Need a ride to Holiday World?

Paula just posted this. I think it is a great idea! It saves gas and will probably increase attendance to the park and help the bus company make some money as well. Talk about a win-win-win situation.

I had to switch to IE to fix the link... *** Edited 6/14/2008 11:07:26 PM UTC by a_hoffman50***

From Nashville, it's a 166 mile drive to Holiday World. That's 332 miles round trip. I would venture to guess that most vehicles could do that on 1 tank of gas. Let's pick a gas guzzler. So a Chevy Tahoe's gas tank is 26 gallons. Here's the math for a family of four:

2 parents and 2 kid tickets on the bus: $261 total.

2 parents and 2 kid tickets to Holiday World @ gate price: $139.80 + gas for Tahoe @ $4 per gallon X 26 gallons = $104

$139.80+ 104= $243.80 total.

I don't see this being that popular. If it's cheaper to drive my gas guzzler, and I don't have to deal with a bunch of morons on a bus, I'll take the gas guzzler every day of the week.

It isn't that great a of a deal but not having to drive yourself may be worth the extra $20 to some.

I'd like to point out that the reservations page isn't secure. Not cool.

^^ Yes. It's one of the very reasons I utilize Disney transportation every time I visit. It's absolutely WONDERFUL to not have to drive back to a hotel after a long day there, even if you have to deal with the bus lines and the people on them, etc..

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Jeff Young said:
Here's the math for a family of four:

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I swear it brings a tear to my eye.

You guys make me so proud. :)

Gonch is training minions!! Heaven help us! I will admit that I did not do the math. But if I were going by myself or with another person to HW and lived near a pick up location, I would probably use this. I could see them making money from having a season passholder price as well.

When I was very young kid, the family was in Florida at Disney, and my parents planned our vacation there to line up with a space shuttle launch. From Orlando, we took a bus over to Cape Canaveral/Kennedy. I believe it was the "Rabbit Bus Company." This bus ended up not having any air conditioning, so it was about 85 degrees or so on the bus. It takes a little over an hour to get there by car, but on the bus, it took 3 hours. 3 hours in an un-air-conditioned bus to see the shuttle sit there, because the weather didn't cooperate either.

I'm not saying that this is what the bus from Nashville is going to be like, but this is why I'd rather drive myself, especially if it's only a 2 hour drive.

In addition, it only runs on Wednesdays and Sundays. I wonder how something like this could make a difference on Holiday World's 2nd day business from Nashville. If you take the bus, you can't come back for a 2nd day for $19, because the bus doesn't run then. You'd have to stay through Wednesday, which would be a long time to spend in Santa Claus.

^Take HW's total attendance for a year. Then subtract all the people who don't come from the Nashville market. Then subtract all the people from the Nashville market who are coming on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Then subtract all of those people not interested in a 2 day stay. The subtract all of those people left who would not be interested in this kind of service anyway. I'm guessing you're not left with a huge number.

Anyway, I think this is a pretty interesting thing HW is trying out here. I'm guessing they did some market research and surveying and found some significant negative sentiment regarding gas prices in this market. Should be interesting to see how popular it is.

I have to agree that most vehicles could do this trip on a single tank of gas.

The hour of the morning when the buses leave is the thing that got me. The first location listed leaves at 4:45 a.m. in the morning and returns at 10:30 p.m.! I can't see many takers for that as HW isn't that big of a place (yet).

The last location listed leaves at 6:30 a.m. in the morning and returns at 9:00 p.m. Now we're starting to get a little bit closer to approaching what I could tolerate for a themepark trip.

The only appeal I could see for the bus is if you don't want to do the grueling drive back and forth since you've got to add an hour on the way back.

No you don't, IntaminFan. Nashville is on central time, just like Santa Claus.

At least, I hope we're on central time. Otherwise I've been a hour early to everything I've done for the last four years.

http://www.copd-support1.com/graphic/usa-map-text.png

I did the math on this as well, and like Jeff Young points out, price wise it is not really the best deal in the world, especially if you are the pickup location at 4:30 AM (rather inconvenient). Although, for people making a solo trip or with only one other person, it would in the long run save a few bucks, at the expense of convenience.

I would say that it could be a good way to get teens in this market who are unable to drive or who's parents aren't keen on a 300+ mile road trip, but it says you must be/must be with someone 18 or older. I'm skeptical, but hopefully this will work out for the park.

Ah, right you are. I neglected to drop back an hour once you're around the Mammoth Caves area. That really threw us for a loop (so to speak) when we visited the caves and then went down to Beech Bend. I saw the little brown sign and resigned myself to defeat:)

It was only a week-long trip, but we kept passing back and forth through Eastern and Central Time far too many times. That was one of two surprise time zone changes on the trip.

The first one happened when we left from SFGAM and headed to Indiana Beach which is on Eastern Time. It wasn't until I saw a bank clock in town and then looked at my phone that I realized it!

You have to understand for those of us who've lived on the East Coast our whole lives, that the split time-zone concept in the same state is strange. We only change our clocks twice a year.

Huh, I could ride my bike to one of the pickup locations (5 miles from my house).
I have to say it's pretty cool that for $68 bucks I could be whisked away directly to Holiday World twice a week. I wish them luck.

I would just rather drive anyway, but if I lived in Nashville I would consider it. :)

-Tina

This would be good deal, for teens, and people who do not/cannot drive.