DisneylandForward

[BrianLo]

Hahah. Our winters can get cold. More mild than most of the country of course but most locals wouldn’t be participating. I’m sure folks from the Mid West would be out there hard nipples and all.

And an indoor water park should be a non starter. They re gross.

I realized I actually answered my question. We were there March 10-12 last year. We had 20’s and sunny days but my family had flight issues. The pool was busy.

Of course our pool day was mid teens at best and raining. We had a great time in the pool.

Yes we are weirdos. But a water park is being built to be accretive for tourists ultimately and encourage their length of stay, it’s not for locals. Which is probably why this is not a receptive crowd. It’s really not that different than the Orlando model. I definitely do not think Anaheim requires something full indoors at all. Just heat the water and have some hot tubs.

 

[coffeefan]

Do not doubt the Canadian will.

But honestly, is it that different than Florida? Asking that earnestly.

As a SoCal local, anything below 70F is cold and sweater weather. Since DL is primarily a locals park, Disney would need tourists to keep it afloat during those stretches.

My guess is Orlando is a different story because they get so many more tourists and snowbirds. It would be interesting to hear from Orlando locals though.

 

[mickEblu]

I realized I actually answered my question. We were there March 10-12 last year. We had 20’s and sunny days but my family had flight issues. The pool was busy.

Of course our pool day was mid teens at best and raining. We had a great time in the pool.

Yes we are weirdos. But a water park is being built to be accretive for tourists ultimately and encourage their length of stay, it’s not for locals. Which is probably why this is not a receptive crowd. It’s really not that different than the Orlando model. I definitely do not think Anaheim requires something full indoors at all. Just heat the water and have some hot tubs.

Where is there?

Mid teens as in 15 degrees?

Florida has milder winters and more importantly WDW has a lot more land. We both know Disney isn’t going to use that precious real estate for a park that would need to be closed half the year and/ or exclude a huge of percentage of their guests/ potential revenue. I don’t think a water park that’s not even attached to the main property is convincing anyone of booking a vacation that wasn’t already going to book anyway. Now I do think having a mini “water park” at one of the hotels would be a good idea.

 

[BrianLo]

Where is there?

Mid teens as in 15 degrees?

Florida has milder winters and more importantly WDW has a lot more land. We both know Disney isn’t going to use that precious real estate for a park that would need to be closed half the year and/ or exclude a huge of percentage of their guests/ potential revenue. I don’t think a water park that’s not even attached to the main property is convincing anyone of booking a vacation that wasn’t already going to book anyway. Now I do think having a mini “water park” at one of the hotels would be a good idea.

Disneyland, celcius. Yes, the Florida parks close a handful of days a year too. How many days a year do the hotel pools close?

It basically is a water park for hotel guests. It’s not about convincing people to book, it’s about length of stay. The metrics on a water parks success are about 1/5th of modern DCA.

 

[mickEblu]

Disneyland, celcius. Yes, the Florida parks close a handful of days a year too. How many days a year do the hotel pools close?

It basically is a water park for hotel guests. It’s not about convincing people to book, it’s about length of stay. The metrics on a water parks success are about 1/5th of modern DCA.

Oh lol. Was confused there for a second. I’m not sure as the I’ve only stayed at the onsite hotels about 5 or 6 times and when we do happen to go in the winter we weren’t interested in the pool. But I can say we did “enjoy” / tolerate a freezing cold pool day at Pixar Place pool in January 2025. Just to say we did the whole experience as we were convinced we’d never stay there again. I’d imagine the hotel pools never close as they are a main amenity.

 

[mickEblu]

It’s not about convincing people to book, it’s about length of stay. The metrics on a water parks success are about 1/5th of modern DCA.

That’s fair but is a small percentage of guests maybe extending their stay by one day for 1/3 of the year really the move? On the last sizeable piece of real estate you have in Anaheim?

 

[Disney Irish]

I needed a little refresher in some of my GIS skills, and this was fun!

