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Politics Anaheim Businesses Worry About Going Under if Governor Keeps Disneyland Closed - Spectrum News
- Thread starter Darkbeer1
- Start date
This thread contains political discussion related to the original thread topic
TP2000
Well-Known Member
I just got off the phone with an old friend who is very knowledgeable about the real estate biz in the Anaheim Resort District.
This news from Sacramento today was expected, Anaheim politicians had been bracing key players for it, and yet it still hit the big players like a ton of bricks once it was formally and officially announced. Everyone has been texting and phoning everyone for the past six hours.
The response from many of the big corporate players in Anaheim is now "Exit Strategy". They need to figure out how to get out of that market with as little damage as possible. We've all been focused on Disneyland, and that's a huge part of it, but the realization that the Anaheim Convention Center won't be allowed by Sacramento to reopen until much later in 2021 is also hitting hard.
The smaller family businesses, like the Tropicana or Park Vue motels, or the various restaurants and shops in the Resort District, are now completely destroyed. What few family businesses that still had some liquidity after six months of closure can't make it another three months. Let alone another six months or more until Disneyland reopens in a dramatically shrunken format in the summer of 2021.
The small family businesses are toast. The bigger corporate properties are now considering exit strategies. Some of the big corporate properties are going to try a staycation strategy aimed at locals, but they aren't sure it can work since they are nowhere near the ocean or any sort of attractive natural or urban environment like their coastal OC and trendy west LA properties.
Anaheim Resort District without Disneyland is a pointless wasteland. It's just Stanton, but closer to the freeway.
Paraphrasing and cleaning up a bit from what my friend said... "Honestly, why would anyone pay to go to the new Westin or JW Marriott to spend your weekend wandering around an abandoned resort district overrun with drugged out homeless guys crapping in the gutters?"
The Anaheim Resort District is doomed for 2021. Unless Governor Newsom suddenly reverses this decision after November 3rd. Based on Science and Data, of course.
This news from Sacramento today was expected, Anaheim politicians had been bracing key players for it, and yet it still hit the big players like a ton of bricks once it was formally and officially announced. Everyone has been texting and phoning everyone for the past six hours.
The response from many of the big corporate players in Anaheim is now "Exit Strategy". They need to figure out how to get out of that market with as little damage as possible. We've all been focused on Disneyland, and that's a huge part of it, but the realization that the Anaheim Convention Center won't be allowed by Sacramento to reopen until much later in 2021 is also hitting hard.
The smaller family businesses, like the Tropicana or Park Vue motels, or the various restaurants and shops in the Resort District, are now completely destroyed. What few family businesses that still had some liquidity after six months of closure can't make it another three months. Let alone another six months or more until Disneyland reopens in a dramatically shrunken format in the summer of 2021.
The small family businesses are toast. The bigger corporate properties are now considering exit strategies. Some of the big corporate properties are going to try a staycation strategy aimed at locals, but they aren't sure it can work since they are nowhere near the ocean or any sort of attractive natural or urban environment like their coastal OC and trendy west LA properties.
Anaheim Resort District without Disneyland is a pointless wasteland. It's just Stanton, but closer to the freeway.
Paraphrasing and cleaning up a bit from what my friend said... "Honestly, why would anyone pay to go to the new Westin or JW Marriott to spend your weekend wandering around an abandoned resort district overrun with drugged out homeless guys crapping in the gutters?"
The Anaheim Resort District is doomed for 2021. Unless Governor Newsom suddenly reverses this decision after November 3rd. Based on Science and Data, of course.
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George Lucas on a Bench
Well-Known Member
RIP, Anaheim.
TP2000
Well-Known Member
George Lucas on a Bench
Well-Known Member
The Westin should sell that place to a real estate agency who can convert it into apartments. There's absolutely no reason to be in business in the Anaheim Resort area. Shut it down, write it off.
As for the Alpine Inn? I'll offer them a couple hundred bucks for the lamp in the upstairs window.
As for the Alpine Inn? I'll offer them a couple hundred bucks for the lamp in the upstairs window.
TP2000
Well-Known Member
When the Alpine Inn has their foreclosure property auction, I'm going to fight you for it.
Luckily, there are two of those lamps. One in each window.
From great adversity can come great beauty. Or at least a tacky lamp with a heckuva backstory.
George Lucas on a Bench
Well-Known Member
The lamp is coming with me to Texas.
