in that the first time I rode the attraction I intentionally didn't get a FP because I wanted to see the full queue. I still haven't seen it, but on my next visit my plan is to bite the bullet and get in line about 90 minutes before park closing one evening. (I figure if I get in line too close to closing, some parts of the queue may already be closed down as part of the 'stacking' process.)

Do you know which parts of the queue are skipped in the morning?
 
I'm confused by the line ever extending back toward Lion King. When this happens do they not have the entire queue opened up? It's the longest queue at Disney and isn't it still rumored to hold a 6 or 7 hour line, which FoP hasn't been.

So if that's the case I don't understand why they don't open up all the twists and turns of the entire line instead of stretching it out of Pandora

Nope, don't think so!! We were there three different days this past week for FP's and the lines were mostly 3 hours mid morning. A CM was standing at the end with a sign - also calling out to the droves of new comers that the line for FOP was at 3 hrs. If the internal que would hold that much, no way would they have a CM at the end of a line way out!! Also, nothing there has internal lines for 6, 7 hrs!!!!
 
To respond to some of the queries above, the full queue is not used for the first couple hours that the park is open. It generally uses what would have been the single rider queue. There are various theories on why this is the case, but I've not heard any of them confirmed.
This was something of a disappointment in that the first time I rode the attraction I intentionally didn't get a FP because I wanted to see the full queue. I still haven't seen it, but on my next visit my plan is to bite the bullet and get in line about 90 minutes before park closing one evening. (I figure if I get in line too close to closing, some parts of the queue may already be closed down as part of the 'stacking' process.)

Nope, not the case at all from what I saw/heard. Wouldn't make any sense at all.
 
Do you know which parts of the queue are skipped in the morning?
From my experience, the standby queue follows alongside the FP queue in the morning. When the line first enters the building, there's a fairly small room, themed to the inside of a "natural" area, as opposed to a utilitatrian area that would have been developed by RDA. But rather than continuing into the various large rooms, the standby riders go down an industrial-style hallway, right alongside (but separated from) the FP riders, until you get fairly quickly to the FP/standby merge point from the larger queue. As I said above, I think this is the path originally intended for the single-rider queue.
With this path, you do have a view into the "laboratory room", and you do get to see the floating Na'vi in the tank. Since the room is empty, you're not blocked by the guests in line, but you don't get a close-up look.
It may be that the process has been tweaked and adjusted since our visit in the Fall, but nothing I've read or heard suggests that they've gone to using the full queue in the first couple hours. It's a curious decision, but there's certinly a reason behind it.
 
Nope, don't think so!! We were there three different days this past week for FP's and the lines were mostly 3 hours mid morning. A CM was standing at the end with a sign - also calling out to the droves of new comers that the line for FOP was at 3 hrs. If the internal que would hold that much, no way would they have a CM at the end of a line way out!! Also, nothing there has internal lines for 6, 7 hrs!!!!
I wouldn't be so sure of that. I've seen a 3 hour line for Space Mountain and the FOP queue is much, much longer. I walked it in May when we were there for the AP Preview. We were not allowed to ride because they ran out of paper FPs before we got to the Avatar gate (30 mins before our timeslot, BTW) but they did allow us to walk the queue so I was able to walk past the floating Na'vi. I did not time it, but the walk seemed to take FOREVER. There was room after room after room after room and we only walked the direct route, not back and forth through the queue. I could imagine that it would hold a 6 hour line.
 
From my experience, the standby queue follows alongside the FP queue in the morning. When the line first enters the building, there's a fairly small room, themed to the inside of a "natural" area, as opposed to a utilitatrian area that would have been developed by RDA. But rather than continuing into the various large rooms, the standby riders go down an industrial-style hallway, right alongside (but separated from) the FP riders, until you get fairly quickly to the FP/standby merge point from the larger queue. As I said above, I think this is the path originally intended for the single-rider queue.
With this path, you do have a view into the "laboratory room", and you do get to see the floating Na'vi in the tank. Since the room is empty, you're not blocked by the guests in line, but you don't get a close-up look.
It may be that the process has been tweaked and adjusted since our visit in the Fall, but nothing I've read or heard suggests that they've gone to using the full queue in the first couple hours. It's a curious decision, but there's certinly a reason behind it.

Thanks! I got to see the full queue during AP previews, but my DH and DD haven't seen it. We have FPs for the end of this month, but are debating whether to do standby (either at RD or at the end of the day) for them to see the full queue. Sounds like the end of the operating hours might be their best bet.
 
Nope, don't think so!! We were there three different days this past week for FP's and the lines were mostly 3 hours mid morning. A CM was standing at the end with a sign - also calling out to the droves of new comers that the line for FOP was at 3 hrs. If the internal que would hold that much, no way would they have a CM at the end of a line way out!! Also, nothing there has internal lines for 6, 7 hrs!!!!
I wouldn't be so sure of that. I've seen a 3 hour line for Space Mountain and the FOP queue is much, much longer. I walked it in May when we were there for the AP Preview. We were not allowed to ride because they ran out of paper FPs before we got to the Avatar gate (30 mins before our timeslot, BTW) but they did allow us to walk the queue so I was able to walk past the floating Na'vi. I did not time it, but the walk seemed to take FOREVER. There was room after room after room after room and we only walked the direct route, not back and forth through the queue. I could imagine that it would hold a 6 hour line.

I got to ride during the AP previews and I filmed the queue at a quick pace walkthrough with no line. It took about 8.5 minutes with no stops. I stopped filming up until you get to the CM who separates you into lines. And this was 8.5 minutes with none of the zigzagging sections open, so there was room for more.

So it's a huge queue that can hold a ton of people. It just has to be that they don't have the full queue open until a little bit after park opening, which idk why. Maybe to deter some people
 
We rope dropped FOP several times and never had over a 30 min wait. But we got to the park at least 30-45 min before opening and we’re close to the front at park opening. If you were just arriving 10 min before park opening, and we’re in the back of the pack entering the park you’d be looking at a much longer wait.
 
I'm confused by the line ever extending back toward Lion King. When this happens do they not have the entire queue opened up? It's the longest queue at Disney and isn't it still rumored to hold a 6 or 7 hour line, which FoP hasn't been.

So if that's the case I don't understand why they don't open up all the twists and turns of the entire line instead of stretching it out of Pandora

Yup. This is a frequent discussion. ;)
 

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