Rumor Lion King Flume Ride being considered for Animal Kingdom

[lazyboy97o]

....until age causes the pipes burst from within the walls and cause A TON of expensive damage (including mold)

Most of the pipes are in a plumbing chase that can be accessed. If you peek into a janitor’s closet you can sometimes see the narrow door that provides access. There are also a few that are directly accessed from the restroom. They also build restrooms out of things like concrete block so they can better handle getting wet.

All true. The danger is they walk a fine line - Replace too many things people like/want to come back for and there is no more nostalgia, which leads to fewer returning guests. There are only so many first-timers out there, no matter what some people think and want others to believe.

But with their announcement/building time lines now, that's probably less of a danger these days years decades.

There’s also just the issue of insufficient capacity. It’s a problem that compounds and only gets more expensive to correct.

 

[danlb_2000]

All true. The danger is they walk a fine line - Replace too many things people like/want to come back for and there is no more nostalgia, which leads to fewer returning guests. There are only so many first-timers out there, no matter what some people think and want others to believe.

But with their announcement/building time lines now, that's probably less of a danger these days years decades.

When people speak out against things being removed/changed it's not uncommon for someone to criticize them by saying that they are just holding on to "nostalgia" as if that is a bad thing. Nostalgia is very important for a place like Disney, people do return visit because things are familiar.

 

[Purduevian]

Just for fun... this is what Tiana's bayou adventure would look like in this space:

It could also fit north of the theater...

 

[MerlinTheGoat]

Just for fun... this is what Tiana's bayou adventure would look like in this space:

It could also fit north of the theater...

The Lion King is massively larger than Tiana. The ride building occupies a 148,000 square foot footprint. Roughly twice as large as WDW's version of Tiana (though to be fair that isn't including all of the overflow queue space outside). The full land for Lion King though is around 327,000 square feet.

I once made an overlay of the attraction as well, using a fairly accurate scale. Should have posted it in this thread. If they did a 1:1 clone of it, it would need quite a lot of land.

Reworking of the backstage and usage of part of that parking lot would be necessary if they place it in Africa. And I don't know how feasible that is, or how willing Disney leadership would be to do it. This may be why there were rumors of them potentially doing a significantly scaled back lower ticket iteration of a LK ride here instead. Though I would imagine getting the full fat experience from Paris should also be possible if they wanted to invest the money and work. Something else that should be noted is that there is now a Club 33 location to the south of the Festival theater directly across the walkway from the restooms. It's not shown on this satellite view (this was shot before it was built). Not a huge facility, but you have to be careful to work around it too. The overlay I made above should factor this in and not encroach upon it.

And just in case anyone wants to play around with the placement, i'll post the template. Use the overlay above to determine the space you'll need though. The image below is also more accurate to the real thing since I altered the walkways somewhat to fit the space I used and connect to an existing walkway alongside the Festival building. Paris' has two walkways in and out of the land.

 

[UNCgolf]

When people speak out against things being removed/changed it's not uncommon for someone to criticize them by saying that they are just holding on to "nostalgia" as if that is a bad thing. Nostalgia is very important for a place like Disney, people do return visit because things are familiar.

It also essentially assumes that whatever is being replaced is automatically worse than its replacement, or was never good to begin with, and so the only reason someone could like it more is nostalgia. It's basically a logical fallacy.

 

[Bocabear]

I bet the Lion King ride would entertain more visitors than the Festival Of The Lion King show does... The would be a lot like like what is happening at the MK... Though for Lion King, I think they do have some expansion area if the wanted to use it....
THere is the entire area near Conservation Station which was rumored to be used at some point....

 

[mattpeto]

It also essentially assumes that whatever is being replaced is worse than its replacement (or was never good to begin with) and so the only reason someone could like it more is nostalgia. It's basically a logical fallacy.

I don’t disagree fundamentally, but Triceratops Spin and carnival games is a very low bar.

Dinosaur is a literal fossil of what it was and it’s counterpart at Disneyland Park is an superior experience and the wait times indicate its popularity.

