Fifth Park

DrPepper44

DrPepper44

New Member
Original Poster
I'm a newbie to this forum so dont' hate me if this has been answered a million times!

But I've heard rumors recently from some developers in Florida that there is a HUGE amount of spae next to DW and I was wondering if there have been any updates about a possible fifth park.

Especially with prices going up at the main parks and competition at Universal rising, do you think there's a chance they'd push for a fifth park anytime soon??? I've always been a fan of the Dark Kingdom concept but I'm just curious
 
B

Bob Harlem

Well-Known Member
Mr Ferret 88 said:
Care to elaborate on your response ?
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2 underbuilt parks and 1 needing an overhaul on the front half.

In short the ride count DAK and DHS vs Magic Kingdom.

Or even ride count of DHS and DAK (even post upcoming expansion) against Universal/Islands of Adventure. Or even more dramatic California Adventure and Disneyland and you'll see why the 5th park idea is an immediate no for some.
 
Kamikaze

Kamikaze

Well-Known Member
DrPepper44 said:
But I've heard rumors recently from some developers in Florida that there is a HUGE amount of spae next to DW and I was wondering if there have been any updates about a possible fifth park.
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What do you mean by this? Disney has plenty of land to build another park on. Always have, always will. Doesn't mean that they should or will. There will not be a fifth gate in the next 10 years. Probably next 20 years.

And yes, every question you can think of has been asked a million times.
The monorail is not getting expanded, to stop your next question.

Bob Harlem said:
2 underbuilt parks and 1 needing an overhaul on the front path.

In short ride count DAK and DHS vs Magic Kingdom.

Or even ride count of DHS and DAK (even post upcoming expansion) against Universal/Islands of Adventure. Or even more dramatic California Adventure and Disneyland and you'll see why the 5th park idea is an immediate no for some.
Click to expand...

You don't even have to go through all of that. Disneyland Park by itself has more attractions than all of WDW combined.
 
BigRedDad

BigRedDad

Well-Known Member
First and foremost is to agree that Disney owns a ton of land still undeveloped. I would say more than 50% of the land there is not developed. The chances of them building another park is WAY down the list of things they would use the space for. The first things they would use the space for is more DVC resorts. They are making a killing off them compared to what they make off the parks. They can spring up new DVC resorts, charge $20,000 for the membership, and get 20,000 people to buy them, that covers the cost of building it. Then, those 20,000 people get to pay for the maintenance and taxes for X years while Disney takes the profits. As long as there is space to build and enough people staying offsite, Disney only has to build more rooms. When they have enough rooms to fill all parks, you will see Disney make a massive change to passes. They will start to require onsite stays to go to the parks. This means they will be in control of 100% of the Disney money.
 
kap91

kap91

Well-Known Member
Severely unlikely. Disney has a hard enough time getting their guests to stay long enough to visit the four parks plus the springs and water parks. With the progress Universal has made in recent years this has gotten even more difficult.

In addition to this, as others have stated 2 of the parks are severely underdeveloped (and WDW finally seems to be starting to address that), and they're all underdeveloped when compared to Disneyland - especially when taking into account the attendance figures.

IF they were to embark on any sort of park or entertainment venue you can bet it would not be a traditional park - it would be something to take advantage of the time people ARENT spending in the parks. Not canabalize their own attendance. Aka they built Disney Springs instead of a 5th park.

Land is not the issue. There's enough space for several more parks and resorts in addition to comservtion area. And Disney is rich enough they could always buy more - though they never would need to. Disney is better off utilizing their developed land more effectively (WDW has had a bad habit in the past of wasting space-see the design of the magic kingdom) than building anything more on undeveloped property.
 
danlb_2000

danlb_2000

Premium Member
DrPepper44 said:
I'm a newbie to this forum so dont' hate me if this has been answered a million times!

But I've heard rumors recently from some developers in Florida that there is a HUGE amount of spae next to DW and I was wondering if there have been any updates about a possible fifth park.

Especially with prices going up at the main parks and competition at Universal rising, do you think there's a chance they'd push for a fifth park anytime soon??? I've always been a fan of the Dark Kingdom concept but I'm just curious
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This has not been answered a million times..... we are probably going on 2 to 3 million times by now. ;)

There was a rumor floating around a year or so ago that a fifth gate was coming to the large plot of land west of Flamingo Crossing, but that rumor came from a site that was putting some erroneous facts together to reach the conclusion. It has also become even less likely for that land because Disney has recently filed a permit to run a road right through the middle of it.
 
HauntedPirate

HauntedPirate

Park nostalgist
Premium Member
hakunamatata said:
Disney owns a ton of undeveloped land, yes. Its undeveloped because with current technology its too expensive to develope. The downside of owning swamp.
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This, a million times. I've been saying exactly that for years - Sure, there's a ton of undeveloped land, but a big percentage of it isn't suitable to build large structures on.

Besides, even if Disney wanted to build a 5th gate in Florida, the way they have gone with building in the last decade it would likely take 15 years to plan, design, and build, and it would cost $25+ billion (before overruns).
 
