Hi, Elizabeth! I think you have made an excellent choice to stay at Disney’s Port Orleans Resort – Riverside. Most of the resorts can be quite large, but they offer more amenities than Disney’s Value Resorts at a great price. In addition to complimentary bus service, the Sassagoula River Cruise is available to connect you with Disney Springs. My family loves to head to the water launch to visit the many dining and shopping venues at Disney Springs in the evening.
There are four bus stops within your Resort: the North Depot, East Depot, West Depot, and South Depot. You may zoom in to
this map to see the location of each bus stop. All of these bus stops feature Wait Time screens which display the current expected arrival times for each bus. I have found the system to be very accurate, but note there can be occasions when times change during your wait. In my experience, when a bus became full before all stops were reached, the bus driver has called to notify the dispatcher of which stop requires assistance.
The two Port Orleans Resorts do often share buses. If combined service is operating, the shared buses will call first at the French Quarter bus stop, then move on to the Riverside bus stops. Within Riverside, theme park buses stop at the West Depot first, then North Depot, East Depot, and finally the South Depot before departing for the park.
If you need to reach different areas of the resort or visit French Quarter, the Disney Springs bus also works as an Internal Shuttle. It calls first at French Quarter and then Riverside South Depot, West Depot, North Depot and East Depot, before looping back to French Quarter and heading to Disney Springs.
Elizabeth, I hope this information helps you understand the transportation at your resort. Please let us know if you have any other questions!
Brandy B.