The Spirited Seventh Heaven ...

[Cesar R M]

That's always been the problem. 1/2 zoo + 1/2 theme park != 1 Full Disney Theme Park.

The zoo stuff just isn't that good - there are regional zoos all over the country that do better. Even the Safari - "hey guys take a look at that as we zoom past as quickly as possible so the trucks behind us don't get backed up and we can get you folks on and off this as soon as possible so we can get you back where you know you want to be, shopping in a nice air conditioned store!".

Yes, the whole place is pretty - and the animals in prettier evironments, but when it comes to animal viewing and interaction, they simply are not impressive enough to draw folks in. Sure, some folks love it - but I don't think most guests who come to WDW are coming there for the limited animal viewing - they are coming to go to theme parks - if they want better animal experiences, chances are they live within one that's a day trip not a week-long vacation.

We have all this MM+ stuff to blame because it Disney didn't figure this out before they went ahead with it. To them, how could a Disney theme park itself be the problem? (Remember, this was pre-DCA.) So they assumed the "market was saturated" - and stopped investing in the parks, instead just trying to figure out how to squeeze even more out of the existing guests.

This beget the practices like feeding the addictions of the most..ardent supporters who are willing to pay hundreds of dollars to attend a "merchandise event" and then spend another thousand in there, etc. Let the mommies and the bloggers promote the place for you (yes, you can buy good publicity, cheaply even - it just takes some free theme park tickets, some cupcakes, and a room they weren't renting out that night any way. Finally, make the wet dream of an efficiency expert - MM+ ("Hey, to heck with this trying to predict guest flow stuff...let's just tell everyone where they can go when! We'll twist it into a "service" we are doing for them? I see bracelets, boys...I see lots and lots of plastic bracelets, with optional doo-dad add-ons we can sell separately. They will be paying us for the privilege! Duffy, eat your heart out!").

I honestly prefer the "Safari" than the Train.
While the stations are a nice touch.. you see very little in the train trip.

 

[PhotoDave219]

I was on Twitter and noticed that Jim Hill posted a new podcast so I decided to listen for some humor.

1. Steve Davison is working on a new show for Epcot to replace Illuminations, possibly as soon as 18 months from now.
2. DHS is getting a makeover, Star Wars is the first component.
3. Great Christmas light fight the new special ABC started doing last year will start to tie into the Osbourne lights.
4. Maelstrom is getting frozen
5. DHS will get a ratatouille type ride but its not ratatouille
6. Great Movie ride will be leaving
7. Star Wars construction could begins soon as January.
8. Universal is building a new 250 million dollar water park that is supposed to be better than Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach
9. Floating Mountains will be some of the best immersive work disney has ever done. That land will be one of the best Disney has ever done.
10. DHS will be getting a mix of A, B, C, and D tickets to make it a full park.
11. Tangled might replace Beauty and the Beast
12. Maelstrom redo starts Oct. 1st.
13. Echo Lake becomes Star Wars, Star Wars X- Wing spinner
14. Hollywood & Vine stay because of Disney Junior, Indiana Jones stays
15. Wilderness lodge is getting more DVC just like Spirit said only difference was Jim said the over water rooms would be cottages not Teepees.

That was it...

1 - Thats been rumored forever.
2 - Duh. Just not anytime soon.
3 - Clark Grizwald > Ozzy Osborne > Jennings Osborne.
4 - We knew that in January.
5 - "DHS is getting..." rumors have existed longer than I've lived here.
6 - Not. Gonna. Happen.
7 - Of either 2015, 2016, 2017 or 2018.
8 - We've heard that rumor too.
9 - Does that involve Christina Hendricks in a lazy river?
10 - See 1, 2, 5, 6 and 7.
11 - Ulla comes at 11.
12 - See 10.
13 - A Disjoined Star Wars area? Is he even reading his own stuff? Like seriously? I've seen better plans from Fapping fanboiz that refuse to stay over in the imagineering sections. (Back, BACK in the closet!)
14 - No, it stays because its on Hollywood Blvd., brings in a metric CoitalTon of money, fits the theme and essentially infrastructure with 50s Prime Time and doing anything to it would be utterly ridiculous.
15 - Spirit got the scoop last month.

 

[lentesta]

@lentesta is a member here.