Jiggsawpuzzle35
Well-Known Member
So with small businesses possibly goI get out of business forever, would it look bad on Disney to start buying these nearby properties?
George Lucas on a Bench
Well-Known Member
It would be stupid for Disney to buy any property in CA seeing as how the government doesn't want them in business. It isn't happening.
Vegas Disney Fan
Well-Known Member
After the last few years I don‘t see Disney increasing their footprint in CA, they’d be better off building a third resort in a more business friendly state to reduce their exposure in CA.
Between the mess with the eastern gateway, then the mess with the DTD hotel, and now the mess with reopening they‘ve lost billions due to political fights in CA.
They’d be better off building a third park in a more central location that could attract 10 million new guests rather than adding on to an already packed DL trying to shoehorn in a few more guests.
el_super
Well-Known Member
It was very doubtful that they would have built a third park in CA anyway, as the demand from the second never really reached expectations. Disney won't build another resort in the US as they can easily just focus their attention on WDW to expand capacity if needed. The real growth is outside the US in new emerging markets. I would think Disney would build another park in China or India instead of the US.
britain
Well-Known Member
It IS a tempting armchair imagineer project: “What would a 3rd US resort look like?” You wouldn’t want to cannibalise the offerings from the other two resorts, but you’d probably still do a ‘castle park’ to maintain brand consistency.
Overall, I’d guess it would be Chapek’s opportunity to clone a lot of the recent reinventing done for Shanghai Disneyland, but with a little less Pirates & Tron, and more Star Wars & Marvel. I’d say top priority would be to lean heavily into Marvel (probably as a complete replacement for Tomorrowland) since a central location like Texas would get Disney as close as they legally could to the eastern US with those properties.
Ok, end dream. Back to the nightmare.
FerretAfros
Well-Known Member
And yet there was such a so much pushback when it was suggested that some sort of traffic calming could be installed along Harbor Blvd, because allegedly it's such a major thoroughfare for local traffic crisscrossing the Resort District.
In reality, locals (aka, people proximate to these theme parks) have long since learned to avoid that stretch of road due to the congestion and slow travel times. Sure, there may be a couple very specific examples where that's the preferred route for someone with neither an origin nor destination in the immediate vicinity, but by and large the traffic along Harbor Blvd is there to serve the Resort District itself. Even when the tourists (aka, people from around the world who descend) and the traffic they create are gone, locals continue to avoid that particular stretch of roadway.
More than ever, it's clear that Harbor Blvd primarily serves the Resort District, and the businesses and customers in it. It's a transfer point where people continue their journey on foot, not a super-highway for through-traffic to distant destinations. As such, the road should be reconfigured with a focus on pedestrians first, deliveries (whether people or goods) second, and passersby a distant third.
The city dodged a bullet when the original Eastern Gateway design was cancelled over disagreements on aesthetics of the bridge. The layout was fundamentally incompatible with the surrounding land uses, treating Harbor Blvd more as a treacherous obstacle that must be crossed, rather than a permeable stream providing life to the neighborhood. Instead of creating a walled-off fortress, a holistic solution needs to continue the area's (unfortunately slow) steady progress toward approachability, walkability, and accessibility for its primary users (in this case, tourists at the start/end of their trip).
If ever there was a good time to undertake a major road construction project with minimal impacts, this would be it, while the Resort District is nearly abandoned. Unfortunately, major infrastructure improvements (whether public or private) seem highly unlikely for the foreseeable future, given the economic impacts of everything going on.
The problem becomes, how do you fairly split the state? You will end up with many socioeconomic issues if it isn't planned properly. It is the same issue as trying to split up LAUSD, both really need to be split into smaller entities, but there is no good way of doing it.
Stevek
Well-Known Member
Unless your POV is that IF we have a larger footprint we have the opportunity to employee even more folks once we get to normalcy
We are grocery store neighbors! Although sometimes I enjoy the Stater Bros on Chapman avenue (but NOT the one on Collins. Bleck!)
TP2000
Well-Known Member
And yet there was such a so much pushback when it was suggested that some sort of traffic calming could be installed along Harbor Blvd, because allegedly it's such a major thoroughfare for local traffic crisscrossing the Resort District.