Tropical Americas should be a home run for the park.

 

[HMF]

Yep, and this is why only MK is truly expanding. It's the only park that is often so crowded that it makes guests not want to return.

Never mind the fact that it has far more land to use than Disneyland but is nowhere near as effective with it.

 

[HMF]

When people speak out against things being removed/changed it's not uncommon for someone to criticize them by saying that they are just holding on to "nostalgia" as if that is a bad thing. Nostalgia is very important for a place like Disney, people do return visit because things are familiar.

I do know for a fact that the loss of the things I have great nostalgia for is probably the main reason I won't be coming back unless there is a dramatic change in management in a positive direction.

 

[UNCgolf]

I don’t disagree fundamentally, but Triceratops Spin and carnival games is a very low bar.

Dinosaur is a literal fossil of what it was and it’s counterpart at Disneyland Park is an superior experience and the wait times indicate its popularity.

Tropical Americas should be a home run for the park.

Oh I definitely wasn't talking about Chester & Hester (and I doubt @danlb_2000 was either). Not much was lost there -- I think more is lost with the rest of Dinoland, but it was always one of the weakest parts of the park.

It's when people throw it around in regards to attractions like Splash Mountain or Great Movie Ride (both of which I've seen dismissed as mere nostalgia here, among others), or even EPCOT as a whole (also seen that dismissed as nostalgia).

 

[HMF]

Oh I definitely wasn't talking about Chester & Hester (and I doubt @danlb_2000 was either). Not much was lost there -- I think more is lost with the rest of Dinoland, but it was always one of the weakest parts of the park.

It's when people throw it around in regards to attractions like Splash Mountain or Great Movie Ride (both of which I've seen dismissed as mere nostalgia here, among others), or even EPCOT as a whole (also seen that dismissed as nostalgia).

GMR was literally the foundation block of the entire park.

 

[jah4955]

I bet the Lion King ride would entertain more visitors than the Festival Of The Lion King show does... The would be a lot like like what is happening at the MK... Though for Lion King, I think they do have some expansion area if the wanted to use it....
THere is the entire area near Conservation Station which was rumored to be used at some point....

Plus...hasn't their obsession, for over 30 years, been lowering operational costs?

 

[Purduevian]

The Lion King is massively larger than Tiana. The ride building occupies a 148,000 square foot footprint. Roughly twice as large as Tiana (though to be fair that isn't including some of the exterior queue space). The full land for Lion King though is around 327,000 square feet.

I once made an overlay of the attraction as well, using a fairly accurate scale. Should have posted it in this thread. If they did a 1:1 clone of it, it would need quite a lot of land.

View attachment 897563

And just in case anyone wants to play around with the template. This is more accurate to the real thing too. I altered the walkways somewhat to fit within this space and connect to the existing AK walkways.

View attachment 897573

I had no idea the lion king ride was that massive.

 

[splah]

I've posted elsewhere to this effect, but we've lost a sense of scale. Rides are now HUGE but less intimate human-scaled. I'd love some compact/concise attractions.

 

[Nickm2022]

I've posted elsewhere to this effect, but we've lost a sense of scale. Rides are now HUGE but less intimate human-scaled. I'd love some compact/concise attractions.

I agree with this so much, expect for ak where I feel they do need at least rn a lot of big rides to flesh out the park. I will not be satisfied until I get a jungle book and lion king ride in this park

 

[MerlinTheGoat]

Disney has become wasteful with real estate over the past couple of decades. Both in regards to how their lands and parks are designed as well as the rides themselves. There's also a diminishing talent with handling forced perspective effects as well, which is a critical component to better optimizing a smaller space. Though I won't dwell on that gripe.

