Although they haven’t officially announced either project yet, Walt Disney World is making plans to add both a gondola system and autonomous shuttles to its transportation system. With a new listing on the company’s career page, it’s evident the company is placing new emphasis on strengthening the role of efficient transportation at the resort.
If you’re an urban planning expert with an emphasis on transportation, your dream job just opened up at Walt Disney World. Imagineering is now hiring a Master Planning Principal – Transportation Planner/Engineer. The position will help create and collaboratively managed a long-term solution to Walt Disney World’s growing transportation needs. The goal is to integrate transportation at the resort into a seamless, immersive experience for guests while still delivering a fiscally responsible and effective system.
Here’s the full posting from the Disney Careers website:
Walt Disney Imagineering (WDI) is the master planning, creative development, design, engineering, production, project management, and research & development arm of Disney’s Parks and Resorts business segment. Representing more than 150 disciplines, its talented corps of Imagineers is responsible for the creation of Disney resorts, theme parks and attractions, hotels, water parks, real estate developments, regional entertainment venues, cruise ships and new media technology projects. The WDI mission is to create magical Disney experiences around the world that provide opportunities for friends and families to spend time together . . . making memories that last a lifetime. At WDI we think happy people make the world a better place.
Within WDI, the globally focused Menu and Master Planning Studio is entrusted to produce, focus and advance planning and development strategies to best drive Walt Disney Parks and Resorts (WDPR) long-term development objectives. As part of this group, the regional Master Planning studios drive the planning vision which promotes the full development potential of each resort portfolio and future business opportunity. The Atlantic Region Master Planning team is specifically charged with enabling smart growth at Walt Disney World (WDW) by contributing land development, infrastructure and real estate expertise to the master planning and project development processes, and providing stewardship for its existing destination resorts and planned communities. Areas of expertise include;
- Transportation and multimodal systems analysis and planning
- Comprehensive land use planning and data management
- Land use/development entitlements acquisition and management
- Commercial real estate transaction support
- Interface and relationship management with local and regional regulatory agencies
- Environmental planning, stewardship and sustainability best practices
- Special projects & new business development support
As part of this mission, the Atlantic Region Master Planning team has been given the responsibility of creating and collaboratively managing a long-term transportation planning process at Walt Disney World; its stated mission is to integrate transportation into a seamless, immersive resort experience for resort guests while still delivering a fiscally responsible and sustainable system. To accomplish this, we have identified a need to fill the principal level Transportation Planner position with a technically accomplished, highly creative and collaboration-minded candidate who has experience in all aspects of transportation infrastructure development including transit and roadway planning and design, bicycle and pedestrian facilities planning and integration of transportation planning with land use and environmental documentation.
Responsibilities
Responsibilities of this position include;
- Leading a cross-functional/inter-disciplinary team tasked to develop and deliver on strategic planning initiatives and long-term goals as well as short-range tactical projects,
- Participation on and management of the WDW Transportation Master Plan Steering Committee which is responsible for transportation planning decisions,
- Direction and supervision of the development of transportation modeling tools currently underway;
– WDW sub-area demand models (CUBE and PTV Visum)
– Property-wide micro-simulation models (PTV Vissim) - Evaluation of transportation improvement strategies for both roadway infrastructure, expanded Guest transportation systems and new, innovative transportation solutions that meet the goals and objectives of improved Guest experience at WDW.
- Coordination-in partnership with WDW Government Relations teams-with external public agencies that impact transportation and land use/development decisions in the surrounding region (RCID, Orange & Osceola Counties, FDOT/FHWA, LYNX, Central Florida Expressway Authority, MetroPlan Orlando, etc.)
In addition to the above, this position will have the following responsibilities as part of the Atlantic Region Master Planning team’s core mission;
- Coordination with internal and external partners including WDI Project Management, Project Controls and Creative teams, WDW Transportation Operations, WDW Facilities and Operations Services/Facility Asset Management, WDW Industrial Engineering/Planning Analytics, Finance and Legal teams as well as governmental agencies and private developers
- Entitlement support and sustainment activities including permit coordination and amendments to legal documents, representation in negotiations, etc.
- Development of scope, preliminary schedule and estimates/budgets, contract initiation and procurement associated with the transportation planning process, including outside consultants
- Procurement, direction and management of outside planning and engineering consultants, contractors, etc.
- Provide development feasibility analysis for projects within WDW resorts and attractions portfolio with a particular focus on transportation and infrastructure planning
- Interface with WDI, WDW and RCID financial planning cycles as it relates to transportation and infrastructure planning
Education requirements call for a BA/BS in Urban Planning and some additional experience. In a previous life, I would have loved this job. How about you?
Definitely.
This is much needed, and frankly I’m surprised that (if) this position hasn’t existed for longer. Transportation within the World is such a (problematic) part of the overall Guest Experience.
…and bendy-busses are not the solution
Disney does not need the double busses. They need to lower their prices just my view lol
It is refreshing to hear that transportation is a focus as it seems like getting around “the world” is not the efficient experience it once was. Changes to road infrastructure like the current project on World Drive are moves in a good direction, but the key is how to move guests around other than by bus. I recall back in the 70s and 80s when the monorail was a sight to see, but has since become inefficient and the current monorail trains have gone from futuristic to fatigued and are well past their life expectancy and it shows. There are certain spots to avoid sitting just to avoid getting dripped on from air conditioning condensation. Hopefully good things are coming that will bring back the fun to getting around.
The concept is great, however what if there are high winds and bad weather as Florida often has? The system would be shut down and people are stuck on the gondola. How would they be able to get off safely? I see lots of lawsuits if that happens! And then there’s the amount of time it would take to get from one destination to another. It already takes forever on the buses. There has to be a better, less expensive monorail system out there.
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