Um, assuming your child is verbal and nonautistic, I am quite sure it is easier.My child may not need a DAS, but that doesn't make it any easier to explain wait times and why we can't go on the ride right now to him.
Um, assuming your child is verbal and nonautistic, I am quite sure it is easier.My child may not need a DAS, but that doesn't make it any easier to explain wait times and why we can't go on the ride right now to him.
Again, fair to the DAS holder, but not fair to the non DAS holder. Fair would be if my wait times worked like that too. My child may not need a DAS, but that doesn't make it any easier to explain wait times and why we can't go on the ride right now to him. But, my child waits the wait time listed when we arrive at the attraction, not the wait time as of the moment we exited the prior attraction.
Just playing devils advocate here, as my child is far beyond the age of not understanding wait times. I have been in a group using a GAC for a niece with ASD, have been in a group with a wheelchair. So I've experienced it all. I'm just trying to step back and look at the picture as a whole. How everyone can be affected fairly.
I think the idea of a PP had merit. One time instant access to each attraction (like universals express pass) then any additional attractions at regular standby. Fair to everyone? No. Open to abuse? Absolutely! But it would cut down on the looping that slows down lines.... If the access is greater to the disabled, the rules could be set to reflect the greater access with tighter controls.
Sorry, it really does completely change the issue if you are talking about DL, not world. I dont know enough about Disneyland. At Disney world I can not imagine any way the proposed idea is not a huge advantage. The only way for it to not be an advantage at WDW would be if they literally marked you and you were not allowed to use a restroom, buy food, shop, or ride anything else until after your wait time. That time that other people are spending in line you now have free to do as you please. The people stuck in line have to come up with more time later to do all you could accomplish while they were in line. They have to wait until after they ride to even walk to their next ride. You get to use your "line time" to accomplish extra and walk to your next ride.
Maybe distance yourself for a minute and think of it this way- they are going to initiate this policy you propose, but you don't get to use it. No matter how difficult your regular life is, pretend the criteria excludes you... Is it fair? Is the person with the pass now on equal ground, or at an advantage?
tinkerpea said:Well then no matter if they keep the current DAS or changed to Universals one " it's what the OP is suggesting he has not made this system up it used at other parks"
You won't be happy with it, since its not the exact same experience to what you yourself have to have in the park.
tinkerpea said:That is utterly disgusting to be told to "stop flapping your hands" I'd have been livid,
I hope that CM gets some valuable teaching time.
This is why the stamps was so handy with the GAC they addressed the persons individual needs not just one size fits all need!!
I wonder if they considered this prior to rolling out the DAS. A drawback might be if a guest could just change the time (let's say the next valid time was 4:00 but the guest writes in 3:00 over it). With the current system, there was talk of a different code word being used each day at each ride so that abuse was less likely.Here is my thought:
Eliminate return times
Instead what would happen is you would present your DAS to the first CM you see at each attraction. They would write the date, atttraction name, arrival time, current wait time and the next valid time. The next valid time would be the current time plus the current wait time. You would then proceed to go on that ride. After that ride, you would need to wait for the next valid time to go on another ride with the pass.
Chickenlady said:To play devil's advocate, using your system would allow one definite advantage....Since you only wait the designated time after you ride...at the end of the evening you ride a ride and then instead of waiting, you go home. No way for you to actually wait for every ride you take. I'd much rather spend my wait time crawling into bed, than watching stranger's behinds from my ECV.
Let's please keep this civil, there are plenty of people who are disabled who are able to ride Space.
I think most in here have been keeping it civil and many have valid points, I may not agree with them all, but they are valid points and I don't want us giving the moderators a reason to have to close this thread. Comments such as this one does nothing to further the conversation and is just trying to bait people.
Ok so if I understand this proposed system you'd be flipping it around to put the wait time at the end of the ride instead of the beginning. The benefit is that you're not starting your day with a wait and you'll be able to ride something at the end of the day when CMs are proving reluctant to give Return Times (i.e. in the last hour a park is open).
No I don't find that unfair to non-DAS people. You're still taking the same amount of time to do an attraction. The extra time for waiting is taken at the end and prohibits you from getting on something until you have completed that wait.
One thing I found potentially unfair at DAS is that it does not account for the additional wait one encounters when using a wheelchair-accessible vehicle. Since there are so few of those it is common to encounter a line that can take another 20 mins or so above and beyond what a non-wheelchair car user encounters. This system will include that wait in it's post-ride Return Time.
Example: I go to TSM at 2pm when there is a 90 min wait. I'm admitted into the FP line and then wait for the wheelchair vehicle another 30 mins to board (6 mins allotted for each party in front of me, and 5 parties waiting before me). I finish my ride at 2:40pm, but now I have until 3:30pm before I can go on my next attraction with DAS. I can go into One Man's Dream or maybe join the queue for Lights, Motor, Action!
