News Tron coaster coming to the Magic Kingdom

montyz81

Well-Known Member
tomorrowland-storybook-circus-path-hudson-expressway-12-1024x682.jpg


Ah yes, the tracks that you can't see here because they are hidden behind the berm... :rolleyes:
Well, don't you feel good about yourself now that you have shown everyone how right you are and how wrong I am. Fact is, I distinctly remember a berm in the 80s that made it hard to see the train from any line of sight in Tomorrowland (save for the skyway).
I hope you feel full of yourself now because, in my opinion, you really are full of it!
 

MisterPenguin

President of Animal Kingdom
Premium Member
Well, don't you feel good about yourself now that you have shown everyone how right you are and how wrong I am. Fact is, I distinctly remember a berm in the 80s that made it hard to see the train from any line of sight in Tomorrowland (save for the skyway).
I hope you feel full of yourself now because, in my opinion, you really are full of it!

So you haven't been to the MK since the 80s?
 

Movielover

Well-Known Member
Well, don't you feel good about yourself now that you have shown everyone how right you are and how wrong I am. Fact is, I distinctly remember a berm in the 80s that made it hard to see the train from any line of sight in Tomorrowland (save for the skyway).
I hope you feel full of yourself now because, in my opinion, you really are full of it!
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Don't get yourself too worked up, I still have room for dessert! ;)
 

marni1971

Park History nut
Premium Member
Well, don't you feel good about yourself now that you have shown everyone how right you are and how wrong I am. Fact is, I distinctly remember a berm in the 80s that made it hard to see the train from any line of sight in Tomorrowland (save for the skyway).
I hope you feel full of yourself now because, in my opinion, you really are full of it!
Hate to say it, but pre 1994 the train was intentionally visible in front of Space Mountain.
 

owlsandcoffee

Well-Known Member
I think part of the confusion comes down to the painstaking efforts of WED to hide other out-of-theme areas from being visible. Seems weird to let the train be visible when it would break immersion. It's better to think of the train as the constant thread through the whole park, similar to the RoA or the steamboat.
 

JoeCamel

Well-Known Member
I think part of the confusion comes down to the painstaking efforts of WED to hide other out-of-theme areas from being visible. Seems weird to let the train be visible when it would break immersion. It's better to think of the train as the constant thread through the whole park, similar to the RoA or the steamboat.
He liked trains though, liked to see them everywhere. Wonder how many times he drove guests around and they were none the wiser?
 

180º

Well-Known Member
Hate to say it, but pre 1994 the train was intentionally visible in front of Space Mountain.
But was King Louie intentionally visible from the Jungle Cruise? 🤔

I think part of the confusion comes down to the painstaking efforts of WED to hide other out-of-theme areas from being visible. Seems weird to let the train be visible when it would break immersion. It's better to think of the train as the constant thread through the whole park, similar to the RoA or the steamboat.
The other unique thing I love about the Magic Kingdom is how visible the steam train is from outside the park on the East, so that it can be seen from the Contemporary and express monorail approach. It makes the “show” look seamless, as if there is no backstage in between the real world and the park. Same kind of illusion as when illustrated park maps try to convince you that, no, there’s not a loading dock behind Main Street. Just trees! 😬

The Vacation Kingdom knew how to make an entrance.
 

TrainsOfDisney

Well-Known Member
My favorite place has always been on TSI by the fort along the river. Something about BTMRR and the steamboat and the WDWRR all coming together. The “tobacco trail” was great but I avoided it due to the smokers.
Yes! That was excellent as well. At Disneyland I kept riding the steamboat trying to get photos of the train along the rocks but I missed it everytime! Ha.

I’ve spent so much time around coal smoke with steam locomotives a little tobacco probably isn’t going to do me in. Besides the smoking area was only one portion of the pathway.
I think part of the confusion comes down to the painstaking efforts of WED to hide other out-of-theme areas from being visible. Seems weird to let the train be visible when it would break immersion. It's better to think of the train as the constant thread through the whole park, similar to the RoA or the steamboat.

Why is a parade float with video screens and loud modern pop music rolling down Main Street? I like “shake yo tail feather” but it seems that hearing it could slightly break the immersion of Main Street USA.
 

owlsandcoffee

Well-Known Member
Why is a parade float with video screens and loud modern pop music rolling down Main Street? I like “shake yo tail feather” but it seems that hearing it could slightly break the immersion of Main Street USA.
Might be sarcasm, I'm bad at reading that, but if you're serious I have mixed feelings about that. The night parades are usually contemporary fare and immersion is pushed aside. Main Street becomes a venue more than a themed experience. It's just part of the weird juggling act of themed entertainment.
He liked trains though, liked to see them everywhere. Wonder how many times he drove guests around and they were none the wiser?
I was referring to WED that is now WDI, not Disney himself. He did like trains, haha and that could very well be part of the reason why they're visible everywhere. My larger part was that the inter-land transports are allowed to break immersion.
 

TrainsOfDisney

Well-Known Member
Might be sarcasm, I'm bad at reading that, but if you're serious I have mixed feelings about that. The night parades are usually contemporary fare and immersion is pushed aside. Main Street becomes a venue more than a themed experience. It's just part of the weird juggling act of themed entertainment.
I was being partially sarcastic (I don’t like shake yo tail feather at all).

I was referring to WED that is now WDI, not Disney himself. He did like trains, haha and that could very well be part of the reason why they're visible everywhere. My larger part was that the inter-land transports are allowed to break immersion.

Walt was dead when Disney World was built.