What I will say is the blueprints of LK's interior layout are available online, and it's interesting how it's designed compared to the likes of Splash/Tiana. It becomes clear why LK occupies such a large footprint. Splash was a very vertically layered ride and the flume spirals up and then down the perimeter of the mountain. Also intersecting at various points. It goes across both the load/unload station and the big lift/drop at the beginning. Then you drop down into the main building, which is comprised of two levels stacked on top of one another. The drops have a practical purpose, not just for extra thrills. You get to the lower level via the drops, this scene is directly underneath the previous ones. The finale is also located directly underneath two of the lifts (not to mention the train passes directly through it as well). It's a VERY complex and intersecting layout, and also exceptionally space efficient. The original Pirates at Disneyland is a similar stacked layout at the start and the train also passes through it. If you were to redesign the layout so the track never intersects or has any overlapping/layered scenes, these rides would likely take up a similar footprint to LK.

Lion King by contrast only has one instance where the flume intersects itself. The final big lift passes over the load/unload station. That's it. Aside from that, it's a very straightforward and "linear" track layout. There's one large lift at the start (instead of the two separate ones in Splash) and two small drops before the final big lift/drop. But the elevation changes appear to be purely cosmetic and for guest enjoyment, rather than serving a practical purpose. There aren't any instances where LK stacks scenes on top of one another and uses its elevation changes to transport guests between these layers. With the exception of the final big lift/drop, it looks like they could probably remove all of the elevation changes and remain within the same footprint while not having to remove or scale down any of the scenes. On the flipside, I also suspect they could have engineered this ride to be more similar to the layered scene design in Splash/Tiana and significantly decreased the amount of land it occupies. From wall to wall, the scenes themselves also don't actually appear like they'll be much larger than the ones from Splash/Tiana (if any). The ceilings MIGHT be a bit higher in some rooms, but I can't say for certain yet.

 

[Mr. Sullivan]

I just can’t see this coming to DAK now that we know more about it. I know they love to throw spinner clones in every corner they can but would they really want to two incredibly similar log flumes (different content I know but similar ride experience) at the same resort?

 

[MerlinTheGoat]

I just can’t see this coming to DAK now that we know more about it. I know they love to throw spinner clones in every corner they can but would they really want to two incredibly similar log flumes (different content I know but similar ride experience) at the same resort?

This argument has been made before with other rides and ride systems. Like the idea that they can't/shouldn't clone RSR because Test Track exists, or that we shouldn't have more EMV based rides. It has never made any sense nor been used by the company to determine what should and shouldn't be built. We're not even talking about putting it in the same park and they're pretty different ride experiences apart from both being boat rides and having a big drop.

There are no less than three runaway train-themed roller coasters across WDW property, two of which are specifically minecart themed and exist within the same park (not even counting the number of other non-minecart coasters). Three omnimovers in Magic Kingdom alone, Epcot once had four of them (with plans for others at World Showcase, along with a clone of Matterhorn and a Mt Fuji coaster too, and even another Peoplemover that would have traveled the perimeter of Communicore). Boat rides also sharing almost identical vehicles/flume design are Pirates, IASW, Frozen, and Mexico (with again more planned to have been built at Epcot in future expansions). Magic Kingdom opened with two bus-bar type dark rides right next to each other sharing the same roof (Disneyland with vastly more, two even partially stacked on top of one another). Star Tours and Body Wars existed at the same time. WDW now (unfortunately) has three modern trackless rides across property, two in the same park. Disney announced a Moana flume for the Dinorama area before settling on Encanto, and there were also considerations afterwards to bring it to MK's Adventureland instead (which may still happen at some point down the line). Over at Universal, they now have two Kuka attractions (both well loved and no one complains about it).

Whether they ever bring this ride to WDW or not, I do not believe they would even consider such a concern when determining whether to do it. Nor should they.

 

[Nickm2022]

If I recall correctly the go rumor was never a clone of the big Paris ride but rather a smaller flat boat ride like SmallWorld or the upcoming COCO ride at DCA. Kinda think comparing Snow White 7D coaster to Snow White dark ride at DL or formerly MK. With the only shared thing being some of the RND and AA's. Kinda like Frozen at DisneySea shares AA's and some RND even tho its nothing like the other Frozen rides

 

[Nickm2022]

the other rumor from a while back was a jungle book ride using Shanghai pirates tech. not saying either of these happen rather they were what was rumored