Disney Property

[DougK]

The purpose of EPCOT was so that Walt would have a cheap source of labor living on property and at his command. None of the EPCOT residents would be allowed to own property or vote. Walt would control the entire complex (including the government) and residents would pay rental, transportation, garbage collection and utility fees to Walt’s private company for the privilege of living there. Walt would have a real kingdom and get rich in the process. He died before he could pull it off. :wave:

Wow I have learned more about Walt Disney from your comments than from any of the many books and interviews I have read over the years. His diabolical plan to get rich off of the garbage collection fees of his "subjects" is just fascinating. Thank God he was stopped by cancer or who knows how far he could have gone in his endless quest for wealth and power. :wave:

 

[Clever Name]

The assumption you made is that the purpose of EPCOT would have been to establish a labor pool. Also the myth that Disney would have "been" the government is completely untrue. The special government situation was established for WDW even though EPCOT never was built and it is till in effect today, we know it as Reedy Creek Improvement District. There are indeed people living within the district and they are allowed to vote.

Walt’s main interest in EPCOT was replicating the Walt Disney Enterprises (WED) deal that he had run in California. As you know, the original WED deal was fraught with fraud and Roy Disney forced Walt to come clean and stop defrauding the shareholders before the entire company got sued.

This time around Walt wanted to recreate a legal and above board version of WED in Florida. The Florida state legislature gave him more than enough power to make his dream come true. This time around Walt would legally own the entire transportation system with right of way. If necessary, he could authorize the government to subsidize the transportation system!

It would have been nice to see a legal version of WED but unfortunately Walt died shortly after he settled all the fraud problems with the original WED and he only got as far as RETLAW. I think WED II (or whatever he may have called it) would have been excellent! :wave:

 

[Clever Name]

Wow I have learned more about Walt Disney from your comments than from any of the many books and interviews I have read over the years. His diabolical plan to get rich off of the garbage collection fees of his "subjects" is just fascinating. Thank God he was stopped by cancer or who knows how far he could have gone in his endless quest for wealth and power. :wave:

Nothing wrong with Walt getting rich in a legal fashion. He was working in that direction. It was unfortunate that he died. He could have done a lot more good things. :wave:

 

[DisneyJoe]

Walt’s main interest in EPCOT was replicating the Walt Disney Enterprises (WED) deal that he had run in California. As you know, the original WED deal was fraught with fraud and Roy Disney forced Walt to come clean and stop defrauding the shareholders before the entire company got sued.

This time around Walt wanted to recreate a legal and above board version of WED in Florida. The Florida state legislature gave him more than enough power to make his dream come true. This time around Walt would legally own the entire transportation system with right of way. If necessary, he could authorize the government to subsidize the transportation system!

It would have been nice to see a legal version of WED but unfortunately Walt died shortly after he settled all the fraud problems with the original WED and he only got as far as RETLAW. I think WED II (or whatever he may have called it) would have been excellent! :wave:

I'd love for you to point me to sources for your material; books etc as I've never heard your version of Walt's dreams after reading at least 5 books on his life.

 

[donsullivan]

Can someone draw me on a map on how far out the disney property extends? i was just curious on how much land they have surrounding the area. thanks!

The most accurate data available can be found on the Reedy Creek Improvement District website. This is the governmental entity responsible for all of the property we know as Walt Disney World. You can also ready the charters of the two cities included in the property and get a little data about the structure of the government of the property.

Take a look at the 2020 Comp Plan and you'll get answers to pretty much any question you could possibly imagine about the land, how much is currently developed, how much is left, how much is reserved as a preserve, etc.. They refresh this every 10 years by state law so that plan will be pretty accurate to where things are right now since there haven't been any major changes to the land ownership in the last 2 years. It's a 42MB file and their website isn't terribly fast so it will take a while to download.

One of the things you'll see is that there are a few fragments of land outside of the typical boundaries we all know that they manage and it also shows what was ceded from the district that is now part of Celebration.

 

[Clever Name]

I'd love for you to point me to sources for your material; books etc as I've never heard your version of Walt's dreams after reading at least 5 books on his life.

For more information read chapter 24 of Bob Thomas’ book, Building a Company: Roy O.Disney and the Creation of an Entertainment Empire (Hyperion, 1998). The bottom line is that Walt defrauded the shareholders for many years. Roy saved Walt from a lawsuit that would have ruined both of them.