L

larandtra

Well-Known Member
New guy asks a reasonable question that people who dont live on Disney specific boards would wonder. I know Ive been asked numerous times by people who dont follow Disney like I do. I always smile and just say, let Disney sort out the parks they already have which need a lot of work for a multitude of reasons, and then they can talk 5th gate. Until then, it is a moot point.I simply ask, do you think the current parks in their current state are the best they can be? A resounding answer even from passive Disney people is no. And that answers why a 5th gate is not in the plans for the near future. It makes no sense from an economic perspective nor from a guest experience perspective. And that usually ends the convo there and leads them to more important things like: What are they going to do about Epcot, why is AK only a half day park and lacks attractions, why do the Studios lack attractions, when will they revamp some of MK because it is just old, etc. All the questions they should be asking rather than about a 5th gate that is unnecessary at this time. Luckily many of those questions are being answered and progress made to address those issues. That is generally the best way to answer the initial posters question and doesnt treat them like second class citizens or push them away from discussions with other Disney fans.
 
D

Disneyfamily4

Well-Known Member
We will never see a 5th park. Look how long Avatar land is taking them. Star Wars and Toy Story are projects that will take years to complete. With just portions of a park taking this long to complete, a 5th park would take 25years. At this point, Disney is content on adding to DW and DL.

I forgot to add in that the Dwarf Mine Train took about 3 yrs
 
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rob0519

rob0519

Well-Known Member
BigRedDad said:
First and foremost is to agree that Disney owns a ton of land still undeveloped. I would say more than 50% of the land there is not developed. The chances of them building another park is WAY down the list of things they would use the space for. The first things they would use the space for is more DVC resorts. They are making a killing off them compared to what they make off the parks. They can spring up new DVC resorts, charge $20,000 for the membership, and get 20,000 people to buy them, that covers the cost of building it. Then, those 20,000 people get to pay for the maintenance and taxes for X years while Disney takes the profits. As long as there is space to build and enough people staying offsite, Disney only has to build more rooms. When they have enough rooms to fill all parks, you will see Disney make a massive change to passes. They will start to require onsite stays to go to the parks. This means they will be in control of 100% of the Disney money.
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The problem with building more DVC rooms is that there is no place to put another 20,000 people in the parks. MK is bursting at the seams on some days as it is. Add more people to that mess and WDW will have a lot more unhappy customers.
 
deix15x8

deix15x8

Active Member
What is the determining factor between expansion and a new gate? While profits are obviously the reason for all expansion, the difference between the two types seems to be based on other factors. The main reason to expand is to help ease over crowding and/or long lines. If a park doesn't have enough space it is too crowded to allow more guests in (Disneyland) and if their aren't enough rides the lines are too long (Hollywood Studios). Either kind of expansion will help these two areas. The Disneyland Resort has both the first and last parks built in the US, but it seems to be the closest to adding a new gate while WDW is all about expansion right now. Obviously Disneyland is much more land locked which makes expansion of resorts a bit tougher, but they do still have some room as we're seeing with the Star Wars expansion.

As far as I can tell it seems like the fundamental design of a resort on day 1 unofficially dictates the maximum size and capacity of the resort in the future. When I was at Disneyland I was blown away by just how crowded it was at night with all the shows and parades going on and it wasn't even peak season. So while they have room to expand still, the added capacity it creates will over tax the basic infrastructure of the park to where it's even less functional than it is now. Without tearing the majority of the resort down and starting over (though MK did kind of do this with the hub) you'll never be able to fix these problems, so a third gate is the only solution. WDW seems to have a different problem though since they seem to be creating all these large expansions to boost capacity for the parks, but aren't increasing ride capacity at the same pace which is creating massive lines. It seems like for the most part, the parks can still handle a bit more capacity being added through additional expansions, but the ride capacities are where they need it most right now. If you look at this past holiday season it seems like the capacity closures were much lower than past years which means capacity is close to where it should be for WDW at the moment, but almost any day their are waits of 2-3 hours or more which should never exist. Anyone paying a couple hundred dollars for tickets will not be happy to spend hours in line for rides which hurts them in the future on repeat business. From the sounds of it, both Star Wars and Pandora are designed to boost ride capacities a bit while not increasing park capacity by much which should be good for both. Once they have the ride waits balanced nicely with a full park and on the edge of capacity for the main infrastructure, they will be ready for another gate to start increasing capacity again. If you look at Disneyland Resort at any given time, they typically are rather well balanced while often resting just on the overcrowded side at night.
 
BigRedDad

BigRedDad

Well-Known Member
rob0519 said:
The problem with building more DVC rooms is that there is no place to put another 20,000 people in the parks. MK is bursting at the seams on some days as it is. Add more people to that mess and WDW will have a lot more unhappy customers.
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It is not bursting at the seems. If they could have all 4 parks packed like they do over XMas, they would be more than happy. If they can build enough rooms onsite to make the parks Onsite Guests Only, then they can truly control who comes. They will get you for $100 a day per ticket and $200+ per night for a Value with no competition.
 

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