SO! PER the list from the website you provided, these were listed-
Orange County Water Parks
- Great Wolf Lodge Indoor Water Park (Garden Grove, CA)
Certainly a waterpark and well within the proclaimed 15 mile radius. ONE
- Knott’s Soak City (Buena Park, CA)
Certainly a waterpark and well within the proclaimed 15 mile radius. TWO
- Wild Rivers – (Irvine, CA)
Certainly a waterpark and right at the edge of the 15 mile radius. THREE
- Adventure Lagoon Aqua Park (Anaheim, CA)
This is a retention basin with a floating obstacle course on it... this is a hard sell as what the American public would fully refer to as a 'water park'.
- Adventure Playground (Huntington Beach, CA)
This is a dirt pond where kids can float on a piece of wood or slide down loose plastic sheeting into the mud. Again, hard sell for what any sane person is considering a 'water park' especially being we're talking about Disney on this forum...
- Aliso Viejo Aquatic Center (Aliso Viejo, CA)
This is outside the 15 mile limit
- Camelot Golfland – Water slides now closed, bumper boats only (Anaheim, CA)
By its own admission, this just is a bumper boat ride.
- Montanoso Recreation Center (Mission Viejo, CA)
This is outside the 15 mile limit
- Newport Dunes Waterpark (Newport Beach, CA)
This is another body of water with a floating obstable course on it... again, a hard sell as what the American public would fully refer to as a 'water park'.
- Splash! Buccaneer Bay (La Mirada, CA)
Sure thing, a waterpark and within the proclaimed 15 mile radius. FOUR
Los Angeles Water Parks
- Hurricane Harbor Water Park – Six Flags (Valencia, CA)
Well outside the 15 mile radius.
- Raging Waters (San Dimas, CA)
Outside the 15 mile radius.
- Dry Town Water Park (Palmdale, CA)
Well outside the 15 mile radius.
- Hansen Dam Aquatic Center – Water Slide (Lake View Terrace, CA)
Well outside the 15 mile radius.
- Santa Clarita Aquatic Center (Santa Clarita, CA)
Well outside the 15 mile radius.
- Seaside Lagoon (Redondo Beach, CA)
Outside the 15 mile radius.
- Universal Studios – Super Silly Fun Land (Universal City, CA)
Outside the 15 mile radius.
- Wibit Inflatable Aquatic Playground (Long Beach, CA)
Again, an inflatable obstacle course etc.

I kept out anything from San Diego, Riverside, or San Bernardino counties, because anything would be outside the 15 mile radius.

SO... what we have, within a 15 mile radius of Disneyland, is a grand total of FOUR water parks. This makes your statement- "There are literally like 10 water parks within a 10-15 mile radius of Disneyland." literally false.

And how many within SoCal? I mean you listed them there, so it’s easy to count.

So I exaggerated the 10-15 miles, you got me, sue me. The point is still the same even if I got the exact mileage wrong. Californians like water parks just like any sunny state.

I’ve already tried to move on from this, so how about we do that.

 

[BrianLo]

That’s fair but is a small percentage of guests maybe extending their stay by one day for 1/3 of the year really the move? On the last sizeable piece of real estate you have in Anaheim?

At this time I think the main campus just doesn’t have the space to do a third gate justice. They’d have to compromise on the space left for DLF park expansion, hotels or a third gate.

The solutions proposed are interesting. In an ideal world Toy Story lot would be twice the size and then the campus would have room for everything. From an operational perspective I think a satellite is still preferred.

They’d certainly need to compromise on parking. A third gate warrants another 10k parking spaces. The current parking solution allows them to take their existing parking lots offline. But I don’t think they in any way account for 15M-25M more guests annually.

If Disney could buy up a significant amount of Harbour, that could change the calculus.

 

[BrianLo]

by one day for 1/3 of the year

Also this made me chuckle. Should we round it down to 1/4 next?

 

[mickEblu]

Also this made me chuckle. Should we round it down to 1/4 next?

Haha no I thought 1/3 was fair but you can round up to 1/2 the year and I think my point would still stand.

