Park Hopping in 2021-What Would Juliana Do?

According to Disney, these modifications are designed to help manage attendance in a way that fosters physical distancing. But, I still have questions.

1. Let’s say the park to which I want to hop IS available for a Park Pass reservation for the first part of the day. When hopping becomes available at 2pm, I leave my first park, but by the time I get to park #2, park #2 ends up hitting capacity. Will I be turned away?
2. If I do get turned away and decide to go back to park #1, but park #1 hits capacity by the time I get back there, what happens? Can I not get back into my original park for the day?
3. If Disney is still operating under capacity restrictions at each park, but reservations are only required for your first park of the day, how can you avoid getting “locked out” of your top choices for the second part of the day, even if it was available to you when you left the first park?
4. Are we all going to end up in some sort of mad dash to the exits as 2pm approaches? What will this look like for crowds on transportation? How much time will I have to allow to park hop when considering social distancing and potentially large numbers of people trying to access transportation?
5. Let’s look at parks that are already at Park Pass Reservation capacity even before rope drop. We have seen Hollywood Studios, for example, sell out of reservations nearly every day. Does this mean we will never be able to hop to HS, since it is almost always already at capacity? And if people who start the day at HS decide to hop to another park, will HS potentially be LESS crowded in the afternoons? Will HS then open up for hopping to, even if it started the day at capacity?
6. Following this logic, let’s say people leave HS (or any park) and head to another park, but people who started their day in that second park choose not to hop elsewhere. That second park will end up even MORE crowded in the afternoon? Will we have to start planning our days around high crowd afternoons? In short, What are crowd trends going to look like even for non-hoppers?
7. What if I have a dinner reservation in my second choice park? Will I be guaranteed entry then? You know how I love to stay at a Boardwalk area hotel and have dinner at Epcot after a shorter day in another park. I know I’m not alone. Will Epcot end up too crowded in the evenings? Or will people who have in-park dinner reservations not be able to take the chance on Park Hopping.

These questions lead to another burning question: What Would Juliana Do?

Answer:

WAIT. WAIT to see how all of this plays out, and in the meantime, plan to visit one park each day. Believe me, I have faith in all things Disney. I usually trust that they know what they are doing, and they probably do here as well. They constantly collect and analyze  information to make our park experiences better. They’ve been doing it for decades. 

But these are unprecedented times. And I don’t know about you, but I miss precedence. I miss certainty. I may not be getting paid the big bucks, but I see potential flaws in this plan.  So if I were headed to WDW in January, I would hold off on the Park Hopping in 2021 for now. I would wait to see how well it works out. There is still plenty of Magic to be made visiting a single park per day, so I would stick with that plan. I am going to wait until any kinks are ironed out. 

Do you have any questions I didn’t consider about how this system will work? Do you see potential pitfalls? Let us know in the comments. And stay tuned as we follow the latest developments as this new system is implemented. We will certainly let you know how it goes.