Refurbishment of Test Track – Week 8

After a long and hectic spring break, Test Track has finally closed down for refurbishment. Disney is hoping that Test Track would be back up by Thanksgiving and if not at least by Christmas. If only I was here in Disney until the end of the year since I am very eager to see how it would look after refurbishment is done. Test Track was the second most popular attraction here in Epcot and I must admit, it’s one of my favorite rides in all of Disney. Many would agree that no matter how many times you ride it, you would still love it. Fortunately, some of us get to ride this ride one last time before the building was handed over to the Emagineers of Disney.

Ever since Test Track been down, Epcot attractions has taken a big hit. It helped me realized how many guests would come from different parts of the world just to ride it. It’s very hard to disappoint a guests after they’ve traveled so far and the worst part is, there’s nothing we could do to make up for the inconvenience. Soaring has always been the busiest attraction in Epcot, Fast pass for Soaring would usually run out by noon, one in the afternoon IF you’re lucky. Now that Test Track is gone, we can’t even give a no strings attach for soaring since that’s the attraction all the guests runs to first. Due to the high demands for Soaring, their closing time has changed to ten at night while all other attractions continues to close at nine.

Besides dealing with the disappointed guests who can’t get on Test Track, we cast members also suffered a major loss of hours. It takes quite a number of cast members to run Test Track and now that it’s down, Disney has spread them out to other attractions. Now each attraction is over staffed and hours been cut. The only way for anyone to get more hours is for one to cross train in another attraction and I think I might sign myself up for cross training in Mission Space.