uncle jimmy
Premium Member
Have you heard what the plan for the area that the bar on stilts or table was suppose to go? Able to share?
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EPCOT Journey of Water featuring Moana coming to Epcot
- Thread starter Rteetz
- Start date
James Alucobond
Well-Known Member
That's assuming you think this is a massive mistake, which you and many others obviously do. I'm also dubious myself from the aerial artwork I've seen, but I'm willing to give it a chance upon seeing the overall effect from a human's actual viewing perspective.
The implication seemed to me to be that Iger overrode all of the designers' wishes and said he wanted a specific thing done, even if it made no sense. This would have been horribly problematic because he's completely unqualified to make specific architectural/design demands. Instead, he was given several options that I hope the design team thought were all viable, exciting options, your personal disagreement obviously notwithstanding. This tracks more with my personal experience with C-level involvement in projects of this nature.
I'm not trying to invalidate your criticism, I'm just curious if there's actual gross misuse of power on Iger's part or if this was simply business as usual.
Turtlekrawl
Well-Known Member
Business as usual may be the problem
Sir_Cliff
Well-Known Member
Who was the architect for the Festival Center? I can't seem to find that anywhere and kind of just assumed it was in-house.
Currently no. It was meant to be something different now I’m not so sure
James Alucobond
Well-Known Member
I meant broadly, not systemically at Disney, which I'm sure has many of its own problems.
Presenting 5 options to a client or leader should not be something foreign to a design team, and one of the first rules of presenting optionality is to prune anything you don't actually believe in or want to work on, particularly when the decision maker isn't an expert. If Imagineering wasn't prepared to demolish the entirety of a CommuniCore building, they shouldn't have presented this option. If they didn't like the look of an asymmetrical World Celebration, they shouldn't have presented this option. If they weren't excited about an open-air walkthrough, they shouldn't have presented this option. There are many ways they could have re-oriented the elements in this design, but they consciously chose to do this and put it in front of someone with the power to make it happen. If they went into that situation thinking this was a throwaway concept, then they made a grave error. I'm instead hopeful that they understand how leadership decision-making works, knew this was a potential outcome, and are still confident in this design even if we aren't convinced at the moment.
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
You should read up on Disney history. Top level executives making even small decisions is not new, but deciding to tear down a building and do something else isn’t the sort of small decision you keep trying to frame it as being. Wanting something radically different as a mark isn’t either.
Again, the festival center is not an internal design. The Epcot project is not actually a single team. Tom Fitzgerald didn’t like what the Marvel team was doing in the park.
FigmentFan82
Well-Known Member
The poster seems to genuinely want to engage in a meaningful discussion and get your point of view and expertise on the subject, yet you keep offering short responses. It would be great to hear a fuller response to his conversation
doctornick
Well-Known Member
Agreed. At the very least, actually building something there is better than the giant construction site. In an ideal world, if this can be built somewhat quickly, then the construction walls can be shrunken down to include only the south west area of the central plaza. Which would still suck but make things better than the current state.
The current state wouldn’t be a giant mess if management had a clue.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
This is a nuance I think a lot of people are missing - that the Journey of Water project was a minor part of a bigger project for this half that was going to include the shelf which was to be the larger and more impressive change - at least how it was all pitched.
I thought this new vertical construction was the reason for the demo work on this half of Communicore to begin with and I always assumed this is why details were spares regarding the Moana part - because there never was going to be all that much to it besides something nice to pass through on your way to the LivingSeas or the new shelf and something nice to gaze down on from the the shelf opposite World Showcase.
Now that the "impressive" element of this change has gone the way of the new Main Street Theater project over at the MK, we're left with what I always saw as the filler between the front of future world and the new weenie (the shelf), now with no new weenie.
To me at least, it feels like a lot of people are pinning their hopes on the edutainment value of something where the concept art shows nothing more than some scenery and where no real details of anything besides water features and landscaping have even been seriously suggested by Disney except in the way they like to talk up things like the re-imagined Purple Wall™ (which they made a specialty drink to commemorate, btw) and a new name tag it apparently took them over a year to design.
What I'm reading here feels like a lot of elaborate imaginative speculation based on a few short lines of actual description from Disney* and not what Disney has actually said they are doing.
What I see is a half torn down spine with an original plan to replace it where the major element of that replacement was shelved after they'd started tearing down what was already there in kind of an "oopsies!" moment.
