Tokyo Disneyland Resort Expansion

Supersnow84

Supersnow84

Well-Known Member
I wonder if it’s because of too much overcrowding or too little

I’m at fantasy springs right now. I know that autumn is a rather quiet time and it’s a weekday but we didn’t struggle at all with anything fantasy springs related (the only iffy thing was frozen but later drops were super common) hell Peter Pan entry passes never ran out till like 8pm, you could freely enter and leave fantasy springs whenever you wanted just by using Peter Pan

The land never felt any more crowded than sea as a whole and the wait times were never excessively high

Maybe it’s the enormous capacity of the rides. Super Nintendo land at Osaka feels busier than fantasy springs but that may just be because the land is tiny
 
BrianLo

BrianLo

Well-Known Member
Supersnow84 said:
I wonder if it’s because of too much overcrowding or too little

I’m at fantasy springs right now. I know that autumn is a rather quiet time and it’s a weekday but we didn’t struggle at all with anything fantasy springs related (the only iffy thing was frozen but later drops were super common) hell Peter Pan entry passes never ran out till like 8pm, you could freely enter and leave fantasy springs whenever you wanted just by using Peter Pan

The land never felt any more crowded than sea as a whole and the wait times were never excessively high

Maybe it’s the enormous capacity of the rides. Super Nintendo land at Osaka feels busier than fantasy springs but that may just be because the land is tiny
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I think you caught an exceptionally slow day. Maybe even the slowest, there's been a few times in the Fall Pan premiere access seems to last until the early afternoon. That is rare, usually it sells out around 1030-11. What were the standby wait times like on the other rides?

Halloween? Perhaps everyone went to Disneyland due to the date.

For me, I'd say both Nintendo and Fantasy Springs felt about the same level of busy, both parks were fairly slammed and a lot of the other areas felt perhaps a touch worse.
 
Supersnow84

Supersnow84

Well-Known Member
We are at Disneyland for Halloween but disneysea the two days before and both were how I described them

Wait time for the rest of sea weren’t anything massively high but what I’m used to for the off season. 2-2.5 hours for soarin and mania. 1.5 or so for the two Indiana’s and hotel Hightower
 
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Supersnow84

Supersnow84

Well-Known Member
Honestly i doubt they could make tinker bell any bigger if they wanted given how strangely space constrained fantasy springs is (somehow both being really wide and also really constrained)

It just seemed like they had very limited ways to play with the space and shoved anything that would fit as a ride count filler (Disneyseas biggest criticism I’d say has always been its sheer size compared to its ride count (the Shanghai problem)
 
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cheezbat

cheezbat

Well-Known Member
Supersnow84 said:
Does anyone feel like fantasy springs is way too big and has way too much dead space for what it actually has

I noticed it as soon as I walked into the land that all 4 rides and the 3 restaurants are pushed right to the edges of the land and then there is a large amount of land in the middle that I feel doesn’t get adequately filled. I also feel like they struggled to make the land feel alive, like I’d 100% say that arendelle at HK feels better designed and more alive than arendelle at Japan as it has basically no accessible areas. I also didn’t quite understand why the only gift shop is shoved in the corner near the hotel

The land kinda feels a bit disconnected from sea, I don’t get the same vibe from it as I get from the rest of sea.

The frozen ride was incredible I will say
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Absolutely. When I saw the acreage for this land, I was like, “there should be 7-8 rides and a show AT LEAST in a land this size. Hope they left spaces to creatively expand the area in years to come.
 
Supersnow84

Supersnow84

Well-Known Member
cheezbat said:
Absolutely. When I saw the acreage for this land, I was like, “there should be 7-8 rides and a show AT LEAST in a land this size. Hope they left spaces to creatively expand the area in years to come.
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Yeah I’m not quite sure what they have planned

Both the Peter Pan ride and the restaurant are shoved under the mountains and I don’t feel like you can properly see skull cove from just about any angle (it reminds me of journey to the crystal grotto in Shanghai which is strangely hidden from every vantage point in Shanghai’s enormous fantasyland)

Tangled is…….well proportioned I guess but having nothing on the other side of the path besides trees screening skill cove hurts it especially since lantern festival doesn’t add anywhere near as much kinetic energy as I thought it would. It also doesn’t help that lantern festival is such a disappointment compared to Peter Pan or frozen (the rides are really the lands highlights)

honestly arendelle is a mess mostly because besides the palace and the entrance to the ride the entire land is dead. People who’ve read a lot of my posts know I’m biased to HK and I don’t really hide it but god damn if HK didn’t nail arendelle far better than Tokyo. Tokyo arendelle’s problem is the entire arendelle is dead, there is no stores, there is no enterable locations or anything and it misses on the forced perspective front for the port. You could cut out all but the restaurant and the ride and you would lose nothing

