Crowds right now: the Canadian Factor

[mamaofsix]

For those currently in the parks: curious as to what the crowds feel like? How many Ontario license plates are you seeing in the parking lots?

As a Canadian, I know that a large number of Canadians have their spring break this week. As with years past, touring plans predicted 7 or 8 crowds during the Ontario Spring Break and the actual crowds have been a '10.' Similar with other crowd calendars.

My theory is that crowd calendars are not properly weighting the 'international affect' when they make predictions. In January, it sounds like the unexpected bump was in some part due to South American tour groups on their break. And every year there is an 'unexplained' surge to level 10 crowds during the week that most Canadians have Spring Break. I understand that most crowd calendar's take into account the Spring Breaks by different U.S. states. However, Ontario's population alone is 13.5 million - larger than all but 46 of your states. And several provinces, not just Ontario, have their break this week.

Curious, @lentesta . . . how much is the Canadian factor considered? I noticed that last year during Ontario's March break touring plans also predicted 8 crowds but actuals were 10.

 

[rwdavis2]

I doubt if it's more than a drop on the bucket. For example, I was listening to the Dis podcast with Len Testa of Touring Plans and he said that the impact of Brazilians on the overall crowd levels was minimal at most. He also said that the reason the parks had long waits in January was that WDW deliberately lowered ride capacity. They counted the number of people coming off rides and the number was around 25%-30% below max capacity.

 

[pitpat]

Yesterday's wait times looked crazy. I was there last week and it wasn't bad, but got noticeably more crowded on Sat. Did see a lot of Ontario license plates on the drive

 

[mamaofsix]

I doubt if it's more than a drop on the bucket. For example, I was listening to the Dis podcast with Len Testa of Touring Plans and he said that the impact of Brazilians on the overall crowd levels was minimal at most. He also said that the reason the parks had long waits in January was that WDW deliberately lowered ride capacity. They counted the number of people coming off rides and the number was around 25%-30% below max capacity.

Yes, ride capacity alterations is a problem this year. However, this doesn't explain how touringplans has gotten their estimates wrong during Canadian Spring Break in years past, when capacity wasn't being tinkered with.

Clearly, those who design the different crowd calendars agree with you that Canadian and International visitors are a "drop in the bucket." My post was to express that I think this assumption is a mistake. Calendars that consistently predict a 7 or 8 during this week and actuals become a 10 is significant data.

Imagine a state with a population nearing that of California. Now imagine that most of this state is made up of middle to high income earners. Now imagine that no less than 10% of this population goes south during their 1 week of Spring Break. If you check the parking lots, they are full of Canadian license plates. The border between Canada and the U.S. is jam packed with vehicles head to Florida every Spring Break. And this does not account for the many times more Canadian residents who have flown down.

 

[quest4dl]

I think a particularly bad winter this year in Canada and parts of the U.S. is have people making last minute plans to escape the unending winter.

 

[Aladora]

Imagine a state with a population nearing that of California.

While I am sure that Ontario spring break has increased the crowds in WDW, I have to correct you on one thing.

Population of Ontatio: Aprox. 14 million.
Population of California: Aprox 40 million.

The entire country of Canada does not have the population of California. (35 mil vs 40 mil)

 

[unrequited23]

If I was going to have to deal with large crowds, I would love for them to be from countries stereotypically known for their politeness.

 

[mamaofsix]

While I am sure that Ontario spring break has increased the crowds in WDW, I have to correct you on one thing.

Population of Ontatio: Aprox. 14 million.
Population of California: Aprox 40 million.

The entire country of Canada does not have the population of California. (35 mil vs 40 mil)

Guess that was confusing - I was referring to Canada having a population nearing that of California. Much of our country has their Spring Break at the same time. My data has Canada's population at 36.2 million and California at 39.4 million...

 

[Shanti]

My theory is that crowd calendars are not properly weighting the 'international affect' when they make predictions.

My theory is that the crowd calendar creators are now clueless, given the recent big shifts in WDW attendance patterns, and are no longer worth paying any attention to.

I'm being serious, not snarky. I stopped following crowd calendars after our February 2014 trip, which was supposed to be a very low-crowd time (early Feb., far from Presidents' Day, used calendars to pick the "right" park each day, etc.) and it was not terrible but it was not a low-crowd time. I figured if the predictions could be this off, so that studying them carefully didn't help, then I might as well just plan my trips for when I just feel like going & when it's convenient (which as a teacher, is not "off-season"), and ignore the calendars.

