The Monorail Project - Goals and Assumptions

I have always been fascinated by the Walt Disney World Monorail System. Although it is sometimes inconvenient to use to get out of the Magic Kingdom after a parade or fireworks, it is also one of the perks that makes staying at the Grand Floridian, Contemporary or Polynesian resorts special. Park hopping from Epcot to Magic Kingdom can be done on the monorail without the hassle of driving. The monorail is one of the things that makes Walt Disney World special.

I have always wondered what it would be like if the monorail connected Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom  to the other two parks. So, about two years ago I decided to spend some of my free time to try to figure out how that might work. After writing a thesis, finishing grad school with a degree in urban planning, finding a job and getting married, I am still pretty far from having an answer. I do not have access to the kinds of data necessary to adequately answer the question, but I have decided to make do with what I have and see how far I could get.

First, like in any planning project, you have to start by establishing some goals and making some assumptions. What would Disney's goal be for expanding the monorail system? A good place to start would be to look at the existing monorail. 

Goal 1: Expand the number of resorts with monorail access.

The three monorail resorts are some of the nicest resorts at Disney World, but they also tend to be more expensive than the other deluxe-level Disney resorts. The convenient access provided by the monorail to the theme parks must be responsible for some of this price difference. If Disney was to expand the monorail, one of the goals should be to expand the number of resort hotels that could charge a premium for monorail access. A higher priority should be given for deluxe and Disney Vacation Club resorts because they cater to people already shown to be willing to pay for a premium Disney vacation. Additionally, the value and moderate resorts may be more likely to cater to families who drove to Orlando and have a car on property.

Goal 2: Make park hopping easier.

The existing monorail is also heavily used for park hopping between Epcot and Magic Kingdom, but getting to Animal Kingdom or Hollywood Studios requires a bus or car ride[i]. Convenient park hopping is important because it can keep people on property for more of the day. If it is too much of a hassle to get between two parks, guests may spend less money on food and souvenirs at their hotel than at a theme park.

Goal 3: Make leaving Magic Kingdom easier at the end of the day.

Lines for the monorail after the fireworks or nighttime parade can be more than 30 minutes on even a moderately crowded day. If the monorail was responsible for getting a larger share of resort guests back to their hotels, it would need a substantial increase in capacity.

Goal 4: Be easy to use and provide equal or better service than buses.

It should go without saying, but an expanded monorail needs to be simple enough for non-English-speaking tourists to use, and it needs to get people where they want to go better than the existing buses and monorails. Any expansion of the monorail would be expensive, so that money would need to provide real benefits over the existing transportation infrastructure. The overall trip times (including wait times and transfer times) need to be as good or better than the existing system, and all hotel-to-park trips should be possible with no more than one transfer.

Assumption 1: Monorail trains can be extended.

Currently, the Mark VI trains have six cars. At some point in the past, the monorail trains had five cars. Obviously, if monorail trains were longer, the stations would need to be longer. But I am assuming that there would be no insurmountable technical limit to the length of the trains.

Assumption 2: Monorail load times can be shorter.

The load time on the monorail is currently limited to the amount of time it takes to load and unload wheelchairs with ramps. Because the monorail doors open out, the floor of the monorail is a step higher than the station platform. Each station has cast members who manually have to wheel ramps to the doors and lay them down. The guests in wheelchairs must carefully navigate the ramps while the other guests wait. The wheelchair capacity of the monorail is limited by the number of cast members staffed at the stations, and the entire process greatly increases the time necessary to load the train. If the monorail system was expanded, existing stations would need to be modified and additional trains would need to be commissioned. Existing trains would probably be retired or refurbished to match the new trains. Therefore, the new trains and stations could be built to have platform-level boarding. This type of boarding would eliminate the step up on to the train and allow wheelchairs and strollers to be driven aboard without assistance, and could reduce the time spent loading and unloading.

Assumption 3: Monorail demand is proportional to the number of rooms at a given resort.

This is likely to be an unrealistic assumption, but without actual origin-destination data, it is as good as I can do. Since the monorail would need to be effective in the extremely busy few weeks at the end of December, I will be assuming that the monorail will be distributing guests to and from the resort hotels based on the number of rooms at the hotels at full occupancy. In actuality, the hotels probably have different numbers of guests per room and different theme park visitation preferences. But without this data (and without access to the more sophisticated transportation demand modeling software), I will have to assume a consistent distribution across hotels.

I will probably add additional assumptions and goals as I progress, but I think this will give you a good idea of my approach to this project. Next time I will describe different potential monorail system layouts. Feel free to post in the comments if you want to challenge any of my goals and assumptions, I would love to hear from you.

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[i] Yes, I am aware that you can get between Epcot and Hollywood Studios on foot or by boat, but it takes more than 30 minutes and is probably not responsible for many of that type of park hopping trips.