DCA Expansion Article in Funworld Magazine

[nepalostparks]

This is probably mostly old news, but since I don't follow much Disneyland news, I found it interesting.

http://www.iaapa.org/industry/funworld/2009/nov/features/exreammakeover/index.asp

 

[TP2000]

It is old news, but it's still an interesting read and Jay Rasulo offered up some insightful thoughts and information behind the long term goals for Anaheim.

Thank you very much for posting the link here! :wave:

 

[sponono88]

thanks for the link, really great article there. wraps up the details of the expansion and gives a great overall view of what changes are coming. I still love the direction they are taking with the concept of Walt Disney's California Adventure. specifically this quote here:

Does refocusing on Walt Disney’s story at DCA speak more deeply to your strong fanbase in Southern California?

We think it will. When people walked into Disneyland [in 1955], in some sense they were walking right into Walt’s brain and seeing the different parts of his creative expression. It was Walt Disney—as a person and a creative genius.

When we thought about California Adventure, the original concept was your California adventure. What we’ve heard from guests is the desire for more fantasy, so we’re making it Walt’s California, and the adventure he had as a young man arriving in this thriving movie capital. I don’t think it hinges directly on people’s love of Walt; it’s more about taking the next step into his life—this is what the dream has grown to. Obviously Walt had no part in “Cars” or “The Little Mermaid,” but it’s the natural evolution of the spirit of The Walt Disney Company, and where we’ve taken those original ideas at Disneyland.

I especially like that last part, where he mentions Cars and TLM. Walt wasn't directly connected to those projects.. but it's the evolution of his dreams/spirit that led to the Disney worlds and themes we have now. It's why WoC works too. It's the celebration of the worlds of fantasy and characters that all began with Walt and his early days in CA. As Jay said, "this is what his dream has grown to".

How will the guest experience change when the park is finished?

Cars Land, for example, is a Route 66, 1950s place, bringing you into a world where the cars are alive and people don’t exist. The main entrance, where today you walk through a postcard and arrive in a kitsch version of Southern California, is going to be more about Walt’s arrival in California; what he saw, the place he found—everything from the Red Car to the Carthay Circle Theatre, and on and on.

Our guests like to be transported to those worlds— they’ve told us that resoundingly. So that is the second part of the expansion: an expansion of the mind and spirit. Following those two guiding principles, the Disneyland Resort is going to be a different place by the time we’re done with this program.

Will it feel like a whole new park when it’s done?

Guests will find Disney’s California Adventure will take as much of their time to go through as Disneyland does. They can enter the gates at 8 o’clock in the morning and stay through “World of Color,” and feel like their time was well spent.

They’re also going to get a sense of those different fantasy realms that are more clearly organized with better wayfinding— they’ll know when they’re leaving one land and entering the next. That kind of clarity will make DCA feel like a new place, even to guests who have been many times.

And finally:

This big addition to Disney’s California Adventure will allow it to occupy more of our guests’ time. Adding nighttime entertainment with “World of Color” means it’s no longer “everybody go back to Disneyland for the nighttime show.” There are now two nighttime shows, a recognition people are staying multiple days and nights.

I see it as a pretty big step in scale. If you measure scale by attraction capacity, the addition of a whole land at one time, the amount of financial resources we’re putting behind it, the amount of time it’s taking … it is the scale of a whole new park.

so true. Save for MSEP, DCA never really had a big nighttime show -- at the end of the day the crowds migrated to catch the fireworks and F! at DL. Now with WoC, it gives a bigger incentive for guests to stay at night and will keep the park open later (which is great because the park looks amazing at night. )