That approach has served me very well over several trips. Our summer trips have been the least crowded of all, as so many people have swallowed the Kool Aid about summer being "terribly crowded", that there are now actually fewer people at WDW in summer than during most other times of year. We defied Internet advice and went over Easter weekend (mid-April) last year, and while there were plenty of people (like usual at WDW), it wasn't terribly crowded or hard to do rides.

I pay attention to people's trip reports & Disney resort costs when estimating how crowded it's likely to be, not crowd calendars or online "conventional wisdom". The latter two seem to be based on old patterns from years ago that are no longer applicable.

From what I've read of people's reported experiences in the last couple of years, March and October seem to be the most consistently crowded months at WDW. Fall as a season (September through December) is probably the busiest time of year to visit. Spring seems to be the second most crowded time, particularly early spring. Winter isn't very crowded but it is no longer very uncrowded, either. Midsummer is a slower time to visit, with lower resort prices than most of the year, as well.

 

[isabellea]

I have many American friends and it looks like many are on Spring break this week. As for Canadians, QC had its Spring break last week and we are #2 in terms of population. When visiting WDW we tend to go during our Spring break (like many of our neighbours and friends) and while we hear more French than at other times of the year, the crowds are still moderate.

 

[pigletto]

My theory is that the crowd calendar creators are now clueless, given the recent big shifts in WDW attendance patterns, and are no longer worth paying any attention to.

I'm being serious, not snarky. I stopped following crowd calendars after our February 2014 trip, which was supposed to be a very low-crowd time (early Feb., far from Presidents' Day, used calendars to pick the "right" park each day, etc.) and it was not terrible but it was not a low-crowd time. I figured if the predictions could be this off, so that studying them carefully didn't help, then I might as well just plan my trips for when I just feel like going & when it's convenient (which as a teacher, is not "off-season"), and ignore the calendars.

That approach has served me very well over several trips. Our summer trips have been the least crowded of all, as so many people have swallowed the Kool Aid about summer being "terribly crowded", that there are now actually fewer people at WDW in summer than during most other times of year. We defied Internet advice and went over Easter weekend (mid-April) last year, and while there were plenty of people (like usual at WDW), it wasn't terribly crowded or hard to do rides.

I pay attention to people's trip reports & Disney resort costs when estimating how crowded it's likely to be, not crowd calendars or online "conventional wisdom". The latter two seem to be based on old patterns from years ago that are no longer applicable.

From what I've read of people's reported experiences in the last couple of years, March and October seem to be the most consistently crowded months at WDW. Fall as a season (September through December) is probably the busiest time of year to visit. Spring seems to be the second most crowded time, particularly early spring. Winter isn't very crowded but it is no longer very uncrowded, either. Midsummer is a slower time to visit, with lower resort prices than most of the year, as well.

I think you are on to something. I don't know if Josh at EasyWDW is back in the predicting game but I do know that last time I was looking for his crowd calendars he had stopped making them and said it was getting way too hard to accurately predict.

 

[starvenger]

My theory is that the crowd calendar creators are now clueless, given the recent big shifts in WDW attendance patterns, and are no longer worth paying any attention to.

I wouldn’t say clueless but certainly the metrics have changed and the creators haven’t figured out what the new variables are, or were too complacent with the old metrics and haven’t adjusted yet.

Or perhaps it’s like the weather and the numbers are only trustworthy the closer you get to your arrival date - which given the need to book dining and FP+ waaaaay ahead of time renders the entire exercise moot.

In any event, I’m pretty much with you in that I’ll book my vacation first and figure out the days after. Use the crowd calendars as a guideline and pivot if I need to later.

 

[Aladora]

Guess that was confusing - I was referring to Canada having a population nearing that of California. Much of our country has their Spring Break at the same time. My data has Canada's population at 36.2 million and California at 39.4 million...

It's funny, when I read your post I immediately thought "that's not right, Spring Break starts NEXT week!" Then I realized that Spring Break in ON is at a different time than here in BC!

And because I am killing time at work before we leave for Mexico tomorrow...