As I mentioned earlier both theme park fans and modern imagineers overthink this. People don’t actually want “immersive” they want to have fun. Now theming is important... but the overall theme is the park itself. Seeing a monorail at the Polynesian isn’t thematically correct, but it just works.

Which is the better land, Disneyland Fantasyland? Or Galaxies Edge? I’d vote for Fantasyland anyday! But which is more immersive? Certainly Galaxies Edge.
 

owlsandcoffee

Well-Known Member
I was being partially sarcastic (I don’t like shake yo tail feather at all).
nor I, lol.
Walt was dead when Disney World was built.
I know! I wasn't sure if you did, cause I could see somebody mistaking WED for meaning Walt.
As I mentioned earlier both theme park fans and modern imagineers overthink this. People don’t actually want “immersive” they want to have fun. Now theming is important... but the overall theme is the park itself. Seeing a monorail at the Polynesian isn’t thematically correct, but it just works.
Yeah, that's a good point!
Which is the better land, Disneyland Fantasyland? Or Galaxies Edge? I’d vote for Fantasyland anyday! But which is more immersive? Certainly Galaxies Edge.
Yes, correct.
 

Rich Brownn

Well-Known Member
Yes! That was excellent as well. At Disneyland I kept riding the steamboat trying to get photos of the train along the rocks but I missed it everytime! Ha.

I’ve spent so much time around coal smoke with steam locomotives a little tobacco probably isn’t going to do me in. Besides the smoking area was only one portion of the pathway.


Why is a parade float with video screens and loud modern pop music rolling down Main Street? I like “shake yo tail feather” but it seems that hearing it could slightly break the immersion of Main Street USA.
I'm still trying to figure out why the background music on Main Street suddenly became Broadway Musical Loop
 

yensidtlaw1969

Well-Known Member
I think part of the confusion comes down to the painstaking efforts of WED to hide other out-of-theme areas from being visible. Seems weird to let the train be visible when it would break immersion. It's better to think of the train as the constant thread through the whole park, similar to the RoA or the steamboat.
This to me is one of the great misconceptions of the contemporary perspective on Themed Design - that placemaking is only as good as it is insular.

Disneyland and Magic Kingdom, two of the greatest themed design efforts in history, both frequently, intentionally, and successfully buck this rule. Anyone suggesting that the Train "breaks the immersion" of Tomorrowland is missing the point. At Disneyland the Train has been visibly passing through Tomorrowland since Opening Day and stopping in it since 1958, and at Walt Disney World there has (until now) always been a prominent stretch of track during which the train was consciously shown off rather than hidden. As Martin says, it was intentionally visible in front of Space Mountain. These were no accidents, they were intentional - as you said, the Train is meant to be a thread that strings the whole park together.

By this standard, Sleeping Beauty Castle is placed at the end of Main Street only because Walt Disney didn't have the resources to mask it off - but we know this isn't true, the Castle's placement at the end of Main Street was half the point of the park. Same with Cinderella Castle, which takes things a step further and is intentionally visible from every land in the park - the presence of the Castle is not an example of Thematic Intrusion, its juxtaposition is purposeful and serves a point higher than the "immersion" of any one land. Who ever looked and said "oh man, I really thought we were in a Space Port until those Medieval Spires ruined the illusion"? No one, and you're not really meant to. Ultimately, before the park is Tomorrowland or Main Street or Frontierland, it is The Magic Kingdom.

This is even more true at Disneyland, where the Monorail, Train, Matterhorn, Skyway, Castle, and more all do (or did) run through or past eachother to a spectacular effect that would never meet the standard of "immersion" where unrelated properties and periods are screened off from each other. The intermingling of these elements has always been one of the great strengths of Disneyland - a feature of its mission, not a liability against it. The purpose of the Berm was to keep the world from intruding on Disneyland, not to keep Disneyland from intruding on itself.

There are, of course, things that SHOULD be masked - unthemed showbuildings should of course be hidden, and things like Rapunzel's Tower are examples of actual thematic intrusion because the view of it from Liberty Square was simply not accounted for in its design - its visibility from there is purposeless. But conscious, considered design can successfully place elements from seemingly disparate stories together to create a new one - the story of the greater Park. This is what WED was doing, and what the current ethos of Imagineering frequently fails to recognize.

That attractions, lands, and even parks are now typically designed with a different methodology is fine and legitimate - there are a number of things built to this end in the last 20 years that achieve spectacular results in this style. But that is a relatively newer approach in the lifetime of the medium. To suggest that Disney themed design has always been in a race towards this end and merely fell far short back in the day is both to retcon what was actually happening and miss the great, great successes of that earlier approach. People have ALWAYS felt immersed in The Magic Kingdom and Disneyland, but that's not DESPITE the presence of a Castle at the end of a turn-of-the-century street or a steam engine in Tomorrowland, it is much more BECAUSE of it.

These are places where "anything can happen", as long as they stoke the imagination rather than ruin the magic. The Train does the former and not the latter.
 

owlsandcoffee

Well-Known Member
These are places where "anything can happen", as long as they stoke the imagination rather than ruin the magic. The Train does the former and not the latter.

Yes, I think you've made the point I was trying to make, and much better than I did! "It's better to think of the train as the constant thread through the whole park" was my way of phrasing it. My choice of wording was meant to parallel the thoughts of the person I replied to.
 

yensidtlaw1969

Well-Known Member
Yes, I think you've made the point I was trying to make, and much better than I did! "It's better to think of the train as the constant thread through the whole park" was my way of phrasing it. My choice of wording was meant to parallel the thoughts of the person I replied to.
Oh let me be clear, for SURE my post was not directed at you. It was clear that you get it, I was just diving into that train of thought.

No pun intended.
 

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