AOA Skyliner- is it a nightmare?

[BriarRose924]

We are staying at AOA in July. I keep seeing videos online of the Skyliner lines that wrap around the resort! How long should we expect to wait in line for the Skyliner in the morning?
Also on our last visit we were taking the Skyliner from HS to Epcot and got stuck at the hub due to lightning in the area. We sat there for an hour waiting on buses to come. Should we expect to have these weather delays throughout the trip since we have to take the Skyliner to those 2 parks from AOA. Thanks for any info and advice you can provide!

 

[Skippyboo]

Are you trying to rope drop? If so I would go 30 -45 minutes before the Skyliner opens to get in the line. It moves quickly.

If you are not trying to rope drop, there isn’t going to much of a line after that rope drop rush if you’re going at like 10am.

You do have to pay attention to weather when you’re leaving the park. I got stuck at CBR station this February waiting to go to Pop because of lightning. Just had to wait it out

 

[BriarRose924]

Are you trying to rope drop? If so I would go 30 -45 minutes before the Skyliner opens to get in the line. It moves quickly.

If you are not trying to rope drop, there isn’t going to much of a line after that rope drop rush if you’re going at like 10am.

You do have to pay attention to weather when you’re leaving the park. I got stuck at CBR station this February waiting to go to Pop because of lightning. Just had to wait it out

Thanks! Yes, we probably will want to rope drop at least HS. Thanks for the advice! Would it save any time taking the first bus to MK then getting on the Epcot monorail?

 

[WEDWDW]

We are staying at AOA in July. I keep seeing videos online of the Skyliner lines that wrap around the resort! How long should we expect to wait in line for the Skyliner in the morning?
Also on our last visit we were taking the Skyliner from HS to Epcot and got stuck at the hub due to lightning in the area. We sat there for an hour waiting on buses to come. Should we expect to have these weather delays throughout the trip since we have to take the Skyliner to those 2 parks from AOA. Thanks for any info and advice you can provide!

Unfortunately July sees almost daily afternoon/evening storms.

I would like to see Disney open a walkway from CBR to POP/AoA so Guests stuck at CBR Station would have the option to walk to POP/AoA instead of waiting for a bus to arrive.

So far Disney hasn't listened to my suggestion.lol

 

[scrappinginontario]

We visited for 10 days in Aug of 2023. Lines for Skyliner are long in the morning before it starts running. (It's recommended to arrive at transportation 90 mins before Early Theme Park Entry hours begin if you wish to be towards the front of rope drop crowds) Once the Skyliner begins to run the lines move quickly. There will always be a line at the beginning of the day but it moves at a good pace.

Yes, there is a risk of weather delays in August but it's impossible to predict how many. In our 10 days we only had one time when we were put on a bus rather take the Skyliner due to a storm in the area but I was surprised as I anticipated it happening more often. Some years/weeks there are more weather delays than others.

 

[BriarRose924]

Unfortunately July sees almost daily afternoon/evening storms.

I would like to see Disney open a walkway from CBR to POP/AoA so Guests stuck at CBR Station would have the option to walk to POP/AoA instead of waiting for a bus to arrive.

So far Disney hasn't listened to my suggestion.lol

Ohh this is a question I had too! Last time we needed to get to Epcot for dinner so we waited on the bus. But if we get stuck at the CBR hub, we can walk to CBR or Riviera and take a bus elsewhere or grab an Uber, right?

 

[WEDWDW]

Thanks! Yes, we probably will want to rope drop at least HS. Thanks for the advice! Would it save any time taking the first bus to MK then getting on the Epcot monorail?

No!

You would have to go all the way to MK,go through Security at MK ,walk to the Monorail at MK,stop at CR,get off at TTC and wait for the Epcot Monorail.

The Skyliner will be faster than all that.

 

[BriarRose924]

We visited for 10 days in Aug of 2023. Lines for Skyliner are long in the morning before it starts running. (It's recommended to arrive at transportation 90 mins before Early Theme Park Entry hours begin if you wish to be towards the front of rope drop crowds) Once the Skyliner begins to run the lines move quickly. There will always be a line at the beginning of the day but it moves at a good pace.