You might also want to read Neal Gabler’s book, Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination (Knoft, 2006). It provides a lot of good information and specifically covers the fact that WED was a secret company that operated within the studio.

 

[WondersOfLife]

When I was 10 they said they had enough space to build another theme park... Would love a good retro-Disney movie themed park

-WondersOfLife


The last original pavilion. :king:

 

[Tom Morrow]

They have room for, I would guess, two or three more theme parks. But that will never happen and should never happen (at least not until each park is fully fleshed out).

 

[s8film40]

The most accurate data available can be found on the Reedy Creek Improvement District website. This is the governmental entity responsible for all of the property we know as Walt Disney World. You can also ready the charters of the two cities included in the property and get a little data about the structure of the government of the property.

Take a look at the 2020 Comp Plan and you'll get answers to pretty much any question you could possibly imagine about the land, how much is currently developed, how much is left, how much is reserved as a preserve, etc.. They refresh this every 10 years by state law so that plan will be pretty accurate to where things are right now since there haven't been any major changes to the land ownership in the last 2 years. It's a 42MB file and their website isn't terribly fast so it will take a while to download.

One of the things you'll see is that there are a few fragments of land outside of the typical boundaries we all know that they manage and it also shows what was ceded from the district that is now part of Celebration.

This isn't exactly accurate to the Disney owned property. The RCID encompasses areas of land that Disney does not own and also Disney owns land outside of the district boundaries. There is a lot of information in those plans though.

 

[donsullivan]

This isn't exactly accurate to the Disney owned property. The RCID encompasses areas of land that Disney does not own and also Disney owns land outside of the district boundaries. There is a lot of information in those plans though.

Too many link options on the web site to cover them all. Most people don't really care about the random non-adjacent land that Disney owns like the former Walker Ranch but this map includes all of those properties at a very high level as well.

 

[maxairmike]

The assumption you made is that the purpose of EPCOT would have been to establish a labor pool. Also the myth that Disney would have "been" the government is completely untrue. The special government situation was established for WDW even though EPCOT never was built and it is till in effect today, we know it as Reedy Creek Improvement District. There are indeed people living within the district and they are allowed to vote.

They're allowed to vote, sure, but they're all of about 60, and together own maybe 5 acres, which is...5 votes to Disney's what, several thousand? Oh, and you won't sniff those trailer homes in either "city" unless you're connected to the mouse in some way. They can vote, but you can be sure they're not going to go against what RCID - and thus Disney - wants to do with the property*

Believe me, Orange and Osceola are still ticked off about what the state allowed Disney to do (because of Disney's empty promises to the governor, etc. that EPCOT was going to happen in it's conceptual form, even though by that time it was already all but certain it was never really going to be), and Osceola especially is still dealing with it (although to a lesser extent) with school situations created by Celebration and the underemployed workforce that lives here in the area.

*Not to say that's a bad thing, or evil, but your portrayal is much more generous and kind to the District and Company than reality. It is neither evil nor good, but it is also far from neutral. The District exists for the sole benefit of the Company, no matter what you may hear otherwise. They're no more like a real city/county government in an obligation to "the people" than when they were created.

 

[s8film40]

They're allowed to vote, sure, but they're all of about 60, and together own maybe 5 acres, which is...5 votes to Disney's what, several thousand? Oh, and you won't sniff those trailer homes in either "city" unless you're connected to the mouse in some way. They can vote, but you can be sure they're not going to go against what RCID - and thus Disney - wants to do with the property*

Believe me, Orange and Osceola are still ticked off about what the state allowed Disney to do (because of Disney's empty promises to the governor, etc. that EPCOT was going to happen in it's conceptual form, even though by that time it was already all but certain it was never really going to be), and Osceola especially is still dealing with it (although to a lesser extent) with school situations created by Celebration and the underemployed workforce that lives here in the area.

*Not to say that's a bad thing, or evil, but your portrayal is much more generous and kind to the District and Company than reality. It is neither evil nor good, but it is also far from neutral. The District exists for the sole benefit of the Company, no matter what you may hear otherwise. They're no more like a real city/county government in an obligation to "the people" than when they were created.

