Talk:Walt Disney World Monorail System

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[edit] Lagoon / Exterior

Edit #190100371 on 9 February 2008 by Mr. Voice uses incorrect justification for the edit. The editor wrote: "The lines have allways [sic] been officialy [sic] refered [sic] to as 'Express' and 'Resort' by the WDW staff and Company. 'Exterior' and 'Lagoon' were names used by non-Disney contractors and builders." This is a false statement (or at least only partially true). I don't know when the switch in terminology was made, but I do know that when I worked rails in 1998 the entire department always called the beams "Exterior" and "Lagoon". We would only say "Express" or "Resort" if we were talking to a guest. Although the official names for the service provided on each beam were indeed "Resort" and "Express", monorail cast members still called the beams "Lagoon" and "Exterior".

I have the drive training manual from the time as evidence, although this is not a public document which invalidates its citability. In any case, the beams were not called by their service names until recently. 69.94.193.193 (talk) 04:36, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I verify this as well. Many Monorail Operations Cast Members continue to refer to the lines as "Exterior" and "Lagoon". While not as popular as it once was, it is still a common designation by coordinators and trainers, especially those who have been in Monorails for some time. 69.69.226.24 (talk) 10:12, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Monorail cars

We could use alot more descriptions of the cars themselves and some good photos. Photos are a weak spot for Wiki. I don't see enough specs on the cars. I remember them having eight seats. Each seat had a door and held five people. Forty people. That was for the old cars. We should try to fix that up a little.69.122.62.231 (talk) 16:32, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

I have LOTS of information about the cars them self. if your interested let me know. Mr. Voice (talk) 04:03, 6 February 2008 (UTC)


I disagree with the original request. This page is for information specific to the WDW Monorail. Any information about the actual trains used, or the cars in them should be placed at the appropriate train page (Mark IV monorail or Mark VI monorail). Both pages are linked from this article, so please feel free to flesh them out with any information and photos you've got. --Maelwys (talk) 12:05, 6 February 2008 (UTC)


I have to say the request was valid. This article my be some what informative about the WDW monorail system, but after watching it for about 2 months now and reading all the comments on the discussion page(s) I have to say it lacks a lot of information. I have sat here and seen people get attacked and punished for trying to make helpful changes and add useful information. I have seen others get over looked for bringing nothing to this article but mundane drone information. This is not the only article to have such reactions. Wikipedia in a whole is an oddly run site. They make claim to be an encyclopedia, but then have their staff make comments such as "Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth." This is very disturbing since many people visit this site every day to find "truth" and "facts". How then are we supposed to know what is true and what is just some person's idea of the truth, or something they heard one day. Wikipedia says they want to verify everything, but what about when someone shows legitimate source, it seems they are told they can not post it. I am not saying any one person here is right or wrong. I just find it odd the way things are handled. To Maelwys, Try to look at things from the other persons view. There was nothing wrong with making a request about the monorail cars in a monorail article. No one was harmed, the site did not crash, all is well in the land of Nod. To the OP of this subject, You can finds thousands of facts about the monorail cars by doing a Google search. Good Luck Mr. Voice (talk) 02:53, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ridder info

I was watching Modern Marvels: Walt Disney World on the History Channel and they mentioned that the WDW monorail carries 50 million guest a year. I made the change in the article but not sure how to source link it since the info came from the TV. Any help please? Mr. Voice (talk) 20:33, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps it could be cited via the {{cite episode}} template? --Kralizec! (talk) 21:36, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Metros :) I was working on it but you got it first.  :) Mr. Voice (talk) 01:29, 14 April 2008 (UTC)