Yes, there is a risk of weather delays in August but it's impossible to predict how many. In our 10 days we only had one time when we were put on a bus rather take the Skyliner due to a storm in the area but I was surprised as I anticipated it happening more often. Some years/weeks there are more weather delays than others.

Thanks for the heads up!! I’m debating just getting a Minnie van the days we go to those 2 parks for rope drop. Definitely something I’ll have to think on. Getting two 19 yr olds and two 16 year olds up and out that early to get in line may be a stress I don’t want to deal with haha throwing 4 teenagers into a Minnie van may be worth the cost haha

 

[BriarRose924]

No!

You would have to go all the way to MK,go through Secutiry at MK ,walk to the Monorail at MK,stop at CR,get off at TTC and wait for the Epcot Monorail.

The Skyliner will be faster than all that.

Ok glad I asked! ’ thanks!!!

 

[Skippyboo]

Ohh this is a question I had too! Last time we needed to get to Epcot for dinner so we waited on the bus. But if we get stuck at the CBR hub, we can walk to CBR or Riviera and take a bus elsewhere or grab an Uber, right?

If it’s going to storm, probably just take Uber to Epcot from your resort and don’t bother with Skyliner. Riviera is opposite side of CBR from Skyliner hub but you could walk over to Jamaica section of CBR.

 

[BriarRose924]

If it’s going to storm, probably just take Uber to Epcot from your resort and don’t bother with Skyliner. Riviera is opposite side of CBR from Skyliner hub but you could walk over to Jamaica section of CBR.

Great thanks!!

 

[DizneyFamof4]

We visited for 10 days in Aug of 2023. Lines for Skyliner are long in the morning before it starts running. (It's recommended to arrive at transportation 90 mins before Early Theme Park Entry hours begin if you wish to be towards the front of rope drop crowds) Once the Skyliner begins to run the lines move quickly. There will always be a line at the beginning of the day but it moves at a good pace.

Yes, there is a risk of weather delays in August but it's impossible to predict how many. In our 10 days we only had one time when we were put on a bus rather take the Skyliner due to a storm in the area but I was surprised as I anticipated it happening more often. Some years/weeks there are more weather delays than others.

This exactly I read soooo many posts from people that you think the skyliner is down every day all the time during the summer. First, it is rarely down in the mornings, the majority of the storms are usually in the mid-afternoons, so unless you are leaving the park in the middle of the day it should not be a big deal. The biggest problem is how WDW handles the closure, they need to put it on the MDE app so there is no guessing.

 

[saraheliz]

We stayed at AoA in August of 2023, we did not rope drop HS but did Epcot and there was like a 2 minute line (we did not get in line when the skyliner first started running but it wasn't too long afterwards, I just looked back at the pictures and and early entry was 8:30, we were outside of the building walking to the skyliner at 7:26 and I have a pic of us on the skyliner at 7:30. I've seen the recent lines but that was not our experience nor did we see lines that long when we were leaving our Nemo suite to talk to the bus to RD other parks.

We had a very flukey trip weather-wise so I can't speak to the storms. We did not see a drop of rain and we were there for 8 days in August. There was one afternoon that storms in the area had the skyliner and pool shut down for maybe an hour. I imagine most summers it happens more frequently than an hour over 8 days.

 

[jimmymc]

I'd say be in line a minimum of 15 minutes before the Skyliner opens. There will be lines leading up to resort early entry through normal opening time.

 

[BriarRose924]

We stayed at AoA in August of 2023, we did not rope drop HS but did Epcot and there was like a 2 minute line (we did not get in line when the skyliner first started running but it wasn't too long afterwards, I just looked back at the pictures and and early entry was 8:30, we were outside of the building walking to the skyliner at 7:26 and I have a pic of us on the skyliner at 7:30. I've seen the recent lines but that was not our experience nor did we see lines that long when we were leaving our Nemo suite to talk to the bus to RD other parks.

We had a very flukey trip weather-wise so I can't speak to the storms. We did not see a drop of rain and we were there for 8 days in August. There was one afternoon that storms in the area had the skyliner and pool shut down for maybe an hour. I imagine most summers it happens more frequently than an hour over 8 days.

Thank you so much for sharing your experience!