Howdy!

FWIW, I can see Disney's logic for gutting GMR. The newest movie in any of the sets is Raiders (1981), right? 33 years ago? Most teenagers haven't seen any of them. It gets below-average scores from every reader demographic in the book. The best thing it has going for it is capacity, and that can be duplicated.

My biggest surprise in talking to Jim is the timeframe for DHS changes. I'd be surprised if it doesn't happen before 2020.

 

[Longhairbear]

We're staying at the Disneyland Hotel on DVC points this Oct. for gay days , as the DVC villas at VGC are always booked solid. We're hoping to run into friends in the theme park, and movie biz that might have some inside info of Star Wars. You get these guys cocktailed up at Trader Sam's, or at dinner at the Carthay in DCA and they tend to spill a few nuggets of intel.

 

[Darth Sidious]

1 - Thats been rumored forever.
2 - Duh. Just not anytime soon.
3 - Clark Grizwald > Ozzy Osborne > Jennings Osborne.
4 - We knew that in January.
5 - "DHS is getting..." rumors have existed longer than I've lived here.
6 - Not. Gonna. Happen.
7 - Of either 2015, 2016, 2017 or 2018.
8 - We've heard that rumor too.
9 - Does that involve Christina Hendricks in a lazy river?
10 - See 1, 2, 5, 6 and 7.
11 - Ulla comes at 11.
12 - See 10.
13 - A Disjoined Star Wars area? Is he even reading his own stuff? Like seriously? I've seen better plans from Fapping fanboiz that refuse to stay over in the imagineering sections. (Back, BACK in the closet!)
14 - No, it stays because its on Hollywood Blvd., brings in a metric CoitalTon of money, fits the theme and essentially infrastructure with 50s Prime Time and doing anything to it would be utterly ridiculous.
15 - Spirit got the scoop last month.

A few good ones in there haha, it was enjoyable.

 

[Darth Sidious]

Both Big Hero 6 and Guardians of the Galaxy can be used at WDW I believe.

Interesting thing I noticed is that the ABC Commissary noticeably does not display anything for Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. likely because of the name Marvel in the title. Now while screening GOTG at DHS they noticeably stripped the Marvel logo from all posters and the movie's logo. The Marvel logo is a big part of the MCU branding and they had to of removed it for contractural reasons. Even on the Disney Parks blog announcement for the screening they didn't mention Marvel but rather the studio that brought you Avengers. (though they did provide a link to marvel.com)

http://disneyparks.disney.go.com/bl...xy-sneak-peek-landing-in-disney-parks-july-4/

 

[the.dreamfinder]

@WDW1974 Speaking of DLR infrastructure and a "plan"... are they finally going to do something substantive with the resort infrastructure? New parking structure?

MiceChat recently reported that Disney has acquired the land behind the Pumbaa parking lot and they are planning to build a parking structure there with a stop on Anaheim's upcoming streetcar service.

http://micechat.com/72436-marvel-ous-plans-dca-diamonds-ahead-disneyland/
Theme Parking
There is some recent good news for parking, however. TDA has been working quietly to purchase additional land around the Resort, and for the most part they have been very successful. In a quiet transaction through a third party, Disney now owns the property directly to the north of the Pumbaa parking lot, which houses a business park currently home to a large US Immigration and Customs office. Now that this land is in Disney’s portfolio, they can move ahead on a joint project with the city of Anaheim to level that business park and combine it with the Pumbaa lot to build a large parking structure. The new structure would share its ground floor footprint with Anaheim’s planned streetcar tracks, a streetcar maintenance facility, and a streetcar station connected to Harbor Blvd., where the Park Vue Inn and IHOP currently stand. As TDA pieced together this land purchase, and a few others around the Toy Story lot over the last few months, they now have the extra land needed to rethink their current parking strategy for both visitors and Cast Members and build a larger complex of parking and transportation infrastructure, adding upwards of 10,000 spaces to their inventory within a few years.

 

[NJBrandon]

I think the most interesting thing that was left out in the post that detailed the conversation was that Avatar may only open with one ride and the other will open up 18 months later.

 

[AEfx]

Did Jim talk about how much he loves his press credential?

Lot of good it will do him with Disney, as I believe he is still banned from Disneyland.

