Dealing with the Walt Disney World buses from a wheelchair perspective.

      Like most people, we like to take vacations every once in a while. This can prove to be quite difficult since I'm in a wheelchair/power wheelchair. You see, I have rheumatoid arthritis, and it's difficult to get around some places.

     Up until a couple of years ago, we limited our vacations to places like Chicago, but we decided that we wanted to go somewhere else. Since both of us hadn't been to Walt Disney World in years, we decided that we would go there. We went in 2008 and 2009, and both time we stayed in the All Star Music Hotel. This hotel is between the All Star Movies Resort and All Star Sports Resort.

      After we made our reservations, we immediately started reading up on how to get around the different parks while being disabled. While I found many helpful pages of information on this subject, it was still different getting to experience it firsthand. Something that I didn't read about in the information that I found ahead of time was what to expect when getting to the parks from our hotel

     We aren't usually morning people, but we had planned to have Character Breakfasts at different places so that we would be sure to get up at a decent hour and be able to make the most of our day in whatever park that we were visiting that day. Some days, we got to sleep in later than others.

      After getting dressed and covering ourselves really well in sunblock, we were on our way to the front of our hotel to await a bus to take us to a park for the day. Waiting times for a bus varied depending on what time of day it was, if the park had “ Disney World Extra Magic Hours”. This is where on designated days, a Walt Disney World theme park will be open an hour early and/or three hours later for Disney Resort guests only. If the park had Extra Magic Hours during the morning, the line for that particular park was really busy first thing in the morning. We usually chose to go to the parks that had Extra Magic Hours in the evenings unless we had dining plans at another park. Anyway, back to waiting in line for a bus.

      Each park has a different line where park goers wait for a bus. That line then has two different “lines”; one for wheelchairs and another for non-disabled people. For the most part, we were usually the only ones waiting at the wheelchair line. However, once or twice there were other disabled visitors waiting as well. For the most part, these visitors were friendly, but there were a couple of occasions where the visitors were not so friendly. One time I recall, this lady, her husband (who was in a wheelchair), and the rest of their group were down at the non-disabled area. However, once we showed up and took our place at the front of the “wheelchair line”, she immediately came over and told us in a not so friendly way that her husband was ahead of us in line. We shrugged it off and continued to wait. Once the bus showed up, her and her husband hurried in front of us and made sure they got on the bus first. There was only one spot for a wheelchair to be tied down (there are two in each bus) on this particular bus since there was already a disabled person tied down. She looked at us and again in her not so friendly voice told us that we were going to have to wait for the next bus, because they were taking the vacant wheelchair “seat”. Again, we just shrugged it off and waited for the next bus.

      Let me tell you about the Walt Disney World buses. They're pretty neat. We noticed that there are two different kinds of buses that pick up park goers and take them to the parks. There are older ones that have steps in the back of the bus and the driver (or Walt Disney Cast Member) has to push buttons (or something like that) to make them straighten out into a ramp for a wheelchair to board the bus. There are also newer ones that have a “kneel” down and have a ramp that folds down (once again by the doings of the bus driver) for the wheelchair to get aboard the bus. Both buses are pretty cool, but I think I liked the newer buses better. But that didn't matter, just as long as we got to the park to begin our day of fun and memories.

      As I mentioned previously, the bus has two tie-down spots for wheelchairs, power chairs, scooters, or whatever vehicle the disabled person travels in. They are “hidden” under normal seats. These seats fold up for the disabled person's vehicle to be tied down for the ride. If a park goer is sitting in these seats, they have to give their seat up for a disabled person to get on board. I thought this was pretty neat. I have to admit that I kinda felt bad about “taking” someone's seat.

      Once the bus arrives at our hotel and in the correct park line, it's time to get aboard. Well, first, if there are people on the bus that are getting off the bus to go into the hotel, they are let off first. Once they are off, then if there are disabled people waiting to board, the driver has to shut the front doors of the bus so that nobody gets on while the disabled person(s) are being loaded and tied-down. Once the handicapped people and their vehicle(s) are tied down securely, the driver goes back to the front of the bus and opens the front doors to let everybody else on board the bus. Within mere minutes, the bus fills up and everyone is ready to go to the park for some family fun.

      The bus ride to the park is a loud one. There are a lot of little kids that are talking about meeting Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and all of the other Disney characters and also adults planning out their day at the park. The ride can also be a bumpy one. One time, I was apparently not tied down well and the driver did a really wide turn and I almost landed on my side. To say that I was freaked out would be an understatement. From that point on, my fiance 1) made sure that I was tied down pretty well, and 2) stood at my right side and positioned himself to where if I tilted at all, he could push against me and keep me upright.

      The All-Star hotels are pretty far away from the parks, so the bus ride can last anywhere from fifteen to thirty minutes. Sometimes it's more, sometimes it's less, depending on the driver and the traffic too.

      Once at the park, the bus goes to the waiting area to unload us passengers. Once the bus comes to a stop, both the front and back doors are open to let the non-disabled passengers off. Once they are off, the driver comes to the back where us tied down passengers are eagerly waiting to get off of the bus. It takes less time to unhook the straps from the vehicles than it did to strap them, which is fine by me, because by this time, we are more than ready to start our day of fun at the park.

Arbitrary but astounding facts:
Walt Disney World has right at 300 buses.
The Walt Disney World bus fleet travels 15 million miles every year!!

Sarah