Yes, but the district was formed to support a much larger population. This population would certainly have had restrictions unlike any other community, but it's not quite as ominous as every one makes it out to be. Yes people would have been able to vote and sure it would have been a restrictive community but with a larger population comes a lot more exposure of the circumstances to the public to keep it in check. Ultimately as well the residents of this city would be an essential part of the operation of the city and they would have needed to keep things beneficial to the residents or they would simply leave and the city would fail. Also with the EPCOT plan it would have created a large number of very high income jobs since the industrial complex pavilions would have essentially been the R&D departments for many of the worlds leading companies.

 

[WDW Monorail]

Here is a better, more detailed image.

 

[Clever Name]

Walt felt that EPCOT should be grounded in a concern "with the public need." To serve this need EPCOT would be "an experimental city that would incorporate the best ideas of industry, government, and academia worldwide, a city that caters to the people as a service function. It will be a planned, controlled community, a showcase for American industry and research, schools, cultural and educational opportunities. In EPCOT there will be no slum areas because we won't let them develop. There will be no landowners and therefore no voting control. People will rent houses instead of buying them, and at modest rentals. There will be no retirees; everyone must be employed." He concluded that "people still want to live like human beings."

Disney Legend Marvin Davis said, "Walt's thought was that in order to maintain the original philosophy of keeping this an experimental prototype, it would have to be something that was pretty much controlled by the company...This is something that we never really discuss very much publicly...In order to have the control that is necessary there, you would just about eliminate the possibility of having a voting community. Because the minute they start voting, then you lose control, and that's the end of the possibility of experimental development!" You can find that quote in Michael Barrier’s biography of Walt Disney entitled, “The Animated Man: A Life of Walt Disney (2007, Simpson Book in the Humanities).

Anyone familiar with EPCOT knows that the entire city was designed around its transportation system. Monorails and WEDWay PeopleMovers were the form of transportation. Guess who was going to own and run those transportation systems? There is nothing wrong with Walt making a huge fortune from the EPCOT project. It’s all part of capitalism. However, when people deny that his intent was to make a lot of money, there is no evidence to support that this was intended to be a charitable operation.

 

[lazyboy97o]

EPCOT was not to be home to permanent residents. People from the participating corporations would have sent employees to do a short stint at EPCOT, but they were not supposed to establish residency there, thus the issue of voting was avoided.

The monorail and WEDway PeopleMover were also not the only means of transit. A car could still be used. The idea though was to reverse a trend that still exists to this day, that mass transit does not become popular until there is major traffic. Look at any city with a robust and well used transit system, the roads are still jammed. EPCOT was trying to demonstrate a means of design that would make transit systems preferable before near-constant gridlock.

 

[Clever Name]

All the better that the residents were temporary. The objective was so Walt would make a lot of money with his ownership of the entire transit system. Of course cars could be used, but the city was designed so that cars would not be the primary form of transport. He would also make money from property rental, garbage disposal and other services that he would decide to own and operate. The prime objective was to make money.

 

[lazyboy97o]

Part of the issue with getting good urban design and planning initiatives completed is the massive costs involved. Showing that these ideas could work without being a sinkhole goes right along with the Florida Project making money. Even then, most were not convinced that EPCOT alone would be financially stable, thus the inclusion of the theme park area as the sort of guaranteed golden goose.

 

[Clever Name]

You are exactly right. The promise of Disneyland East was a tremendous lure that Walt used expertly to cajole the Florida legislature and the governor to get the power he needed to carry out his plans. Let’s also not forget that Walt had just finished with the 1964 New York World’s Fair. The fair itself was a dismal failure but Walt came out of the entire fiasco looking like a genius.

He was able to get Pepsi, GE, Ford and the State of Illinois to spend huge sums of money on exhibits that would later be used in Disneyland and the MK. Walt was first and foremost a salesman. The money that he extracted from his world’s fair sponsors (while legendary) was really just a warm up for his EPCOT pitch. Unfortunately, we only got to see the first part of his sales pitch in which he totally overwhelmed the State of Florida.

It’s a shame that we didn’t get to see Walt draw in the big corporate sponsors at EPCOT. His prodigious salesmanship would have surly made EPCOT a success while also making Walt very rich in the process.

 

[flavious27]

Can someone draw me on a map on how far out the disney property extends? i was just curious on how much land they have surrounding the area. thanks!

 

[Imagineer Mitch]

thanks!!