10/18/23 MK crowds insight

[SL6827]

Given your extensive list of stays in your signature line - you never experienced this time-honored tradition?
While leaving MK is never my favorite part of a trip (around fireworks or not) - I have never really felt it was madness - seems consistent with the exit time of any major venue be it sports, concert or otherwise ...

No. We always have left before hand, knowing this possibility.

 

[DisneyFive]

No need to be fearful. There is no reason you will need to leave as soon as the fireworks/Fantasmic are finished, even if the park is officially closed. You can hang back then leave when you're comfortable. We've done that often. You may need to move a bit to get yourself out of the way if you're in the centre of an area where many are moving but a slow, methodical walk for a little bit can get you to a place to wait until you're comfortable with the crowd level.

I agree 100% but most first timers, like us, did not know that. I do think that Disney has improved the exit after the fireworks in the past 13 years since we had our first visit. This is one of those things that I wish every first time guest to Magic Kingdom would know.

 

[scrappinginontario]

While the park was extremely busy, I was impressed that The Woo made it from the hub to his car in a little more than 35 mins. That's a reasonable amount of time even when it isn't park close!

 

[RoyandWalt]

This week is also fall break, at least here in Indiana.

 

[WDW Traveler]

We tried to "swim" over to Tomorrowland after the fireworks back in September. The cast members were blocking off all of the side walkways but the main one that walks over the bridge. We aren't sure if they were doing this on the other side has well, with people trying to head to Frontierland, but we couldn't understand why they were not letting people branch off to get rid of a little of the rush down Main Street. Took us a good amount of time to get over towards the side.

 

[Marthasor]

I do feel for first-timers who don't realize how difficult it is to exit after the fireworks and don't know they even have to come up with an exit strategy to avoid the masses of people exiting down Main St. We learned our lesson years ago - heck, we JUST learned not to take a boat from Ft. W or WL at fireworks time as even exiting from the boat dock and trying to walk to CR, the buses or the monorail after the fireworks end is a nightmare.

 

[saraheliz]

We just watch from the Adventureland side of the hub, then after the fireworks we link a kid to every adult, squirm our way across one lane of traffic, and then go ride a few last rides before the park closes. No reason to push with the hoards of people. We did this during party season in August so it was plenty packed but once you get up on the sidewalk on the other side of that circle and aren't heading towards the exit, the crowds thin immediately.
Although, I heard awful things about leaving after Fantasmic and that was fine for us. Getting into the theater was waaaaay worse than getting out.

 

[palavra]

Don't leave right away. Move away from the crush of people and shop, get ice cream or just find a seat and people watch.

 

[CarolynFH]

Also the park to park buses are running until the park closes even if the other park has closed. Disney will take you to get your vehicle if you park hopped.

Thanks for this. It makes sense for Disney to keep running those buses as opposed to having guests trying all sorts of other means to get back to their cars.

 

[mi*vida*loca]

We have never left MK right after fireworks for this reason. We just linger in the grass after our dessert party (we've done the party the last 3 trips), wait about 15-20 minutes and do a few rides. Even after waiting that long going in the opposite direction of the crowds is a bit nuts but we make it.

When the kids were younger and we didn't do the parties we would just scoot off to the side and wait and chill out. Once we waited a good 45-60 minutes and got great pictures in front of the castle with almost no one around.

 

[maltdizzy]

Push push out to get in line for the transportation. It's one of the main reasons we stay at a monorail resort (but don't use monorail at park close). We can wait out the crowd then walk or take the resort boat launch, regardless of how bad the monorail, ferry, and bus lines get.

 

[musicguy856]

Walk to Contemporary and take an Uber back to your resort from there.

 

[slo]

My DD20 and I go hang out on The Peoplemover and lollygag around. Then when we leave, we walk to The Contemporary, get a snack and then take the Monorail back to the TTA - it’s a great system

 

[mickeyluv'r]

It's important to make sure our choice of words are correct. A Stampede (a sudden panicked rush of a group, herd pack). Leaving WDW is not a stampede!! Is it fun? Can it be scary? Yes and Yes but as others have suggested here the best coarse of action is to find a place to sit and watch the masses leave and then after it clears out get up and take your time in a peaceful manner leaving the park.

I have seen multiple scary situations in the MK hub when it is crowded.

Most recently was this past NYE. Shortly before the midnight show, the hub was packed, but a group/family of adults tried to shove their way into the center. That caused ripples, and very nearly a fistfight. People were shouting. The pre-midnight music/show was horrible. People were thoroughly annoyed already. The DJ's did not play Disney music. It was just really bad loud noises. The DJ kept trying to get people to dance, but nobody was dancing. Even if they had wanted to dance, there was no room to move. Mostly everyone of all ages just looked annoyed. No CM's were close enough to help.

It was VERY NEARLY a crowd surge. Everyone near us got shoved around, including small children. Some of them fell to the ground. The thing that stopped the latecomers was multiple people yelling that kids were getting shoved ton the ground.

