There's a lot of stuff happening in all the Disney parks that "a lot of us" aren't excited about, and yet, there are long lines for them.
We aren't a random sampling of all park guests.
-
Welcome to the WDWMAGIC.COM Forums!
Please take a look around, and feel free to sign up and join the community.
News Big changes coming to EPCOT's Future World?
- Thread starter djkidkaz
- Start date
There's a lot of stuff happening in all the Disney parks that "a lot of us" aren't excited about, and yet, there are long lines for them.
We aren't a random sampling of all park guests.
No, but we are a good focus group. Well, most of us. Joe public would go to a waterfall at Six Flags and be happy.There's a lot of stuff happening in all the Disney parks that "a lot of us" aren't excited about, and yet, there are long lines for them.
We aren't a random sampling of all park guests.
DreamfinderGuy
Well-Known Member
I'm gonna be real honest, Wonders of Life was a good events pavilion but severely underutilized. The Play Pavilion seems to be under utilizing the space once again. I'm glad to see it become an attractions area again, but from a financial standpoint I don't see why they made that call.
DoleWhipDrea
Well-Known Member
Good point. I think it possibly had more to do with the potential of the dome and what they could do with M&G. No matter what the plans were, I don’t think they wanted to continue using the CC buildings for them and wanted something flashy to encourage families to go to EPCOT for that experience while playing with technology to entertain guests. Having a giant indoor space ready to go gives them a more controlled environment, and by having it located between two thrill attractions an easy spot to encourage families with little ones to check out. Whereas the Events Pavilion they designed is part-outdoors, which makes sense for events like Flower and Garden. The cooking demos and shopping worked well in the WoL building, but didn’t necessarily give them the full environment capabilities they wanted.
Prototype82
Well-Known Member
Maybe I'm crazy, but the events building is one of the things I am the most excited about. As of late, events really are the money maker in this park. I'm biased- I have wanted fresh, bold, futuristic architecture in this park for awhile and the concept art and the model just look so green and futuristic. Covering FW in 90s concrete and garish paint jobs ruined the design a long time ago. In a festival-heavy park, I think it'll make the money back. We'll see what happens.
yensidtlaw1969
Well-Known Member
I think of the story of EPCOT as if it were a fancy restaurant . . .
When it opened, it had a unique and complex menu crafted by master chefs.
Over time, management started taking dishes off the menu that were hard to prepare and started replacing many of them with fast food options.
Prices for the fast food are now higher than they were when the restaurant offered fine dining.
They've managed to keep people coming in by offering fun seasonal options, but the staples continue to suffer.
Now the restaurant's reputation is floundering, and management has decided that a major tentpole of their plan to turn things around is to . . . build new tables.
Like . . . literally. Looking at you, Festival Pavilion.
Josh Hendy
Well-Known Member
Correct me if I'm wrong, I've never been to Food & Wine. But isn't one of the big things about it, that it started out giving free or cheap food and drink samples, but soon turned into really expensive, tiny fast-food snacks and ballpark priced, minuscule wine and beer samples?
Which of course people continued buying in record numbers.
Imagine if they had invested in Epcot 15 years ago and didn't have to rely on "festivals" to keep people coming to a Disney theme park.
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
That would require leadership that understands why people have any interest in going to theme parks in the first place. It also would have had to comply with the franchise mandate, because there was no business case to try and repeat the huge financial success of the roller coaster themed to India or whatever.
hpyhnt 1000
Well-Known Member
That quote from Iger really said it all. One of the world's best theme park attractions rather ignorantly dismissed by the head of the company that built it. And the hamfisted attempt by Iger & Co. to walk back and "erase" his saying that only adds to the absurdity.
trainplane3
Well-Known Member
"Spicy" Joe Rohde is best Joe Rohde (his response to Iger):
Expedition Everest. Now here’s a thing. When we started out this project, it was going to be set in Bhutan, because Bhutan has a climate that is much closer to Florida’s. And Bhutan has its own set of legends related to the Yeti. Some of the very earliest renderings of Disney’s animal Kingdom show a snowcapped mountain in this corner of the park with a Bhutanese palace in the foreground. But the architecture of Bhutan is fantastically elaborate, especially because Bhutanese roof structures are super complex timber framed affairs, almost Japanesey. And so, rather early in the development process, we redirected our design energy towards Nepal, and the flat-roofed architecture of the forbidden kingdom of Mustang. I had already been there once before, and so I had a limited number of photographs that we could start from. Later, we took a short design trip, which was in itself a bit of a harrowing adventure, to visit the towns of Kagbeni, Marpha, Jomsom, Thini, and Syang...All part of the Cultural complex in the upper Kali Gandaki Valley of Nepal. Nowadays, all of these places are searchable on Instagram… So you can look for yourself and compare. It would also be instructive to look at Bhutanese architecture (also accessible on Instagram) and see how simply removing the elaborate roof structures could bring us so close to the final look.
Basically, he's making a point of how much research went into it instead of being "ok it's India, here's a temple, a mountain, now shove a coaster through them".
Josh Hendy
Well-Known Member
Sort of like what some people said they did in the design of Epcot's "fake Paris" especially the new/old backstage area. Then there was that really snarky post from someone who recognized the color scheme from Rue Crémieux (although the architecture of the blue building is still pretty wacky)
Today, most of these research trips could be done through instagram and Street View ... though you would probably never get all the interior details such as molding, furniture, doors and doorknobs etc.
Is this one of the big changes coming to Epcot, because if it's not, it doesn't belong in this thread.
And in how many other threads will you cross post this?
danlb_2000
Premium Member
Despite the construction shut down, there were a number of interesting permits today all of which are a little cryptic.
Test Track is at 1440 Avenue of the Stars so this one is somewhere near there. The actual address isn't on the Reedy Creek site.
3/20/2020 - Epcot - Whiting Turner Contracting Co
1442 Avenue of the Stars (Near Test Track) - 200 PKG 5 - Underground Utilities & concrete Structural Details
Test Track is at 1440 Avenue of the Stars so this one is somewhere near there. The actual address isn't on the Reedy Creek site.
3/20/2020 - Epcot - Whiting Turner Contracting Co
1442 Avenue of the Stars (Near Test Track) - 200 PKG 5 - Underground Utilities & concrete Structural Details
tparris
Well-Known Member
The permit description sounds like it would have something to do with the utilidor under the already razed section of Innoventions west, with its foundation doubling as the ceiling for the tunnel and all. However the location mentioned goes against that, so I’ve no idea what it could be for.
HauntedMansionFLA
Well-Known Member
35.7 billion in stock buybacks would have done wonders if spent in park investment