I feel like current leadership at WDW has had an alarmingly high number of these "oopsies!" in recent years.**
I'd love to either be wrong about my perception of all of this from the start or for, as a result of the main project getting the ax, them deciding to do more with this part than originally planned but I've seen nothing from them or from these boards that give me hope, at least not up to this point.
And given what's happening on the lake under the same leadership...
*If someone can point me to more concrete talk from Disney that details the nature of this project that I've missed, I'd be appreciative.
** I actually started to list them in this space but it's too depressing to spend time on. Lets just say, they have over-promised and under-delivered in all four parks in recent years and for those of you that don't remember, this site's news section is a great place to find "amazing" things we were getting but never got or that we got but were shockingly short-lived or things Disney laughingly tried to hype as amazing such as new paint jobs on buildings while their competitors were opening new major attractions - many of which were true expansions, during the same spans of time.
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James Alucobond
Well-Known Member
I always thought the table was the most detested element of the update anyway. This is probably weird, but I actually wouldn't mind if the space it was meant to occupy was turned into some sort of flat ride that tied into the World Nature theme while also acting as a "gateway" to Imagination in the same way that Journey of Water leads to and thematically connects The Land and The Seas.
If there was a lot of conflict at the design level, that's very interesting and something I'd love to hear more about at some point, though I realize it may not be something that people can share at present. I didn't mean to be combative, just pointing out that if Iger's only directives were sweeping statements like, "Reduce the footprint of CommuniCore to save on maintenance," or "Incorporate a newer, more modern structure with lots of architectural interest," those don't seem like unusual or unexpected requests from leadership, and there are innumerable ways that the design team could have handled them. With the kind of budget they had, I can't imagine they wouldn't have been able to come up with a plethora of concepts they liked, so, again, without having any personal insight into the design process, I have no reason to believe they would have presented something to Iger that they actively disliked.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
For a lot of us, it was but space for it apparently had a lot to do with why they were tearing down what they tore down. The big alternative plan Martin references had them using the back half of that side of Comunicore redesigned as the festival center instead of what we're now not getting - that's the insult to injury in all of this.
While what you're suggesting sounds nice, if they cut the shelf out (something that would have offered premium up-charge space in the park) for budgetary reasons, I can hardly imagine them finding the money anytime soon to build us a nice new dark ride pointing to a pavilion that currently houses one of the most poorly rated rides on property and a theater that's showing second-run shorts that were originally tacked on to the start of moves they released in theaters over the last decade.
Nice dreams - I agree - but you can't give Disney credit for something you just came up with on your own that they could someday maybe do...
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James Alucobond
Well-Known Member
Hahaha, fair enough. Didn't mean to give them credit or anything, I just often get carried away with imagining possibilities for basically anything.Nice dreams - I agree - but you can't give Disney credit for something you just came up with on your own that they could someday maybe do...
hpyhnt 1000
Well-Known Member
The bar on stilts definitely was/is an embarrassing centerpiece of the EPCOT plans, namely because it was just a rooftop bar/private event area. Sure there was a festival space included, but at a square footage significantly smaller and less accessible than the Communicore building(s) it was to replace.
What you propose - a ride that bridges the gap between the new neighborhoods - is exactly what one would expect such a project to include, all the more so considering the perception EPCOT is a park lacking in attractions. Maybe the folks in management come to their senses and do just that, but I'm not hopeful at this point.
mightynine
Well-Known Member
You seem to think the designer’s opinion matters, it doesn’t. They are not going to be the one making the decision. If their directive was to design a revenue-producing structure
in coordination with a new nighttime show, those are the ideas they will present.
“Put more trees here” - Bob Iger
Hardly the kind of person who should be making major decisions about what to do with a theme park. Eisner could at least be somewhat trusted to not hose things up too badly, Epcot 94 aside. I wouldn’t trust Iger to approve the design of a doghouse. I trust the bald merchandise guy even less.
Hardly the kind of person who should be making major decisions about what to do with a theme park. Eisner could at least be somewhat trusted to not hose things up too badly, Epcot 94 aside. I wouldn’t trust Iger to approve the design of a doghouse. I trust the bald merchandise guy even less.
doctornick
Well-Known Member
In an ideal world, I'd love to see an actual attraction in the southeast part of the central spine and then have a festival area/bar on the levels above it - yes, providing views for Harmonious or whatever show ends up happening in the future. Disney of yore was always great with using vertical space like that.