News EPCOT Parking Plaza refurbishment?

tparris

Well-Known Member
Visiting the park today, I noticed two small new details on the parking plaza structure/signage. First of all (also the more insignificant change of the two), they’ve seemingly wrapped or changed the entire Alucobond(?) panel for the Disney Transport logo to change it from the old logo to the newer one. They also updated the clearance lettering (and the building address number) to the new EPCOT typeface. First picture is from @wdwmagic taken when the sign was installed and the second photo was taken by me today. You can see the panel with the new Disney Transport logo is much cleaner looking than the rest of the structure.
157C76E0-F3D6-40F6-9B2C-556F9D275BD8.jpeg
8A0B815A-E835-44D3-83E7-9851F1F4A215.jpeg

The second change I noticed leads me to believe they’re not quite done here yet and may be adding more elements to the signage. When the main EPCOT logo sign was installed, there was nothing else on or around it, but today I noticed two poles of some sort protruding upwards from either end of the sign. I’m thinking they’re planning on adding something else to the sign, perhaps the classic five-ring flower logo? First photo is again from wdwmagic, second photo from me.
E2C9826E-4B95-47C8-B7C2-F2F8553DD60F.jpeg
7312D8F9-899C-4441-9E1A-6F459B9ABFFD.jpeg
 

wdwmagic

Administrator
Moderator
Premium Member
Original Poster
Visiting the park today, I noticed two small new details on the parking plaza structure/signage. First of all (also the more insignificant change of the two), they’ve seemingly wrapped or changed the entire Alucobond(?) panel for the Disney Transport logo to change it from the old logo to the newer one. They also updated the clearance lettering (and the building address number) to the new EPCOT typeface. First picture is from @wdwmagic taken when the sign was installed and the second photo was taken by me today. You can see the panel with the new Disney Transport logo is much cleaner looking than the rest of the structure.View attachment 695607View attachment 695608
The second change I noticed leads me to believe they’re not quite done here yet and may be adding more elements to the signage. When the main EPCOT logo sign was installed, there was nothing else on or around it, but today I noticed two poles of some sort protruding upwards from either end of the sign. I’m thinking they’re planning on adding something else to the sign, perhaps the classic five-ring flower logo? First photo is again from wdwmagic, second photo from me.View attachment 695611View attachment 695612
Great spots!

Definitely lightning rods on the EPCOT sign.
 

trainplane3

Well-Known Member
Visited today. There is just not good contrast of the “Welcome” lettering and the concrete behind. They only get readable when you get close. Unlike the blue letters. Not very welcoming.
Concrete? Those are alucobond panels. Though I can understand why you'd see them like that. They look filthy and should've been washed prior to the new signage going on.
 

Epcot82Guy

Well-Known Member
aside from the nice new booths, the rest looks grimy and awful, not impressed with the marquee either, I don't know.🤷‍♂️
I think it would be a pretty easy fix. Love it or hate it, they could easily do an arch in the style behind the Walt statue, using the triangles, or any number of designs - and it would do wonders. Plus a good, old-fashioned cleaning/refurb, as you noted.

They aren't really going with stark modernism/minimalism any longer, so I don't know that a stark/modernist approach on the entry works either. It looks a little more "plain" than "sleek", IMHO. But, again, a relatively easy fix.
 

Andrew25

Well-Known Member
I'm willing to sacrifice one E-ticket for some sort of parking lot(s) enhancement project that provides shade to and from your walk to the park.
 

jeanericuser001

Well-Known Member
I'm willing to sacrifice one E-ticket for some sort of parking lot(s) enhancement project that provides shade to and from your walk to the park.
God I hope you are not suggesting disney consider a parking garage like universal. Its bad enough having that many people in the park at once when the parking lot is full but doubling it or more could be quite insane.
 

Andrew25

Well-Known Member
God I hope you are not suggesting disney consider a parking garage like universal. Its bad enough having that many people in the park at once when the parking lot is full but doubling it or more could be quite insane.
No, I just want them to add a shade structure like those found at Disneyland Paris. With the parks becoming less popular to attend in the summer, I'd imagine they're gonna be forced at some point to improve the guest experience during those brutal months.

Also not sure what the issue is with Universal's garages? They take up a smaller space than Disney's expansive lots, provide shade, and require less walking as it's more compact.
 

jeanericuser001

Well-Known Member
No, I just want them to add a shade structure like those found at Disneyland Paris. With the parks becoming less popular to attend in the summer, I'd imagine they're gonna be forced at some point to improve the guest experience during those brutal months.

Also not sure what the issue is with Universal's garages? They take up a smaller space than Disney's expansive lots, provide shade, and require less walking as it's more compact.
Let me put this in perspective. The parking lots provide proportional space equal to what a park can handle. The greater the size of the park the greater the size of the parking lot. Universal prior to their garages had a much smaller amount of people in the parks due to less parking. Thanks to the garages they greatly increased the overall amount of people that could be in the parks. Some times greater than what the park itself can actually handle. Now imagine epcot with a massive multi-layer parking garage. Some disney stockholders would relish such a thing as the added money from parking combined with ticket prices would only increase profits but for anyone inside the park it would be shoulder to shoulder every single second. Ride waits for even something as simple as journey into imagination could be unimaginably high. If you have been there during the busiest days its already bad enough as it is but if disney got the incentive to add even more people it would make things even crazier. That is why I am fine with just keeping it in the old school fashion. Disney has a perfect ratio of parking/park visitor. The last thing we need is a lot more people entering the park than what it can handle.
 

J4546

Well-Known Member
solar panel shade structures would do wonders for all the disney parking lots, but start at epcot please. The shade alone would be fantastic, but also generating power is a plus, and with all the surface area of those lots I bet youdd genereate wuite a bit of power, maybe enough to power a percentage of each park off their parking lots?
 

Andrew25

Well-Known Member
Let me put this in perspective. The parking lots provide proportional space equal to what a park can handle. The greater the size of the park the greater the size of the parking lot. Universal prior to their garages had a much smaller amount of people in the parks due to less parking. Thanks to the garages they greatly increased the overall amount of people that could be in the parks. Some times greater than what the park itself can actually handle. Now imagine epcot with a massive multi-layer parking garage. Some disney stockholders would relish such a thing as the added money from parking combined with ticket prices would only increase profits but for anyone inside the park it would be shoulder to shoulder every single second. Ride waits for even something as simple as journey into imagination could be unimaginably high. If you have been there during the busiest days its already bad enough as it is but if disney got the incentive to add even more people it would make things even crazier. That is why I am fine with just keeping it in the old school fashion. Disney has a perfect ratio of parking/park visitor. The last thing we need is a lot more people entering the park than what it can handle.
Oh, this is not what I thought you meant lol. Disney has no need for a parking garage, as they have more than enough parking spaces available at each park. I thought you were comparing the difference between a surface lot to a parking garage.

solar panel shade structures would do wonders for all the disney parking lots, but start at epcot please. The shade alone would be fantastic, but also generating power is a plus, and with all the surface area of those lots I bet youdd genereate wuite a bit of power, maybe enough to power a percentage of each park off their parking lots?
Oh this would be fantastic if possible. Legoland did it a few years ago, would love to see WDW do it.
 

Register on WDWMAGIC. This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.

Back
Top Bottom