 

[WestieChic04]

We are staying at AOA in July. I keep seeing videos online of the Skyliner lines that wrap around the resort! How long should we expect to wait in line for the Skyliner in the morning?
Also on our last visit we were taking the Skyliner from HS to Epcot and got stuck at the hub due to lightning in the area. We sat there for an hour waiting on buses to come. Should we expect to have these weather delays throughout the trip since we have to take the Skyliner to those 2 parks from AOA. Thanks for any info and advice you can provide

Definitely would plan to get the sky liner 30-45 mins prior to park open if trying to rope drop. However, my family and I usually like to take our time in the morning and stack genie + so we opt for 10-11am arrivals and never wait in line for the sky liner.

 

[DizneyFamof4]

Definitely would plan to get the sky liner 30-45 mins prior to park open if trying to rope drop. However, my family and I usually like to take our time in the morning and stack genie + so we opt for 10-11am arrivals and never wait in line for the sky liner.

This is also how we do the parks, because going RD to close is so tiring over a week and when we get back home we feel like we need a vacation from our vacation, just to relax. We muuuuch rather close the parks then do RD, so I will wake up just before 7 get G+ and ant LL's situated while the rest of my family still is sleeping. This way we stay a lot more well rested during our trips and we are not rushing in the morning to get ready. Plus, I found getting up super early to stand in line for an hour or two so we can be one of the first into the parks, a bit of an oxymoron. We arrive around 10 and almost always get everything in that we wanted to do and plus some. Those 2 hours of sleep really is a BIG difference maker for our family. At the end of the night we hang out at the park and rarely wait in line for transportation going back to our resort We started doing this way back when FP+ first came out and it has been so much more enjoyable and relaxing.

 

[bluezy]

I'll just share our experiences from our stay at AoA in June 2022. We did rope drop at DHS one day. I wanted to be at the Skyliner station by 6:45 a.m. (EE started at 8:00 a.m.). We were late getting out of the room and didn't get to the station until 6:55. The line was wrapped all the way back to building 3 at Pop. We walked over and got to the end of the line just before 7:00 (I was scheduling our LLs just as we got to the end of the line). Based on the time stamps on my pictures, we were through security and standing in line at DHS (about 30 people back from the front of the line) by 7:22. I know we were standing in line a minute or 2 before I took the picture. They let us in the park at about 7:40 a.m. and we walked over to ToT. DH & I sat on a bench with our grandson while the rest of our group rode the ride. They were off the ride by about 8:00. The rode RnR next and then we were in line for MMRR before 8:30. It worked out well for us. Now, if we were planning to do RoTR at rope drop, we would have been further back in the line than I wanted to be...though if we had gotten in line for Skyliner by 6:45, we probably would have been ok.

We had one time (out of at least 12 rides on Skyliner that week) that we were stuck at the CBR Hub due to lightning. Maybe we were lucky, but they had a bus there very quickly. They waited about 15 minutes before making the call to go to the bus rather than waiting out the storm (it wasn't raining there but there was lightning in the area). Once they called the bus, it was there in about 5 minutes and bus driver told us her job was to sit in a nearby parking lot just waiting to be called. Our son and his family were staying at Pop on that trip and they were meeting us at DHS. They left their room a few minutes later than we left ours in AoA and Skyliner was already closed by the time they got out there. The walked out front to wait for a bus. We both got to DHS at the same time. That was the only Skyliner shut down we encountered over our 8-day stay. I know it was down other times, but we weren't riding it when those stoppages happened.

 

[rlk]

My wish is that the MDE app will be able to let us know if the Skyliner is down due to weather and when it comes back on line.

 

[ThisIsMyName]

We just got back from staying at AoA and we had no issues with the Skyliner in the morning getting to HS for rope drop on Monday and crowds were moderate level.

They had 2 lines running - one for the AoA side and one for Pop side that they were alternating from. There was no line at the Caribbean to change to HS or EPCOT. I think before the whole line was on Pop side so maybe that was changed? It would have been annoying to walk all the way around the lake to get in line.

EE HS open was 8:30am for our day. We got to the Skyliner at like 7:20 and to the park at like 7:45. The Skyliner sign said it would start running at 7:30 but it was running earlier. I think the line might back up before it starts and then once it starts it moves fast so we timed it just right.

They let us in to the park at 8am and we were actually in the front of the entry pack. With a little "jogging" we got a good spot in the SDD line and were off the ride by 8:40am.