An Illuminating Day

Our student pairs have done great work with our daily blog posts.  Each pair has written three posts, and we hope you have enjoyed their descriptions of our group’s experiences over the past few weeks.  For the final three posts, the professors will take a turn at the keyboard.

We have been remarkably impressed with this group of students.  They are cooperative, inquisitive friendly, and eager to learn.  Their curiosity has led the group to investigate a number of aspects of Walt Disney World.  All students have been involved with collecting data in lots of ways, in analyzing that data, and in the preparation of findings.  In these last three blog posts, we will describe three of the projects that have resulted from their work.  (Don’t worry, we will also tell stories about our experiences on these days, too!)

Single Riders?

One of the things that the group has investigated involves what Disney calls “single rider lines” at some of its most popular attractions.  When a ride has its seats arranged in pairs, then it is often the case that odd-sized parties can be completed by pulling from the single rider line (which is made up of people who don’t mind riding by themselves, or actually, with strangers).  Our students are investigating several issues related to this type of situation (for instance, when it is advantageous to try the single rider line as opposed to the regular line).  The students collected lots of data in a variety of interesting ways -- and this caught the attention of many other park guests.   We were certainly proud of their creativity and their persistence.  Fortunately, their work (which was all perfectly legal) did not get the attention of Disney security!

A Blast of a Day

Today started with a little “probability by the pool” as Dr. Hutson met with a group of students to discuss some of the probability ideas relating to the single rider line project. 

After that, the group loaded up and headed over to Epcot to meet with another Disney cast member -- one that one of our students knew from home.  This cast member had spent a number of years working in the pyrotechnics division of the Illuminations nighttime show at Epcot, and he had arranged for one of the show’s directors to give us a backstage tour of the Illuminations setup area.  We learned a great deal about the complexity of the show’s setup, execution, and take down.  We got some very close up views of the huge globe that is the centerpiece of the show as well as a rare look at the inferno barge that was out of the water for routine maintenance.  We were also treated to a peek inside the show’s control room, which is hidden inside a tower in the Mexico pavilion.  Since photographs are not allowed in backstage areas, this exterior shot of Mexico will have to suffice as a memento of our fun time in the control room, marked by the small window peeking over at the top of the decorative stairs going up the building.

Whenever you see an amazing fireworks display, we learned that it's nice to show your appreciation to the unseen pyrotechnicians who safely prep the show for the guests by cheering loudly afterwards.  Next time we're watching Illuminations at Epcot, we'll be sure to applaud the efforts of these dedicated experts after a great show!

Just as we were about to head to lunch, the bottom dropped out of the sky and the rain started to fall -- hard. We delayed by riding the Gran Fiesta ride in Mexico (our group filled an entire boat), but the rain kept coming.  We decided to brave it and so we dashed over to the Land Pavilion for a nice lunch together.

We returned to the hotel for the students to have some work time, and they made the best of that.  After dinner, a small group went over to Downtown Disney for some shopping and snack finding.  The van rides to and from our destinations continue to be sources of great entertainment.  As various songs from students’ playlists play through the speakers, you never know who you will see dancing, singing, or playing air drums!

Everest and Animals and Everything Else

We all woke up bright and early Thursday morning for our backstage safari tour of Animal Kingdom.  The main function of the tour was to show us how Disney maintains all of the animals on property given that most of them in the wild would require miles of space to be able to live.  After slipping backstage, we saw how they manage each animal according to its species.   For example, giraffes have a specialized two-story building where they sleep at night, whereas monkeys have to live in a bunker-like structure because they are clever enough to escape the habitats of similar-size animals.  Each animal sleeps backstage in their enclosures rather than in the actual safari, and while they’re in the safari, Disney uses a combination of natural and artificial barriers to keep some animals separated from others.  For example, the lions are surrounded by a moat not visible to people on the Kilimanjaro Safari so that they are unable to reach the zebras.  Another such example is how they use cattle guards—pipes that require a dexterity level greater than that of cows in order to be crossed—to deter animals from leaving their section of the safari and entering that of another animal.

My (Jamey) personal highlight of the tour was being able to stand about five feet away from a 3,000 pound white rhino.  Probably the closest I’ll ever be to one (here’s hoping).  One thing I learned on the trip was that black rhinos have a problem with iron absorption.  They absorb so much of it that the iron concentration in their bloodstream can actually kill them when they are housed in zoos.  Disney circumvents this problem by giving them phlebotomies regularly, thus keeping their iron levels down and the rhinos healthy.  We also saw the skull of an American Lion, which I previously had not known to have existed, apparently the biggest of all the cats before going extinct approximately 11,000 years ago.

