The art of queueing up at Disneyland

Tourist Experiences at Overcrowded Attractions: A Text Analytics Approach

“…Moreover, this study highlights the excessive waiting time at the attractions that can cause negative tourist experiences. Apart from implementing possible solutions to reduce the perceived waiting time such as embedding gamifying and technological elements to entertain visitors [ 47 ], based on the keywords derived from this study, it appears that tourist experiences can be improved by informing one in advance of a rough waiting time or providing sufficient seating capacity. Notably, it is interesting to see that a high level of perceived crowdedness is not always negative [ 46 ].…”

Avatarme: digital avatars in a theme park queue creating a better experience and an emotional connection

“…Themed entertainment is about creating an environment through the use of audio visual, props, and set pieces in order to create a larger story that runs throughout the guest experience. An amusement park aims to simply amuse the guests, while a theme park holds a "more interrelated entertainment collection behaving in a coordinated and immersive fashion" (Nelson, 2016). For the purposes of the research, I will be focusing specifically on theme parks, and in the narratives.…”

“…Some of the initial attempts included adding wait time signs, and protective covering from the weather for the guests. They determined that "an ideal queue set the scene for the story and transitioned guests from the land outside to the attraction's theme", what is known more commonly as the onboarding or the preshow (Nelson, 2016). Some of the attractions adopted more waiting room style "queues" which became areas of entertainment instead.…”

“…In particular, The Jungle Cruise attraction in Adventureland had a script that was edited and changed to have a more lighthearted tone -and the queue itself also was edited and changed, eventually having the queue lined with props from the ride's script. The flow of people and traffic was very important to the Imagineers, as well as Walt himself -they would spend hours playing a 'tourist' role in order to learn what the guests could be doing in the queues, and as a result, better understand how to improve the experience (Nelson, 2016).…”

“…FastPass has allowed Disney to significantly increase the level of satisfaction of its customers while maximizing the utilization of its attractions (Duguay, 2014). In fact, in the first five years of operation, the FastPass reduced wait times by 40% (Nelson, 2016). Queues have changed dramatically as designers began to understand what made a queue good, reducing stress and frustration in guests.…”