Featured Image Courtesy: Orlando Sentinel
In big companies, sometimes there are things that just don’t make sense. Maybe it’s the issue of bloated budgets, different departments, and pet projects that aren’t great optics next to other situations. Whatever the case may be, Disney World is currently in one of those peculiar moments where people are scratching their heads. What is it that they’re up to? Keep reading…
For the past twenty-something years, Disney World has used road signs that are very specific to the resort. Originally designed to mimic the official colors of Mickey Mouse, but with purple added, the signs certainly signal when you’re on resort property. For some reason, Disney has decided to spend major money on changing out all more-then-one-hundred road signs with brand new signs. That’s fine, but they don’t really offer much advantage. Even if you think about people who are color blind, these still don’t do much.
What is so odd, though, is that while Disney World is spending all this cash on new road signs of limited increased value (if any), the trams that pickup guests in the parking lots are still sitting still everywhere except Magic Kingdom. It’s freezing today in Orlando, but guests are stuck trekking the entire expanse of Animal Kingdom, Hollywood Studios, and Epcot parking lots without any help from a tram. Sure, it might be saving a ton of money for Bob Chapek, but this is getting silly. There’s literally no reason for the trams to not be helping people other than making spreadsheets look better… and there probably never was.
Walt Disney World went 644 days without operating parking lot courtesy trams pic.twitter.com/EQ1zEr8uLQ
— WDW News Today (@WDWNT) December 19, 2021
So at the same time that Disney is spending on new blue road signs (which I will admit, I like them), they’re not spending on helping grandmothers and expectant mothers by giving them a tram to ride from their vehicles. That’s the sort of prioritization that just doesn’t make sense. One item provides little extra reward, the other greatly changes the guest experience.
Bob, get the trams running.
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One capital expense does not equal another capital expense. You can say the signs are not necessary, but if they cancelled it, trams are still not going to return…. Yet.