After the backstage tour, we began collecting data for ride output and average party size for Expedition Everest, and we also collected data on how many people Disney puts on each raft for the Kali River Rapids.  For Everest, what we’re doing is spacing ourselves out every ten people in the single rider line and then recording data on both the posted standby time, posted single-rider time, actual time in line, and then the average amount of people per party in the regular standby line, with hopes that we can eventually calculate the benefit of riding single-rider and also the throughput for Expedition Everest.  This, of course, required that we ride the roller coaster several times, but we put up with it in the name of statistical analysis.  We got lots of interesting looks from fellow riders as we craned our necks to see how many people were in each party and as we recorded information on our tablets and notebooks, and people inevitably asked us what we were doing.  Jordan got so tired of explaining the trip that he eventually resorted to telling people he was working for NASA or that he designed the ride.

For Kali River Rapids, we stood on the bridge overhanging the ride and counted how many people were seated in each raft so that we might eventually see how many people Disney is not fitting per ride in terms of capacity, then comparing the theoretical optimal output of the ride with the actual output which we observed.

We are making headway on the Magic Kingdom algorithm; before long, we should have it up and running and showing us the optimal touring plan for the park.  We have begun data collection on our new project of examining single rider lines and average throughput, but we still have (get) to collect data on Test Track, Rockin’ Roller Coaster, and Tower of Terror.  Today we made good progress; hopefully tomorrow we might notice some peculiar trend in the data and perhaps get some insight from it.  We’re waking up early tomorrow for our Epcot tour, tomorrow will be a busy day.  Oh yeah, and Stella almost died stepping out of the Backstage Safari van.

Jamey and Joey

(We apologize for this post being delayed!  Our internet WiFi went down yesterday and this morning and we had a full day at the parks!  This is the post from Thursday May 29.)

Around the World in 14 Hours

World Travelers Stylin'

Hello! Jordan and Annie here to update you on our activities for Wednesday, May 21^st. We spent a full day in Epcot today with lots to report!

Fun with Mickey!

Behind the Seeds

35 Pound Winter Melons

We began the day with a look "Behind the Seeds" of Disney's greenhouses, where they grow a variety of plants and animals for both decoration and food. Our very knowledgeable tour guide, Jake, led us through greenhouses connected to the Living with the Land boat ride as well as through several "backstage" greenhouses that contained a wide range of both domestic and tropical specimens. In addition, we got to see Disney's Biotechnology Lab for Crop Improvement, cosponsored by the United States Department of Agriculture. In the lab, scientists were using a technique called tissue culture to produce thousands of plants without seeds, which is much faster and more efficient for mass production. Disney then uses many of these crops in restaurants throughout the parks and resorts. Yet even in their greenhouses, Disney always adds a little Disney magic... Giant tomato trees, Mickey Mouse-shaped cucumbers, and thirty five pound winter melons were just a few of the unique GMOs created in the lab. In addition, one of the greenhouses even contained a Mimosa Pudica (AKA Touch Me Not), which curled its leaves when touched. Overall, we really enjoyed the tour, which provided interesting information about scientific applications not commonly thought of in relation to Disney World.

Collecting Data

Data Collection Fun

Though the tour opened our eyes to the biology and chemistry associated with the greenhouses in Epcot, we were excited to get back to math and work on our project of creating a network map of the park. To do this, we needed a series of nodes, so each attraction in Epcot was marked as such. However, measuring the distance from every attraction to every other attraction in the entire park would be unbelievably time-consuming, so we took Len Testa’s advice of establishing (centralized) “way points” that one has to walk past in order to get to multiple attractions. In doing so, we minimized the number of edges in our network that we had to measure, since we could instead measure distances from attractions to only the four waypoints and other nearby attractions. Since measuring distances requires walking back and forth between attractions with a stopwatch, minimizing the edges (while still maintaining an effective model) is ideal. Thus, our morning at Epcot was spent timing the walk from way point to attraction, attraction to attraction, and way point to way point; of course, we were obligated to take breaks to ride some of our favorite rides (because walking past Test Track and Soarin’ all day without being drawn in for a ride, we learned, is near impossible). We each ended up with travel times for all of our predetermined edges, so our next step is to calculate an average time for each edge from our collective data to incorporate into our model.

Biergarten

After our long day of data collecting, we had a few hours of free time in the park before our group dinner reservation at Biergarten, a Germany-themed buffet in Epcot. Not only was the food delicious, but the restaurant is decorated so that the patrons feel as though they’re dining in a German, nighttime, outdoor setting, which of course would not be complete without live music. We loved being able to catch up on each other’s afternoon activities over a good meal in a fun setting.

Biergarten

 IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth

Following our delicious German meal, we remained together as a group to watch the IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth firework show, which occurs each night at 9 p.m. over the Epcot World Showcase Lagoon. A breath-taking display of fireworks, lasers, giant torches, and a giant globe that displayed beautiful images of locations all around the world dazzled viewers. We are looking forward to an exclusive, behind-the-scenes tour of the show toward the end of our trip, but, for now, we simply enjoyed the magic!

IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth

The Keys to a Mathemagical Adventure

Selfie by our tour guide with another cast member

Hayden and Rahul are back to give you the most recent updates from our mathemagical adventures. 

