Guests Frustrated as Disney Resort Blocks Off Access

in Disneyland Resort, Featured, Theme Parks

Tomorrowland in Disneyland Park

Credit: Disney

One of the most notable things about Walt Disney World Resort is its size. The Central Florida resort is more than 43 square miles — that is a lot of walking! That’s why there are so many modes of transportation, including the monorail, the Skyliner, buses, boats, and ferries.

Walt Disney World’s parking lots are so big that Disney has trams to take guests from the parking lot to the park entrance. However, guests visiting the Magic Kingdom must park at the Ticket & Transportation Center and then take a monorail or ferry.

A green and white monorail glides along an elevated track under a cloudy sky. In the foreground, a purple sign with the words "Magic Kingdom Monorail" and an illustration of the monorail indicates the entrance to the transportation system.
Credit: James N, Flickr

Related: What Are All the Different Transportation Options at Disney World?

Disneyland Resort, on the other hand, is not nearly as large as Disney World — covering only 500 acres in Anaheim, California. Disneyland could actually fit inside the Ticket and Transportation Center parking lot!

Now, there are benefits to Disneyland being so much smaller. Guests can park their car in the Mickey & Friends, Pixar, or Toy Story parking lots and then walk to the theme parks and the Downtown Disney District.

Of course, if guests want to save some steps, trams will take them from the Mickey & Friends and Pixar Parking lots to the entrance to Disneyland and Disney California Adventure, and buses will take them from the resort to the Toy Story parking lot.

Pixar Pals Parking Disneyland
Credit: Disney

Related: Disneyland Cast Members Drag Away Guests’ Cars

Every Disneyland guest has a preferred way of getting to the theme parks, Downtown Disney, and the Disneyland Resort hotels. It can be very frustrating when Disneyland makes their route more difficult, especially if there doesn’t seem to be a reason for it.

X (formerly Twitter) user @MHawk9955 recently visited The Happiest Place on Earth and noticed that Disneyland security really didn’t want guests walking through…. a parking lot. That’s right, Disneyland had actually put a security guard at the entrance to the parking lot. And it should be noted that this was not a backstage parking lot.

They put a security guard position here….so we don’t walk through a parking lot….

Related: Disneyland Fights To Keep Its Monopoly on Expensive Parking, Insider Reports

Based on the photo, it appears that guests were being prevented from walking through the Downtown Disney parking lot. There is a path that takes guests from the Pixar lot to Downtown Disney, and guests will typically shorten their walk by cutting through the Downtown Disney lot.

While some people understood why Disney didn’t want guests walking through its parking lots, others were confused, since the lot is not blocked off on a regular basis. It’s also the only lot that Disney appeared to care about guests walking through.

If you’re not a Disneyland local, for some reason Disney doesn’t want people walking through this parking lot, even though you already walk through another parking lot to get here. But people still walked through. First a sign, then a bench, and then another sign. Now a CM 😂

Of course, Disney could be concerned about guests putting themselves at risk by walking through a parking lot, but it should be noted that guests have to walk through various parking lots to get to the trams and security. Also, as we noted before, the lot is not blocked off every day, so guests are able to walk through the lot most of the time.

Others said that guests should just stick to the walking path that Disney put in, saying that cutting through the Downtown Disney lot doesn’t save that much time. However, it did seem a little over the top to put a cast member there to make sure guests didn’t go that way.

Do you think it was silly of Disney to post a cast member at a parking lot to prevent guests from walking there? Let us know in the comments!

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