DisneylandForward

[britain]

So essentially you agree with everything I said on my long rant yesterday but not one “like? I see you I see you. Haha

I’ve realized im way too liberal with my “likes.” I’m cutting way back.

Yes. Yes I do.

 

[mickEblu]

Yes. Yes I do.

Well here, take this “like” then.

 

[DrStarlander]

In my opinion, the most profitable thing that WDW has that they would love to recreate more of at DL is World Showcase / Illuminations.. er.. Harmo... whatever they're calling it now. It is essentially a beautiful mall that you have to pay to visit, pay to shop at, pay to eat at, and pay to get really good seating for the nightly light extravaganza while you pay for your very expensive drinks.

WITH HARDLY ANY COSTLY-TO-BUILD RIDES.

They have sort of retrofitted DCA into being a place kind of like that (World of Color, Food & Wine Festivals), but it's not optimal. They know DCA has no romance to it. It's easier to add "fun rides" to DCA than to make it an atmospheric place where everyone wants to linger. (They've done their darndest, but it will never be NOS & Rivers of America.)

The Toy Story lot is not much space. They know they can't blow the acreage on a Galaxy's Edge that might not hit the spot. They also know it would be more optimal for them to create urban lands rather than simulate wilderness (a berm of buildings can cut much closer to the edges than a berm of trees).

The OTHER most profitable thing that WDW has which they would love to have more of at DL is pricey hotel / DVC rooms. The old Westcot plan was going to have the shops, restaurants & rides on the main floor or deeper, and all the 2nd floors and up would be hotel rooms. Similar to how the Grand Californian stands on top of Downtown Disney, but more immersively - it would be more like a park full of Club 33s.

A handful of single IP lands would probably eliminate the opportunity to get hotel and park double duty out of the Toy Story Lot. I mean some IPs could do it (Wakanda?) but Arendale won't give you very many hotel rooms, and something like a Lion King land cuts it entirely out of the equation.

Ultimately, I think they'll build something that is a lot like Disney Springs, but with more exotic theming, a "few" rides, but mainly atmospheric places to sell drinks and to do nighttime shows, all underneath disguised resort hotel rooms.

Yes, they can fit all of World Showcase's placemaking plus some additional attractions (about 9 total attractions, plus a couple of classy flat rides), and a couple hotels/DVC. They wouldn't re-use the layout of Epcot pavilions but just as proof of concept see below. The whole thing would be more urban as you say. More like the Hotel MiraCosta area of Tokyo DisneySea where the hotels become part of the placemaking and a thematic backdrop, or like Ministry of Magic in Epic. Including Garden Walk acreage is likely necessary.

 

[GravityFalls]

But why not have both? Westcot at TSL and DL/DCA expansions at Simba? It's a win-win.

Could end up with hotels in the TSL and hotels at Simba. A lose-lose, lol

 

[Disney Irish]

Yes, they can fit all of World Showcase's placemaking plus some additional attractions (about 9 total attractions, plus a couple of classy flat rides), and a couple hotels/DVC. They wouldn't re-use the layout of Epcot pavilions but just as proof of concept see below. The whole thing would be more urban as you say. More like the Hotel MiraCosta area of Tokyo DisneySea where the hotels become part of the placemaking and a thematic backdrop, or like Ministry of Magic in Epcot. Including Garden Walk acreage is likely necessary.
View attachment 910082

You haven’t left enough room for infrastructure, ie all the stuff needed to run the Park because it’s separated from the rest of the Resort. So shrink that by 1/3 and then see what you have left.

 

[Nirya]

The actual pie-in-the-sky, this is what Disney should do if they had unlimited money thing to do here would be to use the Toy Story lot to build a brand new Disneyland hotel complex. For Disney, this would be great as they could put in a bunch of hotels at different price points while also double-dipping into the convention center crowds. Part of this would also include razing the current Disneyland and Pixar Place Hotels, along with any DTD building west of the monorail station (Din Tai Fung can move over to this new spot or take over Splitsville, which continues to feel out of place in DTD and could easily be replaced). Also, as part of this, Disney finally buys Garden Walk specifically to provide access for a monorail/Peoplemover to take guests from this hotel area to the new security checkpoint at the EGW structure (or build it out further and connect it to the plaza if you want). In an evil bit, Disney could even raise the prices at the Grand Californian under the idea that it is the closest hotel to any of the parks.