Finally the hotel. That pink monstrosity needs to be ripped down and totally rebuilt. It looks horrid from every angle, the entire park sized lands only gift shop is shoved in its basement and you need a map to find it. Even if you have no intention of coming back into the land you can’t leave via fantasy springs so you need to slog 1km back to the entrance so you can catch the monorail back to bayside where you were 30 minutes ago and while the water art is absolutely gorgeous I’d rather it fill the weirdly empty pathway from the Arabian coast and completely convert the area in front of the hotel. It’s just so much wasted space

Honestly as I’ve had a week or two to think about it my opinion on fantasy springs has kinda really soured. I can’t really articulate what I think should be immediately changed but above is a cliff notes version of what I find seriously wrong with it
 
BrianLo

BrianLo

Well-Known Member
Supersnow84 said:
Honestly as I’ve had a week or two to think about it my opinion on fantasy springs has kinda really soured. I can’t really articulate what I think should be immediately changed but above is a cliff notes version of what I find seriously wrong with it
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Fantasy Springs is the spiritual successor to New Fantasyland and what was wrong with that design philosophy. Mostly a land of facades for rides and restaraunts. Very pretty, oddly little substance.

Its clear redeeming quality is the rides are largely good.

Arrendelle at HK is a much better modern land. As is even the beauty and the beast section in Disney. I think it’s largely the weird lack of retail. Never thought we’d reach the day when one of the bigger flaws was the sheer dearth of ride exit shops. 😂
 
Supersnow84

Supersnow84

Well-Known Member
I wouldn’t even be opposed to gift shops in random places not necessarily at the ride exits

But why is there no gift shop besides the one in the basement of the hotel. Arendelle is a whole town there and doesn’t have a gift shop, neverland uses up so much space to do so little. About the only place I can legit see a gift shop not properly fitting is corona

The land just doesn’t seem to have enough moving parts for what it’s meant to represent
 
Markiewong

Markiewong

Well-Known Member
Don't forget that when Fantasy Springs was designed the park attracted 14.6 million people annually, they most likely expected to break the 15 mil barrier after FS. However with the removal of AP and their new strategy that number has dropped to 12.4 in 2023.
 
Supersnow84

Supersnow84

Well-Known Member
That still is likely generated by prep for fantasy springs and the wider disneysea’s very slow return to pre Covid levels on the entertainment front

There is little to suggest that OLC is bracing for the expectation of permanently lower guest numbers
 
O

OzAn

Member
I feel like OLC making Fantasy Springs a broadly themed land where multiple IPs can co-exist instead of just focusing on Corona, Arendelle and Neverlands was deliberate - so they can easily add new popular IPs in the future without planning a whole land around it. So makes sense they leave some 'empty' areas for that possibility.
 
BrianLo

BrianLo

Well-Known Member
Markiewong said:
Don't forget that when Fantasy Springs was designed the park attracted 14.6 million people annually, they most likely expected to break the 15 mil barrier after FS. However with the removal of AP and their new strategy that number has dropped to 12.4 in 2023.
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I’d be pretty surprised if 2024 (or at least the full operating year cycle of fantasy springs) hasn’t blown right passed that. The park is incredibly busy.
 
Supersnow84

Supersnow84

Well-Known Member
OzAn said:
I feel like OLC making Fantasy Springs a broadly themed land where multiple IPs can co-exist instead of just focusing on Corona, Arendelle and Neverlands was deliberate - so they can easily add new popular IPs in the future without planning a whole land around it. So makes sense they leave some 'empty' areas for that possibility.
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That’s the problem though, the areas aren’t “empty” due to having future expansion space they are just dead zones
 
Markiewong

Markiewong

Well-Known Member
Supersnow84 said:
That still is likely generated by prep for fantasy springs and the wider disneysea’s very slow return to pre Covid levels on the entertainment front

There is little to suggest that OLC is bracing for the expectation of permanently lower guest numbers
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There is quite some evidence that they focus on a higher yield per capita. The more bigger vacation packages, Disney premier access, ticket price increases, only single day tickets and most importantly their sudden focus on overseas visitors. I really don't see them going back with AP's except if the tourism crashes.
 
Supersnow84

Supersnow84

Well-Known Member
I won’t say it doesn’t make sense to increase the focus on tourism. Japan is drowning in tourists who have access to a lot more money than the locals because of the weak yen and while Tokyo has never been “hostile” to foreign tourists it also wasn’t the most welcoming to them like say HK

The tourist boom generated by the weak yen won’t last forever but increasing foreign tourism doesn’t seem like it will negatively affect the locals perception alone. Though possibly the other changes like loss of annual passes will
 

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