In reality, locals (aka, people proximate to these theme parks) have long since learned to avoid that stretch of road due to the congestion and slow travel times. Sure, there may be a couple very specific examples where that's the preferred route for someone with neither an origin nor destination in the immediate vicinity, but by and large the traffic along Harbor Blvd is there to serve the Resort District itself. Even when the tourists (aka, people from around the world who descend) and the traffic they create are gone, locals continue to avoid that particular stretch of roadway.
More than ever, it's clear that Harbor Blvd primarily serves the Resort District, and the businesses and customers in it. It's a transfer point where people continue their journey on foot, not a super-highway for through-traffic to distant destinations. As such, the road should be reconfigured with a focus on pedestrians first, deliveries (whether people or goods) second, and passersby a distant third.
The city dodged a bullet when the original Eastern Gateway design was cancelled over disagreements on aesthetics of the bridge. The layout was fundamentally incompatible with the surrounding land uses, treating Harbor Blvd more as a treacherous obstacle that must be crossed, rather than a permeable stream providing life to the neighborhood. Instead of creating a walled-off fortress, a holistic solution needs to continue the area's (unfortunately slow) steady progress toward approachability, walkability, and accessibility for its primary users (in this case, tourists at the start/end of their trip).
If ever there was a good time to undertake a major road construction project with minimal impacts, this would be it, while the Resort District is nearly abandoned. Unfortunately, major infrastructure improvements (whether public or private) seem highly unlikely for the foreseeable future, given the economic impacts of everything going on.
Brilliant summation! Your contributions here are always an informative read.
Harbor Blvd. and Katella Ave. for the past six months proves how needless that area is for most
The silver lining to the current disaster Disneyland and the Resort District are dealing with is that it gives them a second chance at some mistakes they were about to make in the past. Let's hope they don't waste that opportunity.
Although I worry that the long-term financial situation will squash any momentum to really rethink investment in and around the Resort District, both on private property and the public right of ways. It's easy to think big and go bold when there's lots of money in your bank account! Anaheim and Disneyland won't have lots of money to play with for quite awhile now.
Giss Neric
Well-Known Member
Keep in mind he had his winery open the whole time, his kids are in school in Idaho and he has homes out of state while he ruins California. Good job Governor.
Congressman Correa Urges Gov. Newsom To Help Orange County Reopen Disneyland | U.S. Congressman Lou Correa of California
Lou Correa - Congressman of the 46th District of California
correa.house.gov
>>
The Honorable Gavin Newsom
Governor
State of California
California State Capitol, Suite 1173
Sacramento, California 95814
Dear Governor Newsom
Today, the California Health and Human Services Secretary Mark Ghaly issued guidelines for the reopening of Disneyland, permitting the park to reopen at 25% capacity once Orange County reaches Tier 4. According to Orange County's Public Health Officer Clayton Chau, Tier 4 may be obtainable by the Summer of 2021.
The residents of central Orange County are hard-working, blue-collar taxpayers. Tourism is the cornerstone of our economy. Disneyland has about 30,000 employees, the vast majority being members of local unions. Additionally, local hotels, restaurants, and other businesses rely directly on tourism. We need Disneyland and other California businesses to reopen in a scientifically proven safe manner as we seek to survive economically.
The Coalition of Resort Labor Unions sent you a letter on October 17 that stated, "…we believe that a path exists where Disneyland would be able to open safely when Orange County moves into the Orange list [Tier 3]." Although uncertain, we expect that Tier 3 can be obtained in early 2021.
The letter further states, "…in our view, the effectiveness of public health agencies in addressing COVID-19 would benefit from coordination with worker representatives like ours that have practical knowledge and expertise regarding the challenges of addressing exposure risk..."
I ask you to direct your reopening task force to work with representatives of resort workers who are working in the resort day-to-day.
As previously stated, it is imperative that we reopen California and Disneyland in a scientifically safe way. Such a process needs to include the local workers that we want to protect. Neither Disneyland employees nor their representatives were consulted. These decisions are difficult, and much is at stake. That's why the "boots on the ground" must be part of the decision-making.
Since this pandemic started, I have been working non-stop in making sure that my constituents get a box of food to eat. But my constituents do not want a handout. They need a job and the ability to support their families.
I call on you to meet with our local labor and small business leaders and Disneyland to reach a scientifically safe way to reopen under Tier 3. My friends' and neighbors' health and well-being, many of whom I grew up with, are at stake. Orange County stands ready to work with you and the State of California to get our community back to work safely.
Sincerely,
J. Luis Correa
Member of Congress<<