Industrial Engineer at Disneyland and Tian Tan Buddha Visit

Background:
The Hong Kong Disneyland project was announced in November 1999 as a venture between The Walt Disney Company and the Hong Kong Government. With the completion of reclamation for Hong Kong Disneyland Phase I by the Hong Kong Government, Disney has begun construction in January 2003 with the project scheduled to open in 2005 or 2006.

My wife and I joined a Technical Visit to Hong Kong Disneyland organized by The Institute of Industrial Engineers (Hong Kong) (IIE-HK) on 23rd April 2009. Industrial engineers of Disneyland gave us a briefing on their achievements for process improvement, logistics and capacity management.

Disneyland MTR station and train have a special design.
My wife and I took a photo inside the train.


Platform is different from other MTR station.

Dr Chin, Dr. Tsang, my wife and I took a photo in front of Disneyland. We were representatives of Hong Kong Society for Quality (HKSQ) to join IIE technical visit.

Mr. Ken Leung (Industrial Engineer – Disneyland) introduced the role of Industrial Engineer (IE) in Disneyland. IE works as internal business consultant and a bridge to link up management and operation. They promote good idea and usually express it in terms of Return on Investment (ROI).

IE products and services includes
- Capacity / demand analysis
- Measurement & analysis
- Operations planning
- Process design & improvement
- Tool creation & transfer
- Decision & simulation modeling
- Work standards generation
- Resort expansion planning & support

IE career ladder in Disneyland is from IE assistant to Manager of IE. The ratio of soft skill required to technical skill would be increased through the career ladder.

There are four types of skill to be concerned. They are “Consulting”, “Technical”, “Relationship” and “Leadership”.

Mr. Harry Li (IIE President) presented a souvenir to Mr. Ken Leung.

After that we had site visit. We were separated with two teams.

Ms. Rosalyn Woo (Industrial Engineer – Disneyland) led a team including HKSQ ex-co members. When we passed “Costuming Dept”, Ms. Woo explained the RFID have just been employed for inventory control in order to reduce cycle time and material loss. They have more than hundred thousand items in the Dept.

Mr. Ken Leung led the other team.

The Sleeping Beauty Castle

We asked why Disney didn’t use digital display for actions. Rosalyn explained the theme park presenting an old era.

Then we went to “TOMORROWLAND”.

We saw “BUZZ LIGHTYEAR”!

FASTPASS mechanism was introduced by using which guest could have better planning for their visit. Thus, better experience in the park would be obtained. The time period shown on the FASTPASS display would be renewed every 5 minutes.

Cyber Toilet Design

Then we visited SPACE MOUNTAIN and studied their queue management and design.

Oh! Stitch!

Interested Car

Dr. Melon is a funny guy.

Then we left Disney and took a group photo.

After the visit in Hong Kong Disney, my wife and I went to take Ngong Ping 360 Cable Car. It was the advertisement of Crystal Cabin.

The station of Cable Car

The price of Cable Car Round Trip is HK$96 per person but Crystal Cabin costs HK$157.

On that day, few people were queued for the cable car. My wife and I enjoyed private cabin service (officially it costs HK$2400!!!)

We observed an engineer in a maintenance cable car. It seemed so dangerous.

After that, we went to Tian Tan Buddha Statue (Big Buddha) through Ngong Ping Village.

We saw Nature Centre.

Walking with Buddha

Ngong Ping Village toward Big Buddha

Introduction of Big Buddha

We walked up the long stairs to reach Big Buddha

Some followers sculpture

Tian Tan Buddha

Po Lin Monastery (Opposite to Big Buddha)

The photo was taken for visitors in Cable Car by auto-camera installed in Ngong Ping 360 station.