 

[MK-fan]

Let’s just put a DisneyQuest in TSL and call it a day

 

[coffeefan]

Haha no I thought 1/3 was fair but you can round up to 1/2 the year and I think my point would still stand.

Knott's Soak City is only open for four months in 2026, Hurricane Harbor, Wild Rivers, and Raging Waters are similar too, so even 1/2 the year is very fair.

 

[BrianLo]

Knott's Soak City is only open for four months in 2026, Hurricane Harbor, Wild Rivers, and Raging Waters are similar too, so even 1/2 the year is very fair.

C’mon guys, you are being a tad silly. You can currently go to Disneyland today in March and go on a water slide. They heat the water. A Disney waterpark would likely be open 350+ days a year with a few weather closures and some open marginal days.

Disney isn’t a regional operator. They aren’t building something to run 4 months a year.

 

[mlayton144]

C’mon guys, you are being a tad silly. You can currently go to Disneyland today in March and go on a water slide. They heat the water. A Disney waterpark would likely be open 350+ days a year with a few weather closures and some open marginal days.

Disney isn’t a regional operator. They aren’t building something to run 4 months a year.

I can’t imagine they would choose , of all things, a cheaper admission water park for that valuable land. Are people gonna walk in their damp bathing suits to the new EG parking lot from the TS lot area on those public roads?

 

[PiratesMansion]

As a non-SoCal visitor, the fact that most of the year it's only truly hot from ~11-5 might give me pause at committing to a water park day, no matter whose name was on the sign. If I didn't know how the day's temperatures typically progressed and I was a tourist who popped out at 10 AM to check the temperature, I might be tempted to re-evaluate my plans for the day.

Maybe it doesn't matter because that 11-5 window would naturally be the busiest time of day anyway, but I also know that I was here in December and there was absolutely nothing that could have happened to get me to go on a water ride, let alone go to a full blown water park.

Were there people at the hotel pools that day anyway? Yes. But would there be enough to make a water park viable 365 as is usually the case in Orlando? I doubt it.

I also think that with DLR you need something to appeal to the locals as well. While this site is perhaps a biased sample of locals, I don't think it's far-fetched to believe that people who live in the OC or greater LA wouldn't be convinced unless Disney built the DisneySea of water parks.

 

[BrianLo]

Are people gonna walk in their damp bathing suits to the new EG parking lot from the TS lot area on those public roads?

I’m sensing this cognitive error occurring that people think the Eastern Gateway is being overbuilt for current needs.

Whatever occurs down in Toy Story lot will require its own parking solutions. The bigger conceptually you go, the more parking it requires and therefore the less usable space or greater expense they’ll require to go more vertical.

 

[Gusey]

A big thing against Disney building another water park is that they seem to not invest much in the current WDW theme parks beside their annual maintenance (and only just decided to operate two at the same time). Since Blizzard Beach opened 30+ years ago, those parks have only added 2 slides (Crush 'n' Gusher and Miss Adventure Falls). To be fair, Volcano Bay at Universal has also not opened any new slides yet and it turns 10 next year, so it's not just a Disney thing. I feel like if they did decide to build a waterpark at Disneyland, they would just build it and not add anything to it for decades

 

[mickEblu]

C’mon guys, you are being a tad silly. You can currently go to Disneyland today in March and go on a water slide. They heat the water. A Disney waterpark would likely be open 350+ days a year with a few weather closures and some open marginal days.

Disney isn’t a regional operator. They aren’t building something to run 4 months a year.

You’re going to compare a water slide at a hotel or two water rides (both of which have drastically lower wait times in the winter) to Disney using their last piece of sizeable real estate on a water park? lol cmon man. A Disney water park in California would never be open all year because it would never happen. Definitely not on the Toy Story lot. And if it did happen it wouldn’t justify the cost of operation for 1/2 the year.

 

[Distorian]

Water parks just aren't interesting. You might think they are, but they're just not.

 

[britain]

Water parks just aren't interesting. You might think they are, but they're just not.

A waterpark doesn’t need to be interesting enough to get people to GO to DLR, it just needs to be interesting enough to get people to stay another day.