This would open up the entirety of the westside for a third park that sits completely in the same security bubble as the first two. This would be a longer park, but you'd generally get the same square acreage as DCA currently (also bigger than Knotts up the road). Disney could further work to conserve space by working with the city to lower Disneyland Drive north of DTD so that the new park could share back of hourse space with Disneyland.

There are a lot of positives to this plan, but it would also cost a fortune that the company (probably rightly) wouldn't want to spend just to reconfigure things.

 

[GravityFalls]

Given the space constraints I think these are the possibilities for the Toy Story Lot.

• Hotels and retail only
• A smaller boutique theme park (what Discovery Cove is to Sea World)
• A multi-level theme park (sort of like how Universal Hollywood's Minions area is built on top of their parking garage)
• Disney purchases additional land and builds a proper theme park

 

[mickEblu]

Yes, they can fit all of World Showcase's placemaking plus some additional attractions (about 9 total attractions, plus a couple of classy flat rides), and a couple hotels/DVC. They wouldn't re-use the layout of Epcot pavilions but just as proof of concept see below. The whole thing would be more urban as you say. More like the Hotel MiraCosta area of Tokyo DisneySea where the hotels become part of the placemaking and a thematic backdrop, or like Ministry of Magic in Epcot. Including Garden Walk acreage is likely necessary.
View attachment 910082

Nice mock up. If they could buy the land outlined in red they’d really be in business. Ideally before they build the park but there’s a potential expansion right there.

 

[Disney Irish]

Nice mock up. If they could buy the land outlined in red they’d really be in business.

View attachment 910090

 

[DrStarlander]

You haven’t left enough room for infrastructure, ie all the stuff needed to run the Park because it’s separated from the rest of the Resort. So shrink that by 1/3 and then see what you have left.

There's space outside the guest area and in below-ground utilidors as I noted earlier (even if not as ambitious as I described). Walt would've wanted it no other way .

Hopefully they have the foresight to run a service road under the elevated EGW-Bridge walkway off Harbor and around the western edge of the new parking structure over close to Garden Walk/Disney Wy., so in the future they can make the service road drive from Toy Story (with Garden Walk) to the core resort easy.

 

[Disney Irish]

There's space outside the guest area and in below-ground utilidors as I noted earlier (even if not as ambitious as I described). Walt would've wanted it no other way .

One small issue with that, and the reason why they haven't really at Disneyland/DCA.

Hopefully they have the foresight to run a service road under the elevated EGW-Bridge walkway off Harbor and around the western edge of the new parking structure over close to Garden Walk/Disney Wy., so in the future they can make the service road drive from Toy Story (with Garden Walk) to the core resort easy.

One small issue with that, they don't have the easement rights to do that, and I don't see them getting those rights.

 

[DrStarlander]

Thank you! Good luck with you gigantic shopping center (blue) when Disney can't even keep tenants in business in their little small shopping center (pink) they already have, which is right by the parks.

One small issue with that, and the reason why they haven't really at Disneyland/DCA.

You have clearly never been into an underground parking lot or into a multi-story commercial building in California. You know, all of California is not strip malls.

One small issue with that, they don't have the easement rights to do that, and I don't see them getting those rights.

They don't need an easement to use their own property. I said nothing about public streets.

 

[Disney Irish]

Thank you! Good luck with you gigantic shopping center (blue) when Disney can't even keep tenants in business in their little small shopping center (pink) they already have, which is right by the parks.
View attachment 910091

I've never said make it a whole shopping center. I've said all along make it a hotel (mostly)/retail. It'll be primarily for hotels with light retail.

You have clearly never been into an underground parking lot or into a multi-story commercial building in California. You know, all of California is not strip malls.

I have, many of them. And there is a reason why many new ones don't get built and why they don't go down very far underground with large basement structures (also why most homes in CA don't have basements). A whole utlidoors type facility wouldn't likely be feasible due to the potential earthquake issues.

They don't need an easement to use their own property. I said nothing about public streets.

They don't own any property the connects the Resort to this plot of land, to do that would require easement rights by either the City or those property owners. They couldn't even get the Harbor businesses to give them easement rights to build an entry to the walkway for the original EGW plan (which is why the bridge will now have public access), so I don't see them getting any easement rights for this plan of yours nor do I see Disney purchasing up any property to be able to do that.

