Credit: Inside the MagicFrustration is growing at one Disney park as young parkgoers increasingly rent electric wheelchairs for their own comfort, causing chaos for their fellow guests.
For accessibility reasons, Disney parks across the globe allow for an array of aids to support those unable to complete a 20,000-step park day on foot. At Walt Disney World and Disneyland, electric scooters (AKA Electric Conveyance Vehicles, or ECVs) and wheelchairs are available for rental at the parks, while Disneyland Paris rents out wheelchairs, and external companies provide scooters.
Electric Wheelchairs Cause Chaos at Disney Park
A report from Shanghai Disneyland claims that these young parkgoers are renting electric wheelchairs “as a means of transportation in the park, driving around the park with laughter, and even playing ‘bumper cars.'”
According to the Yangtse Evening Post, this issue stems from the fact that businesses near the park are providing electric wheelchair rental services and, in order to deal with the inspection when entering Shanghai Disneyland, they can provide an “inspection form” that will ensure they’re given access.
The Shanghai Disneyland website states that electric wheelchairs are “to be used only for the purposes of carrying guests with assisted mobility needs due to disability, advanced age or relevant medical conditions.”
Guests are not happy about this latest trend at the park, with the Yangtse Evening Post quoting recent visitors as complaining that “I originally brought my children to Disneyland to enjoy a happy parent-child time, but I didn’t expect these electric wheelchairs to disrupt my plan,” and that “yesterday I was in a hurry to go to the toilet, jogging all the way, and when I turned at the back door of Sweetheart, several electric wheelchairs rushed out and blocked the road!”
Electric wheelchairs are a huge help to guests with mobility issues because, as we all know, navigating a Disney park is no small feat. Shanghai Disneyland—home to the newly opened Zootopia Land, Toy Story Land, TRON Lightcycle Power Run, and Pirates of the Caribbean: Battle for the Sunken Treasure—is Disney’s biggest “castle park,” spanning 963 acres. That’s 11 times the size of the OG Disneyland Park in Anaheim.
However, the rampant use of electric wheelchairs as a theme park “hack” (as is apparently the term used to refer to them by Shanghai Disneyland guests recently) or a fun extra not only wastes resources but also hinders those who genuinely need them. Not to mention, providing false certification for a wheelchair may technically be illegal.
Yangtse Evening Post spoke to a rental service near Shanghai Disneyland, which claimed that it can provide a “checklist” to help guests bypass the necessity checks at the park entrance. “Disney staff sometimes check and sometimes don’t. If they do, the list we provide can come in handy,” they said. “In fact, many tourists who rent electric wheelchairs are healthy young people who just want to walk less.”
A similar phenomenon occurred at the Disney park several years ago when guests rented wagons and stroller wagons to transport their children around the park. These were ultimately banned in 2023.
Likewise, there was a trend of “no-queue service” providers, who would use disability certificates to sell guests the ability to skip the lines for 400 to 500 yuan ($55.20 to $69 USD) per person. Perpetrators were later arrested.
We’ve previously seen complaints about the use of electric scooters at Disney World and Disneyland, with guests calling for stricter rules – such as requiring a short safety course or a learning permit or introducing a speed limit – to reduce the number of accidents they cause in the parks.
Reports include guests being knocked over and ran over, including a five-year-old who was dragged along the ground by a scooter at Disneyland in August.
Do you think it’s wrong for guests to rent electric wheelchairs when they don’t need them?