Disneyland's Main Street or Magic Kingdom's Main Street?

[__r.jr]

Ironic how Disney loves to utilize the term "immersive" to the point of ad nauseum when describing new developmental concepts for its theme park resorts. Yet over the past few decades, what is known it be the first act in its domestic castle parks betrays the weight of that term.

At the risk of sounding hyperbolic, it certainly falls in line what other recent aesthetic desecrations have occurred whether it be the botched forced perspective and architectural redesign in New Orleans Square or the poorly excusable removal of the elemental Waterfall Garden in the Polynesian Village Resort. For me the sticking point has always been not just the dramatic desecrations, but the death by a thousand cuts that have denuded many areas of the resorts and/or parks. Main Street, U.S.A. is the prime example.

Speaking on the general conceptual execution of Main Street, U.S.A. (and not one specifically to any castle park here in the States) it once contained a working bank, the Walt Disney Story, a place to have an old-fashioned photograph taken, a card/book shop, a clock shop, a candle shop, a tobacconist, a magic shop, a flower market, and a cinema showing cartoons. All that fit or came close to the time period. All these establishments were involved to hold conviction for us to believe the environment Disney was attempting to idealize and romanticize is real; to immerse us in a typical late 19th century business thoroughfare, with civic institutions and commerce, where the guest could feel one was actually taking part.

Now it’s generally a little more than a themed shopping mall for Disney merchandise and a backdrop for parades. For many that doesn’t matter. It’s an attitude I have a difficult time understanding. It matters to myself, to others, to the original WED Imagineers... It mattered to Walt Disney.

We live in a time where many people seem to have no historical or aesthetic context for understanding their own experiences. And with the continued thematic immersion erosion to Main Street, it proves just that.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

Disneyland's is mainly superior because in the Summer of '85 the rare limited Return to Oz float graced the brick-less pavement to the bewilderment of guests. And now you can walk that same street with the knowledge that Jack Pumpkinhead and Dorothy's chicken were once there. There's just no history at the other parks.

Paint the Night needs this ASAP

 

[Little Green Men]

Wow. It always amazes me when I hear something new. How many people actually get haircuts there?

I have! Very nice cast members in there with the Disney touch. Always been happy with my haircut too.

 

[NiarrNDisney]

Disneyland's Mainstreet has more to do and isnt just one large shopping center

 

[fctiger]

First off I agree with others DLP is easily the best by a mile!

But yes when comparing the domestic parks DL is the clear winner for me. I just love that there is stuff like the cinema, the art gallery (I don't think anyone mentioned that), the DL museum and Lincoln. It feels like there is more than just shopping and eating. Its also the place that has Walt's old apartment. I do miss the old Marketplace coffee shop but I can't deny how popular Starbucks is there. I just wish there was a way it could've looked like before. But outside of that one grumble DL MS is still pretty cool and a place you can explore in its own right without doing any shopping.

MK does look nice though but it doesn't have the stuff DL has.

 

[yeti]

Magic Kingdom voters, tell us why, because otherwise I'm assuming you haven't actually been to Disneyland.

Because it's the one I grew up with.

 

[DisneyAndUniversalFan]

Because it's the one I grew up with.

nostalgia shouldn’t count. think i might change the rule.

 

[dweezil78]

Speaking on the general conceptual execution of Main Street, U.S.A. (and not one specifically to any castle park here in the States) it once contained a working bank, the Walt Disney Story, a place to have an old-fashioned photograph taken, a card/book shop, a clock shop, a candle shop, a tobacconist, a magic shop, a flower market, and a cinema showing cartoons. All that fit or came close to the time period. All these establishments were involved to hold convection for us to believe the environment Disney was attempting to idealize and romanticize is real; to immerse us in a typical late 19th century business thoroughfare, with civic institutions and commerce, where the guest could feel one was actually taking part.

You're forgetting a fairly important point though -- in 1955, a turn of the century Main St. was still a familiar setting to many people who were alive at the time and evoked some serious feelings of nostalgia. It'd be like having a 70s themed land today. That obviously is no longer the case. We're now almost 65 years further away from that era than we were in 1955. Very few guests alive in 2018 has the kind of association that guests in 1955 would have had with Main St. USA.

Is it a bummer there are fewer specialty stores and so many Disney specific stores? Well, sure. But in 2018, what do guests want more -- to walk into the equivalent of a small strip mall with different stores (after literally just walking by a big one) or be surrounded by all things Disney?