Most of the other times that got a bit scary were times we tried to head upstream after the fireworks. (back to the rides) People walk holding hands in groups. sometimes large groups, and they will not let anyone pass between them, so they form walls. It is very hard to get around them.

 

[TinkerPan]

I do think Disney has improved the after fireworks experience. Not having the park close immediately after the fireworks does really help.

We were there in mid-September and I was really worried about an after fireworks crush, but it didn't materialize like I experienced it back several years ago, which was truly scary. The crowd in September was very orderly. I was on the Frontierland side of the hub with a Disney scooter when the fireworks ended. That meant I had to cross over to the left side of main street to return the scooter. My 2 adult daughters, one pushing a double stroller was able to stay with me. We kept bearing gradually left and made it across main street without too much of a problem. We regrouped with the rest of our party (there were 9 of us total) by the scooter return. I did a quick bathroom break in the Theatre while waiting and my DD bought some bubble wands for the kids while waiting for the others. It didn't take long to regroup and we then proceeded to make our way to the ferry. I noticed that once we left the main entrance and headed in the direction of the ferry we were in a massive broad crowd "line" that would eventually snake back and forth. This meant we had plenty of room to spread out and we were constantly moving. I had expected more of a stop-and-go which really can make for some unpleasantness. But, that never happened. I attribute this to how Disney now had designed the approach to the ferry. It was certainly more steps but because we were constantly moving it was great not to feel you were going to be crushed, and the crowd sort of naturally spread out.

 

[AnnaKristoff2013]

Walk to Contemporary and take an Uber back to your resort from there.

This is the way.

 

[AnnaKristoff2013]

I was there over Columbus Day week this year. One of the non-party nights (we always hang out by Gastons tavern for fireworks since it’s usually empty), about 15 minutes prior to the show there was a park wide announcement that Main Street and the hub were completely full and closed off to any more people. I’ve never experienced that and I go on Christmas and New Years every year.

 

[IndyToThere]

One of my worst experiences at Disney was leaving MK at night during a spring break week (this was about 5 years ago). It wasn't so much the crowd surge at Main Street, but at the parking lot trams. We arrived at the tram lines that night around 11:15 or so. The Tram castmembers for some unknown reasons were holding up the departure for each tram by a good 5 - 10 minutes. When I looked up and down the trams, people were getting loaded very quickly and even folding up their strollers right away, so I don't know what the holdup was. Saw at least one fight almost break out when someone tried to jump the line. The whole crowd starting to clap and cheer sarcastically every time the tram would eventually take off.
We didn't get on a tram until 12:30 or 12:45am. Had we not parked in the very back of the Villains side of the lot, we would have walked. (in hindsight we would have walked but had no idea it was going to take that long - we weren't terribly deep in the lines when we started)

I don't know what the purpose of the CMs to hold up the tram loading process that night was, but it basically made us swear off staying off-site again. Not a good lasting impression to have when leaving the park.

 

[Scalemaster34]

One of my worst experiences at Disney was leaving MK at night during a spring break week (this was about 5 years ago). It wasn't so much the crowd surge at Main Street, but at the parking lot trams. We arrived at the tram lines that night around 11:15 or so. The Tram castmembers for some unknown reasons were holding up the departure for each tram by a good 5 - 10 minutes. When I looked up and down the trams, people were getting loaded very quickly and even folding up their strollers right away, so I don't know what the holdup was. Saw at least one fight almost break out when someone tried to jump the line. The whole crowd starting to clap and cheer sarcastically every time the tram would eventually take off.
We didn't get on a tram until 12:30 or 12:45am. Had we not parked in the very back of the Villains side of the lot, we would have walked. (in hindsight we would have walked but had no idea it was going to take that long - we weren't terribly deep in the lines when we started)

I don't know what the purpose of the CMs to hold up the tram loading process that night was, but it basically made us swear off staying off-site again. Not a good lasting impression to have when leaving the park.

They hold there rather than get backed up out in the parking lot, and guest deciding to jump out rather than wait for the Tram ahead to clear.

 

[musicguy856]

One of my worst experiences at Disney was leaving MK at night during a spring break week (this was about 5 years ago). It wasn't so much the crowd surge at Main Street, but at the parking lot trams. We arrived at the tram lines that night around 11:15 or so. The Tram castmembers for some unknown reasons were holding up the departure for each tram by a good 5 - 10 minutes. When I looked up and down the trams, people were getting loaded very quickly and even folding up their strollers right away, so I don't know what the holdup was. Saw at least one fight almost break out when someone tried to jump the line. The whole crowd starting to clap and cheer sarcastically every time the tram would eventually take off.
We didn't get on a tram until 12:30 or 12:45am. Had we not parked in the very back of the Villains side of the lot, we would have walked. (in hindsight we would have walked but had no idea it was going to take that long - we weren't terribly deep in the lines when we started)

I don't know what the purpose of the CMs to hold up the tram loading process that night was, but it basically made us swear off staying off-site again. Not a good lasting impression to have when leaving the park.

I was there one night where they didn't allow anyone to load on 2 resort line monorails because there was a large back up at the Contemporary. I guess people walk there to avoid the lines at MK?