The Mouse

 

This morning we got to go “backstage” in Magic Kingdom on the Keys to the Kingdom tour given to us by our hilarious tour guide Megan. This signature Disney tour goes behind the magic of Disney World, explaining some of the little known history and secrets of the happiest place on earth. And lucky you, we’re going to share some of these “secrets” with you. One of the coolest parts of the tour was getting to explore part of the Utilidor; that’s right, the Magic Kingdom really does have secret underground tunnels! The Utilidor is the real ground level to the Magic Kingdom that is used by staff and cast members to help maintain the four keys to the Kingdom- safety, courtesy, show, and efficiency. Cast members and characters can use the Utilidor to travel across the park without being seen out of costume or in the wrong “land.” Maintenance use the corridors to quickly transport any require tools or equipment, and Reedy Creek Emergency Services (Disney has to provide their own emergency services due to its size and spread across two counties) can use the tunnels to quickly access guests in need without dealing with crowds above. Part of the Utilidor is also used to vacuum trash collected above into a tunnel that sucks the over 80,000 pounds of trash produced each day to backstage trash compactors.

Students take picture on tour

We also learned interesting new facts about some of the more visible “upstairs” Disney secrets. As you walk down Main Street, you may have noticed some of the writing on the stores’ upstairs windows; this is what Disney World considers its “credits.” When you first walk in and look above the Confectionery, you see Roy Disney’s name. Roy, Walt’s brother and partner, helped start Disney World, taking care of most of the business’s finances. Walt in on the other end of Main Street, above the Ice Cream Parlor since he had a nightly bowl of ice cream. We also learned about the cues they use to transition between the different lands, such as changes in the sidewalk color and texture, different music, changes in decorations, and some less obvious and more symbolic details. For example in Liberty Square, the light-colored stone path throughout this section of the park, symbolizes towns before plumbing where waste was thrown into the street. Each branch of the stone path leads to a bathroom, all of which are technically outside of Liberty Square and in the next land. This is just one of the many details that helps to make the “show” by bringing guests back to pre-twentieth century United States. Overall the tour was an incredible experience, that exposed the hard work and detailed ingenuity needed to create such a magical destination.

The Math
 

The tour was far from the end of our day. We had lunch at the park and then returned to our hotel. After a quick 20 minute break, we were back at work. We had previously been split up into groups and assigned to read mathematical papers and present on the mathematical models they described. These papers related to various problems faced at amusement parks like Disney: optimizing hotel reservations, golf tours and crowd flow.  These were peer reviewed papers published in respected journals, not aimed at undergraduate students. Mirroring last week, we, Hayden and Rahul, had contrasting yet similar experiences here. I, Hayden, am a rising sophomore Chemistry major, so before this I’ve had almost no experience reading mathematics journals. However, each of our groups included students with a wide range of experience with this type of work. Students like Rahul were able to explain some of the math notation and terminology that was new to me, so ultimately, I was able to fully understand the paper I had read. I, Rahul, am a rising senior Mathematics major, and have done Mathematical research both of my previous summers at Furman and have as a result have read a number of mathematical papers. However, reading a mathematics paper on an unfamiliar topic is always challenging, no matter your background, it took time and effort before I had any idea how the model worked. At the presentations today, it was clear that all three groups had put in a good deal of work and displayed a full understanding of the situations being modeled as well as the mathematics behind it: objective function being optimized, the variables and the constraints.

Planning locations of Waypoints

Now that we had shown that we had a solid grasp of how mathematical modeling worked, we finally began what we hope will be our primary project for the remainder of the course. We are going to create our own model for optimizing tours of Disney World. Like with any other project, the key is to start small. The first step is to gather data about a small segment of the park. We will use our data gathered from the Epcot Challenge last Friday as a starting point. We plan to gather more information tomorrow while visiting the park and will combine this with data scraped from the internet. Rather than trying to calculate travel time between every single attraction at the park, we created a set of “waypoints” on the map of Epcot which will form the nodes of our graph. We will only need to know the travel times to the central node. Other travel times can be computed with this data using, for example, Dijkstra's Algorithm. Another advantage of using such a system with waypoints is that it is easily expandable, thus making for a robust model.

The Fun
 

About half the group chose to stay at the hotel this evening, but the rest of us decided to venture back into Disney, this time to Hollywood Studios. This was mostly just for fun, although we did try to test out a few theories we had developed about wait times, with some success. We finished up the night watching the fantastic Fantasmic! show, featuring everything from fireworks and lights to costumed actors and animations projected onto sheets of water. As we left the park, we noticed cast members closing the gates to Tower of Terror and Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster. Just this morning, Megan had described Disney’s closing process of checking one attraction at a time and moving toward the main exit from there, and she assured us there was no way to hide out over night with this thorough shutdown plan. Dr. Harris, however, seemed to have taken this as a challenge and was working on an algorithm or two to solve this particular problem as we walked out.