So it appears the crowds are very high right now even though some sites predicted low crowds. Is there a reason why the uptick?

[Aimeedyan]

Our local schools are out and I know several families there today (live ~1 hr away).

 

[DeeBee3]

What schools close for Yom Kippur??

I had no idea that this wasn't a national public school thing! Living in NYS, Jewish holidays like Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah have always been days off.

 

[WxKristin]

interesting? Just out of pure curiosity I did a search and someone actually put together a map of which schools have it off.

View attachment 796729

interesting! did you use webscraping and/or python to create this map, a specific website, or something else altogether?

I feel like every time I go hunting for school vacation days to anticipate crowds, I end up searching individual counties (such as Orange County, FL) and it always seems like a waste of time.

 

[rlk]

What schools close for Yom Kippur??

NYC public schools close for Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah. This year Rosh Hashanah fell on a weekend.

 

[rmclain73]

Most Boston area schools are closed today as well.

 

[focusondisney]

I had no idea that this wasn't a national public school thing! Living in NYS, Jewish holidays like Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah have always been days off.

Not NY State. NY City sure. Most of NYS schools do not get off & never have.

 

[Gr8t Fan]

interesting? Just out of pure curiosity I did a search and someone actually put together a map of which schools have it off.

View attachment 796729

Impressive! Thanks for putting this together.

 

[msmayor]

We were at WDW for a long weekend Thu-yesterday, and we started our Saturday at Epcot to finish up Food & Wine booths and we learned Epcot hit capacity and closed to hopping as we were leaving. It truly felt crowded, but we attributed that to the locals hitting F&W.

We hopped to MK around 5 and the crowds were definitely larger than we expected. Wait times on most popular rides were 65-85 minutes. Our biggest goal was to see Happily Ever After so that's all we did....then left. It was just too crowded.

 

[PAsFab5]

What schools close for Yom Kippur??

My daughter attends a cyber charter based out of Pennsylvania and they are closed today. She logged on for class this morning and was shocked-we had no idea!

 

[VAtink]

We were at WDW for a long weekend Thu-yesterday, and we started our Saturday at Epcot to finish up Food & Wine booths and we learned Epcot hit capacity and closed to hopping as we were leaving. It truly felt crowded, but we attributed that to the locals hitting F&W.

We were in Epcot on Saturday, didn't realize it closed to hopping, but I can totally see why it did. We're used to crowds on Saturday during food and wine, but we've never seen crowds like this before, we had 30-40 min waits for the food booths, it was nuts!

 

[DL1WDW2]

I drove past AK parking lot about 2:30 today and couldn’t believe how crowded AK looked!
Now I know why.
And EPCOT closed Saturday to capacity for NO Park Hopping WOW!
Currently hearing thunder in area 6:24 p.m. grey skies
Rain thunder lightning for next hour !

 

[raidermatt]

Non party days are way more crowded than party days.
Another chance is that the attraction was closed at opening and reopened right in front of that guest. But all those are statistical anomalies and as such should be ignored for touring strategy.
No plan would made sense to suggest to go to 7DMT at 9am.

Yes, I am aware non-party days are busier than party days. That's why I emphasized non-party days.

Not all days, even non-party days, are equal. And yes, occasionally lines for popular attractions are surprisingly short soon after opening. It does happen. And if Disney posts the wait time correctly, it would be a great opportunity to alter whatever plan had been in place. But with the wait time posted incorrectly, it removes that option failing a personal inspection of the queue line. Hence the problem with posting inaccurate wait times in the app.

None of this is disputable, unless you of course are simply calling those who say they have seen this liars. In which case, I guess we're done.

 

[raidermatt]

Although you may have experienced this, SDMT being a 5 min wait at 9AM would be an extremely rare occurrence any day of the year.

At 9AM ETPE guests have been in the park for at least 30 mins and the park is always open to all guests. Traditionally SDMT is an attraction many head to first so the line is very rarely 5 mins except at park close.

All completely true. However, the statement by Len was it was actually observed with a short wait at that time and the posted wait was inaccurate. The point is not that this happens with any kind of regularity. Only that it does occasionally happen, and it would be helpful if the wait times were posted accurately when it does happen.

Me personally, I'll grant that 5 minutes is probably an exaggeration, but I have entered that line in the morning with a long wait posted and waited no more than 10-15 minutes on a couple of occasions.

Again, that is not to say EXPECTING a 5-15 minute wait is a viable strategy. Only that this is just another example of how inaccurate posted wait times result in guests making bad decisions.

 

[DeeBee3]

Not NY State. NY City sure. Most of NYS schools do not get off & never have.

I live in NY State and have always had those holidays off. However, I am less than 2 hours from the city.

 

[focusondisney]

I live in NY State and have always had those holidays off. However, I am less than 2 hours from the city.

I live in NY State too. Down state might get off. Western NY, Upstate, Southern Tier & most of Central NY State don’t. So no, NEW YORK STATE doesn’t get off. Some of NY State does, but Not the majority of the state.

 

[greeneyedchick]

What schools close for Yom Kippur??

NJ

 

[DeeBee3]

I live in NY State too. Down state might get off. Western NY, Upstate, Southern Tier & most of Central NY State don’t. So no, NEW YORK STATE doesn’t get off. Some of NY State does, but Not the majority of the state.

Didn't mean to bother you so much. I know people are touchy about what part of NY they are from. Have a good night.

 

[disneydreamer781]

Yeah, I just recently moved to an area of Boston, and schools in our community were closed today as well. Was surprised because, in the few places I lived in MA before, although the holiday was recognized, the schools were open.

 

[georgina]

Driving around Arlington, VA today I saw a lot of school aged kids out & about. Northern VA fits into the map posted previously I think.

 

[Minnie1222]

It has been insane since I arrived on Friday. Even Spaceship Earth and Living With the Land had a 40 minute wait yesterday!
I was at the Halloween party last night and haunted mansion was 45 minutes until the very end!!
The great news is that I used Genie+ for my park days and the weather has been perfect

I concur! The parks have been very crowded. We had to use Genie+ for Living with the Land yesterday. We rope-dropped MK today and just look at the sea of people that greeted us at around 8 o'clock this morning.



By the time we walked to our first ride Jungle Cruise, the standby line had swelled up to a 40 minute wait. We got to Sunshine Terrace at 9:50 for its 10 o'clock opening and there already were 3 people infront of us waiting to buy Dole Whip.