 

[Adventureland Veranda]

I think they will go with a World Showcase or WESTCOT for the lot. They can make the pavilions multi level experiences and use all the space available with utilidors, deliveries, service areas, etc. built below. The most immersive areas of the current World Showcase are smaller like France (front part of the pavilion), Mexico, and Morocco.

Since DL Forward is a long-term project, I think more land will be acquired. Add in a people mover to connect the rest of the resort and it'll be amazing.

I know Disneyland is primarily for locals, but there are those of us from the East Coast who have a much better time in Anaheim than WDW. A third gate will attract more tourists easily and please their beloved shareholders.

 

[Disney Irish]

I mean since we're all talking fanciful anyways, and cost is no object, and neither is the time needed for this....

Disney can just buy up every property they don't own inside this red area and just build WDW West -

Then everyone gets what they want, a hotel/retail area, a World Showcase, a Westcot, heck maybe even an Animal Kingdom.

 

[mickEblu]

I mean since we're all talking fanciful anyways, and cost is no object, and neither is the time needed for this....

Disney can just buy up every property they don't own inside this red area and just build WDW West -

View attachment 910096

Then everyone gets what they want, a hotel/retail area, a World Showcase, a Westcot, heck maybe even an Animal Kingdom.

Seems reasonable

 

[Adventureland Veranda]

I can't wait to shop at Sam's Club and Aldi in the Toy Story Lot. Add a hotel and it'll be a goldmine!

 

[Disney Irish]

Seems reasonable

Other than will cost $100B+, take about 75 years, and we'll all be long dead.

 

[britain]

The really weird thing I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around is this new 300' height limit for up to 4 landmark structures.

I know they got burned by having Westcot's golden SpaceStation Earth top out at 300' and they wanted it in writing that this would never be a point of contention again.

But still - where in the whole resort would you use a 300' icon? That's around a hundred feet taller than Tower of Terror! Unless there's a lot of fat volume to the structure (again, like a globe or pyramid) then it's just going to be another mainly vertical structure, and I worry that THAT would just throw off the scale of most things at DLR.

I could MAYBE see a rebuilt Matterhorn being that tall. If they build the new one back in the Motor Boat Cruise area it would appear to loom just as high above Sleeping Beauty Castle as the current Matterhorn does when viewed from the hub (and maybe integrate a couple of attractions within the same mountain: Bobsleds AND Shanghai's ropes course!).

But you wouldn't want to put anything super tall anywhere on the west side of DL. And you wouldn't want to put anything super tall on the east side of DCA (don't want to make ToT look short now do we?). So what does that get us? Another Maliboomer?!

In the Toy Story lot, they don't have the space for what they intended for Westcot, so no resurrection of SpaceStation Earth. And I don't see much point putting a 300' tower in the center of a World Showcasey / Disney Springs. MAYBE they could really wall the park in with Cadillac Range-style mountains, but do they really need to be 300' feet tall?



Seems like a provision they wanted just so they'd never need to worry about it again. Not that they'll ever use it.

 

[Disney Irish]

The really weird thing I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around is this new 300' height limit for up to 4 landmark structures.

I know they got burned by having Westcot's golden SpaceStation Earth top out at 300' and they wanted it in writing that this would never be a point of contention again.

But still - where in the whole resort would you use a 300' icon? That's around a hundred feet taller than Tower of Terror! Unless there's a lot of fat volume to the structure (again, like a globe) then it's just going to be another mainly vertical structure, and I worry that THAT would just throw off the scale of most things at DLR.

I could MAYBE see a rebuilt Matterhorn being that tall. If they build the new one back in the Motor Boat Cruise area it would appear to loom just as high above Sleeping Beauty Castle as the current Matterhorn does when viewed from the hub (and maybe integrate a couple of attractions within the same mountain: Bobsleds AND Shanghai's ropes course!).

But you wouldn't want to put anything super tall anywhere on the west side of DL. And you wouldn't want to put anything super tall on the east side of DCA (don't want to make ToT look short now do we?). So what does that get us? Another Maliboomer?!

In the Toy Story lot, they don't have the space for what they intended for Westcot, so no resurrection of SpaceStation Earth. And I don't see much point putting a 300' tower in the center of a World Showcasey / Disney Springs. MAYBE they could really wall the park in with Cadillac Range-style mountains, but do they really need to be 300' feet tall?



Seems like a provision they want just so they'd never need to worry about it again. Not that they'll ever use it.

Future proofing.