 

[doctornick]

Roger Rabbit still pulls in significant wait times on a daily basis. It always hovers around the 30-45 minute wait limit. Compared to the other Fantasyland dark rides it could still be deemed "popular", I mean after all Pinocchio, Mr. Toad, and Snow White rarely make it past 15 minutes. I don't see them doing away with the ride entirely. It would fit perfectly in Hollywoodland.

RR does have FP though, unlike all of the FL rides you mention. This impacts the Standby wait times.

 

[NearTheEars]

1 - Thats been rumored forever.
2 - Duh. Just not anytime soon.
3 - Clark Grizwald > Ozzy Osborne > Jennings Osborne.
4 - We knew that in January.
5 - "DHS is getting..." rumors have existed longer than I've lived here.
6 - Not. Gonna. Happen.
7 - Of either 2015, 2016, 2017 or 2018.
8 - We've heard that rumor too.
9 - Does that involve Christina Hendricks in a lazy river?
10 - See 1, 2, 5, 6 and 7.
11 - Ulla comes at 11.
12 - See 10.
13 - A Disjoined Star Wars area? Is he even reading his own stuff? Like seriously? I've seen better plans from Fapping fanboiz that refuse to stay over in the imagineering sections. (Back, BACK in the closet!)
14 - No, it stays because its on Hollywood Blvd., brings in a metric CoitalTon of money, fits the theme and essentially infrastructure with 50s Prime Time and doing anything to it would be utterly ridiculous.
15 - Spirit got the scoop last month.

You No. 9 response is my favorite.

 

[lentesta]

Lot of good it will do him with Disney, as I believe he is still banned from Disneyland.

I've been in DLR with Jim within the past year. I fully expected steel cages to pop from the ground when Jim's AP was scanned. Didn't happen. Also his lunch was mysteriously not poisoned, and we were not offered a Jungle Cruise boat full of guys in dark suits. Almost makes me wish for the old days.

 

[lazyboy97o]

Lot of good it will do him with Disney, as I believe he is still banned from Disneyland.

whats the story behind that?

I believe he was only told to stop touring groups of people around the park. I believe he offered them for free on days when he was in town, but it was still seen as him competing with Disney's own tour offerings. Lou Mongello however has apparently not been told to stop offering his tours, for which he gets paid.

 

[flynnibus]

A very interesting graphic from TouringPlans...
https://twitter.com/LenTesta/status/498813134162104320/photo/1

It shows how Disney has managed to more evenly distribute crowds over the calendar year. Periods that used to be light in the inner bands of the chart.. are now darker in the outer bands. The 'off-season' periods are now busier.

 

[ford91exploder]

So Universal's 2 parks could continue to outdraw 3 of WDW's and current management would continue to do nothing. Great business strategy right there, these guys must have been top of their class

Remember their Chief used to stand in front of a green screen and ad-lib the weather...

 

[ford91exploder]

I assume this is a joke?

If you were at DCA 1.0 unfortunately the Tortilla factory and the Bakery WERE D-Tickets compared to the rest of the park...

 

[ford91exploder]

I don't know who is saying WDW's Star Wars project will be the best version. They should be very, very similar.
Overseas, those projects will each likely be different.

Will there even BE a WDW Star Wars attraction worthy of note besides a restaurant and meet-n-grope?

 

[ford91exploder]

There's no reason for the Great Movie Ride to be leaving. That just sounds like BS

It's expensive to maintain - since it had not had an mechanical refurb since day one, It's the same reason the 20KL Subs were pulled from WDW, No maintenance and now 'Too Expensive' to fix. But fear not gift shops will fill the space...

 

[Cody5242]

It's expensive to maintain - since it had not had an mechanical refurb since day one, It's the same reason the 20KL Subs were pulled from WDW, No maintenance and now 'Too Expensive' to fix. But fear not gift shops will fill the space...

If they rid of it then I fear that they will not get rid of the BAH. It does a good hiding the attraction as it is

 

[flynnibus]

It's expensive to maintain - since it had not had an mechanical refurb since day one

Yes it has - overhauled and rebuilt to something newer? No. But it has had refurbs like virtually every attraction has. It has also had updates to it's film portions, AA upgrades, but it has also suffered cuts in its shown effects that have never been replaced (like the stage dancer scene at the start).