And the solution to deal with this so called problem is to tear out the soul of the land that is RoA? Thats their great fix to deal with whatever problem they have decided suddenly now exists?
Yes? Get rid of the thing that is causing the imbalance.
I think most folks agree that MK needs more capacity relative to the demand that exists for the park. This is a difficult problem to tackle when there are attractions present that guests do not wish to participate in. It drives up the clogging of other attractions that they do. The riverboat and TSI has the ability to function as a people eater, but it wasn't and hadn't been for a long time. Not enough people were doing it to pose any assistance to the other, overcrowded areas of the park.
So what is the solution to that?
You get rid of the things that are not working in tandem with the rest of the park to help disperse crowds and replace it with something that will do that job.
People are looking at Cars completely on it's own, when the reality is that it's a package deal with Villains. These two additions are clearly meant to work together to take strain off of the rest of the park.
The days of being able to plop down a simple theatre show or small level attraction on it's own to help fan guests out is gone. Now, part of that is Disney's own doing and part of that is people's desires and approach to visiting places is different now than it used to be. Many people don't plan vacations according to relaxation and calm go with the flow energy these days, they plan with the intention of maximizing a return on their investment and how that translates to theme parks is placing a focus on big draws and ignoring the other stuff along the way.
This is something all theme park operators have seemed to notice. Even my home park Dollywood which used to open up small kids rides and flats as their big new offerings for a season have gone into a cycle of opening major "E tickets" every single year because that's simply what the guests who're planning visits to the park are demanding.
If guests were showing an interest in smaller scale offerings, diversions, and these people eaters like the river, then there's little doubt in my mind that Disney and other parks would be more keen to keep them in place because they would be fulfilling their purpose of helping to distribute people around. But that's not what their clientele is telling them.
You say they have decided suddenly that this problem exists, but I don't think that's the case. The problem has always been there. They're only just now responding to it.