And all that aside, 2018's Disneyland Main Street still features an old school firehouse, a richly detailed Emporium with cool era-specific displays inside and out, a magic shop, a movie theatre, and opera house w/ an AA president, a little cafe, an ice cream shop, a candy shop w/ freshly made candy and a Welte Organ, a coffee shop, an art gallery, a working train station, WALT'S APARTMENT, period appropriate transportation, and more stuff I'm too lazy to type out at 12am.

So yeah, there's no bra shop anymore... I guess you can say it's been denuded. The main reason most of that early stuff existed in the first place was because Walt and Roy didn't have anything planned to go into those Main Street stores and they knew they could make some extra $$$ on the side by leasing out the property to real businesses for as long as they needed to. It was a decision made out of necessity and smart business sense.

 

[Phroobar]

On my recent trip to Yellowstone, we came across many little towns that had a main street that looked a lot like Disneyland's. Sure most large city dwellers have no concept of small town America but it still exists in the mid west and elsewhere. You just have to get out of your comfort zone, travel and do more than see large corporate vacation destinations.

 

[mikenatcity1]

If you liked the look of DLP's, you should also check out HKDL's. A near clone of Disneyland's Main Street except it swaps the brick sidewalks for the brick road like DLP. The mountains in the background behind the castle are beautiful too. A shame their new castle will probably block that view out when it's completed.

Wow! That's beautiful I wish I could have seen it before the castle change

 

[lazyboy97o]

But in 2018, what do guests want more -- to walk into the equivalent of a small strip mall with different stores (after literally just walking by a big one) or be surrounded by all things Disney

Ah yes, the ridiculous notion that theme has no place in a theme park and that storytelling is somehow not “Disney.”

 

[Phroobar]

Wow! That's beautiful I wish I could have seen it before the castle change

Not one person in that picture has any conception or attachment to the environment they are in. It's as alien to them as Baatu is to us.

 

[dweezil78]

Ah yes, the ridiculous notion that theme has no place in a theme park and that storytelling is somehow not “Disney.”

I never said that in the slightest. Thanks for not taking the time to read my post before you mounted your high and mighty horse.

 

[lazyboy97o]

I never said that in the slightest. Thanks for not taking the time to read my post before you mounted your high and mighty horse.

Your statement only makes sense if Main Street, USA was somehow not surrounding people in Disney, that it needed to be more Disney.

 

[HauntedPirate]

Wow. It always amazes me when I hear something new. How many people actually get haircuts there?

I and all three of my sons have gotten haircuts there over the years. After a haircut, we went to Mickey's Backyard BBQ, where a CM made the comment - "Tinkerbell done throwed up in your hair!".

 

[HauntedPirate]

I've been to WDW more times than I can now remember, and have been to DL once. DL's Main Street still wins in my book. Walt's apartment. 'Nuff said.

 

[mickEblu]

I and all three of my sons have gotten haircuts there over the years. After a haircut, we went to Mickey's Backyard BBQ, where a CM made the comment - "Tinkerbell done throwed up in your hair!".

Lol

 

[dweezil78]

Your statement only makes sense if Main Street, USA was somehow not surrounding people in Disney, that it needed to be more Disney.

I made multiple statements -- you chose to extract one and assume my entire POV on Main St. was exclusive of that single thought. I also said that Main St. is still full of shops and features that are still of that era and fit within the theme. But I do still stand by the remark you're pointing out, that with more shopping options than ever before both offline (especially in Southern Calfiornia) and online, people don't really want to go to Disneyland park to do niche shopping -- especially shopping focused on turn-of-the-century style shops.

Also consider that when Disneyland first opened, guests could pretty much enter the park for next-to-nothing and paid per attraction. Main St. then would have been considered a valid shopping destination in an area with far less options than there are today. Guests could visit and shop without feeling the need to spend more money elsewhere in the park. In a sense, it served as the Downtown Disney of its day.

 

[Kram Sacul]

Your statement only makes sense if Main Street, USA was somehow not surrounding people in Disney, that it needed to be more Disney.

Reminds me of the vague plans of the clueless CEO to make Epcot “more Disney”. Most likely the same way they made Paradise Pier more Pixar.

 

[BD-Anaheim]

I have to come down on the WDW Main St side. The Victorian architecture is more grand and the forced scale works better to the build up to Cinderella’s castle (whereas in comparison the DL castle can seem a bit swallowed up). WDWs Crystal Palace and the grand staircase to the train station are also winners.

Despite the redesign, the staging area in front of Cinderella’s castle, complete with the moat, is more impressive. In comparison, it can get cramped and claustrophobic in front of Snow Whites castle due to crowd and space issues.