Under current DAS rules, I'd get my Return Time at 2pm. Then return at 3:30pm, wait the extra 30 mins in the Wheelie Line to ride, and get out at 4:10pm. I've now spent longer than any guest to do the same thing.
(People really need to understand that if one has a disability that affects boarding, there is always extra time allotted to for every attraction. The mythical FOTL pass abuse was for folks who have no boarding issues.)
Also this system would allow me to get on TSM in the last hour DHS is open. Currently, CMs have been refusing to give Return Times because they'd be after the park closes. That's decidedly unfair to disabled DAS guests because everyone in Standby is allowed to ride as long as they're in the line before the park closes.
The biggest problem I see with all the cards is getting the castmembers to actually listen to your needs when you are using a wheelchair. They just automatically decide that the only accommodation needed is wheelchair seating. I have had that happen too many times to count. Power wheelchair. Ok, right over there. No I need the interpreter area. No wheelchairs go here. Even got ripped a new one at Tough to be a Bug when I requested captioning in addition to being in my wheelchair. ANd was mocked for using sign language
richflour said:My thoughts . If you can go on space mtn. You are not handicapped.
I think I would have actually just parked my chair in the middle of the way until a supervisor came to apologize for the other CMs idiocy.
I have had to make friends with CMs at all the shows in DL just so I can be in the interpreter area with my wheelchair - I am learning sign, and have family members who are losing their hearing (and it turns out I may as well, we don't know), and I often travel with people who need the interpreter. There is actually a spot for Magical Map that I don't even think was planned until someone asked how a person in a wheelchair will see the interpreters.
I have discovered the best way in my case is simply not to acknowledge the wheelchair. If they do say something about it, I say that the wheelchair can do nothing for my dysautonomia (I put it in simpler words than that).
I also explain what will happen IN THEIR LINE. I had a friend ask for a DAS right after me (same problems and even worse in terms of dealing with SoCal heat), and I got mine no problem and she had issues (with the same CM). Listening to her and others, I have discovered that when people say that "such and such" will cause fainting/seizures/meltdowns/etc and then "we have to leave the park" or "I have to go to the hospital" - that has nothing to do with how you wait IN THE LINE.
My best suggestion, if you have issues in addition to or that cannot be met only by wheelchair use, don't bring it up, and explain what will happen in their line. "This things that happens in your line causes me to do this undesirable thing in your line."
When it comes to changes to the DAS, I am not sure what to suggest. I do know that having more CMs need to keep track of how long wait times were when I entered the ride (I have seen times go from 5 to 45 mins in the blink of an eye after fireworks) is going to end up with people getting annoyed. Guests will argue that they waited longer than the standby time (which can happen), or other such problems. The reason the CMs at the kiosks use the app (that guests can use) is to avoid such problems.
Right now I am thinking of the exit of most rides in Fantasyland or continuous loading rides (Mansion, Pirates, Buzz) in DISNEYLAND. What I am about to say is usually true for WDW rides too, but I wanted to be specific. There is ONE person at the ride exit (which is where guests with wheelchairs board and all guests exit). And even at the "bigger" attractions, each CM present has a very specific task. The person at Fantasyland, in order to load me (wheelchair guest) is only allowed to take her hands off the ride control console once a vehicle stop is in place (nothing moves in the boarding area while she gets me in).
Even when guests disembark, the CM is not allowed to take her hand off the control panel. It is actually part of the rules - she may wave a guest off with one hand, but the other remains on the panel at all times. When CMs change position, the new CM will come up to the old CM and put his hands onto the control panel before the old CM is allowed to move to her new position in the attraction.
I know that CMs sometimes do other things - but this is what the rule is supposed to be. And also, the guest who is working the secondary control panel at the guest exit of Splash Mountain (the one by the logs, not the one outside where the single rider/wheelchair entrance was) has no clue what the stand-by time is. Some rides are just too big and there are too many positions (many of which guests do not even see) for the person who rotates around to know the stand-by time when you boarded the ride.
There would need to be extra people there for the purpose of writing the times at the ride exits, and I am just not sure how that is supposed to work. I can say, after years of going to Disneyland and being married into a CM family (my wife worked Splash in DL), I cannot see the CMs at ride exit being able to stop and write down times. I am not even sure how they are going to be doing it in WDW.
Um, assuming your child is verbal and nonautistic, I am quite sure it is easier.
Just curious Does that mean your not happy with the way the current DAS works too then? Since the DAS holders are still at an advantage of not having to wait in a line?
Autistic or nonautistic, have you ever stood outside Dumbo with a stubborn three year old who did not understand why he can't go on right now?
I haven't walked in your shoes, you haven't walked in mine, don't assume easier if you haven't lived it, because I certainly don't assume anything about your situation.