BC: March 17 - Apr 3 (yeah, 2 weeks!)
AB: March 23 - Apr 3
SK: March 30 - Apr 6
MB: March 26 - 30
ON: March 12 - 16
QC: Mar 5 - 9 (some end 12)
NB: Mar 5-9
NS: Mar 12-16
NL: Mar 30 - Apr 9
PEI: Mar 26-30
Yukon: Mar 19-23
NWT: varies but most Mar 19 - Apr 2
Nun: varies but most Mar 30 - Apr 6

Interestingly, only Ontario and Nova Scotia have Spring break Mar 12-16.

Yeah, seriously killing time until I get to go on vacation!

 

[sherilaine]

This isn't the first time Ontario assumes the rest of the country is just like it - and not all of us go to WDW - many in the West go to DLR.

 

[Donald - my hero]

This isn't the first time Ontario assumes the rest of the country is just like it - and not all of us go to WDW - many in the West go to DLR.

Hey now, don't lump us all into the same pot there my first thought was "i doubt there are many Ontario plates in DL" but then i remembered that the DISboards do focus primarily on WDW.

I agree with others about the crowd calendars being slightly *off* lately but think that has more to do with the overall increase in population in general and the HUGE increase in the amount of advertising that Disney currently does. There is no way for anyone to predict how this will attract the "once & done" crowds. Sprinkle a good dose of any events happening that aren't directly connected to Disney (either coast here) but attract people who figure they will tack a Disney stop onto their vacation/business trip (I'm looking at all the ProBowl people who messed with our "low crowds" last Jan/Feb) Gone are the days when arriving after the US thanksgiving let you experience crowds that would leave room for empty castle pictures at any time of day, front of the lot parking at any park, lines no longer than 15 minutes for any ride/attraction AND walk-up tables in the castle, le cellier & Chef Mickey (yes we were able to do this in 2000) I think this is dating me somewhat!!!

 

[Scar1199]

We were there last year for the first 2 weeks of March and the numbers went from tolerable the first week to stupid the second week. Talking to people last year it was because a cold spell hit. Florida starts their break during the second week and they said with locals not going to the beach and choosing Disney and those at the resorts not swimming, crowds went through the roof. I looked yesterday, wait times were crazy and the temperature was only 64.

 

[Tanooki]

Yesterday's wait times looked crazy. I was there last week and it wasn't bad, but got noticeably more crowded on Sat. Did see a lot of Ontario license plates on the drive

I was going to say exactly the same thing about crowds. We were there last week as well and found it busy but manageable until Saturday, which was our last day and we went to MK.
Although I do understand that MK during the weekend is going to be busier, it was absolutely packed!
We did our FP and pretty much nothing else after that since the wait times were too bad.
Got my thinking that I never want to deal with Christmas crowds!

 

[mamaofsix]

It's funny, when I read your post I immediately thought "that's not right, Spring Break starts NEXT week!" Then I realized that Spring Break in ON is at a different time than here in BC!

And because I am killing time at work before we leave for Mexico tomorrow...

BC: March 17 - Apr 3 (yeah, 2 weeks!)
AB: March 23 - Apr 3
SK: March 30 - Apr 6
MB: March 26 - 30
ON: March 12 - 16
QC: Mar 5 - 9 (some end 12)
NB: Mar 5-9
NS: Mar 12-16
NL: Mar 30 - Apr 9
PEI: Mar 26-30
Yukon: Mar 19-23
NWT: varies but most Mar 19 - Apr 2
Nun: varies but most Mar 30 - Apr 6

Interestingly, only Ontario and Nova Scotia have Spring break Mar 12-16.

Yeah, seriously killing time until I get to go on vacation!

lol... my frequent reference to Ontario's break is because Ontario's population makes up almost 50% of Canada's entire population. Much more than any other province...

 

[Aladora]

lol... my frequent reference to Ontario's break is because Ontario's population makes up almost 50% of Canada's entire population. Much more than any other province...

Lol, I was born in TO and grew up in Ottawa, I totally get how Ontario centric we can get!

 

[mab2012]

We were there last year for the first 2 weeks of March and the numbers went from tolerable the first week to stupid the second week. Talking to people last year it was because a cold spell hit. Florida starts their break during the second week and they said with locals not going to the beach and choosing Disney and those at the resorts not swimming, crowds went through the roof. I looked yesterday, wait times were crazy and the temperature was only 64.

This was my take as well. We've been several times in mid March, crowds are consistently high but usually not crazy, *except* last year. I also chalked it up at least partly to weather. It was pretty cool - long pants and light jackets kind of weather, even for those of us acclimatized to Canadian winters. The pools were deserted, and no doubt the water parks were empty too.