  • There seems to be a lot of trouble with these numbers, since we have several that simply don't match. From above, the monorail 'carries 50 million guests a year'. From somewhere else and now in the infobox, it carries 150,000 a day (almost 55 million a year). And from a source in the Disneyland article, they estimated that the 2007 attendance figures were: 17 Million visits to Magic Kingdom and 10.9 million to Epcot (which does definitely NOT add up to 50 million, especially considering that most people hit both parks at the same time, thanks to this monorail, so there's a lot of overlap in those numbers). The only way I can find to reconcile those numbers is that the 50-55M/year number isn't the number of people that rode it, it's the times that it was ridden. So if I go to the park and ride it 3 times in a day, I'm counted as 3 'guests' for purposes of the 50 million figure. Is there anyway that we can re-word the numbers to reflect this better (mainly, by removing the word 'guest', which I believe is what makes it misleading)? --Maelwys (talk) 14:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
Does the article mention the resort monorail? I'm not sure that it carries the extra 20 million needed to make the statement true however. --blm07 15:21, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
Sorry for the confusion. The 17 and 10.9 numbers above aren't specifically focussed on monorails at all, that's just the number of people who've visited the parks. And since the monorail only goes to the parks, I'd assumed that there aren't 20 million people a year that ride the monorail without going to one of the parks... ;-) --Maelwys (talk) 15:26, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
If you remove the word guest, then who is riding the monorail? But I think you are correct in that if one guest rides 3 times they are counted as 3 guest. However this does not change the facts at all. The monorail still transports that guest 3 times so it does the work of moving the equivalent of 3 guest. Disney can not keep track of which guest are repeat riders or not. they can only count how many people walk onto the train. That number equals 50(-55) million guest. A side note about your "I'd assumed that there aren't 20 million people a year that ride the monorail without going to one of the parks..." comment. Surprisingly there are lot's of monorail fans that will go to WDW and ONLY ride the monorail around for a few hours. I talk to many people on web boards that go to video the round trip and just enjoy the monorails. I am not saying that 20 million people do this, but it does happen. Probably a good 900- 1,000 people. Mr. Voice (talk) 05:36, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Third rail

I replaced the "third rail" comment with "Busbar" since 1) that is what maintenance calls it. and 2) since a monorail only runs on ONE rail, then there can not be a THIRD rail. Mr. Voice (talk) 05:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Guest Relations Edits.

What you call "rambling" is actually useful information. Mr. Voice (talk) 02:41, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

"Rambling" was actually a kind portrayal of this paragraph as it was, which was an evil stew of awkward phrasing, comma splices, run-on sentences, overuse of passive voice, and, as a cherry on the top, original research. It's fine to add information but none of us are perfect writers and we must accept when others clean up our mistakes. Jgm (talk) 03:29, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
I made a lot of those edits, and the thing just didn't read right. At the same time, the whole issue of the Resort line cab requests was taking up way too much space for what it is (essentially a "how-to" guide, something Wikipedia is not). I honestly don't know how the requests for the cab on the Resort line are handled, hence me adding the fact tag to my own edit. The Epcot and Express train info is pure logic; all guests must disembark at each station, regardless of where they're sitting. I'll see what I can find out from Resort line monorail cast members the next time I go, but I doubt seriously someone would be allowed to just stay there for more than the one lap from where they started. Yes, it could still be original research, but it'd be a start. Opinions? --McDoobAU93 (talk) 17:19, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
They undoubtedly have rules (written and unwritten) on how to handle the various I-wanna-ride-in-the-front situations. Trying to enumerate them in detail here doesn't add much to the reader's understanding of the Monorail System, though. I'd be happy to limit the section to noting the facts that:
  • there are a limited number of (okay, four) seats for riders in the pilot car;
  • access to these seats is handled by and is at the discretion of Disney workers (okay, "cast members" if we must);
  • front-car riders can get a souvenir card.
On the other hand I wouldn't really mind more details than this if they can be made readable and grammatically acceptable, and given its own section. Jgm (talk) 18:39, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
By which I meant, "Guest Relations" is an odd, insider term for a section title. I think I'll go ahead and change that aspect now. Jgm (talk) 18:50, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
I'm all for revising this article, but I think the Infrastructure section is way too thin. I expanded it a bit to add something of a timeline to it, and I have a picture of one of the Florida resident monorail tickets from Epcot's 25th Anniversary exhibit, if needed for verification.
Similarly, what's wrong with using "cast members," especially since it is wiki-linked and therefore can be explained? I agree that the "guest relations" term was awkward (yet, as mentioned, hardly unique) and the information was moved to a better section. --McDoobAU93 (talk) 21:24, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Different training

Obviously bus drivers and monorail drivers receive different training. I mean, how could you teach someone how to drive a bus and expect them to drive a monorail? --blm07 14:10, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

To me the bigger question is this: are the monorail pilots under the Disney Transport "umbrella" or are they separate entities within the resort? Bus drivers and train operators for mass transit systems like MARTA receive separate training, but are all employees of the same organization. Within Disney's organizational structure, are monorail pilots separate? --McDoobAU93 (talk) 17:02, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
I think the main point is that the CM's on monorails can drive a bus because they are most the time promoted from bus to monorail, but bus drivers can not drive monorails. In other words it's not the same as CM's who attend attractions how one CM may work the haunted Mansion one day and Small World the nest. Knotslanding (talk) 05:35, 13 June 2008 (UTC)