News Liberty Square Riverboat closing for long refurb

EricsBiscuit

EricsBiscuit

Well-Known Member
Yeah no partial drain today. Still looks beautiful though. Couldn't make it out yesterday but got here today.
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crxbrett

crxbrett

Well-Known Member
dig311dug said:
I didn't see the riverboat listed on the refurb. page on this site... it's still being rufurbed correct?
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I was just looking at DW's site and it still lists the Liberty Belle as being closed thru Aug 30th. Was the more recent refurb extension only from Jul 19th to Aug 30th, and it is indeed re-opening Aug 31st? Or is Disney just slow to updating the site? Technically fall isn't until Sep 21st, but maybe Disney just said "Fall 2018" since late Aug/early Sep is basically the beginning of their fall season at the parks.
 
Kman101

Kman101

Well-Known Member
crxbrett said:
I don't think so. I thought somebody on here had already spoken to a CM or 2 and confirmed the boiler or some other part that was being replaced/refurbed on the ship was taking longer than expected. Also, I thought they had said it was requiring divers to go into the river at night to do some repairs.

Unlike 20KLUTS, I don't think this attraction requires nearly as much upkeep and it definitely does not need the same amount of CMs to operate it. I think that (the latter) was the biggest reason they pulled the plug on 20K, as dumb as that might be.
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Yeah there were park politics at play with 20K. They deliberately had it be in poor condition to justify it's closure. Wasn't there talk of an exec being deliberately loaded into a leaking sub? Shame. MGMT sucked back then too. EDIT: They basically found a way to get rid of it without having to spend the money to update it and keep it. Sound familiar? lol
 
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dig311dug

dig311dug

Well-Known Member
crxbrett said:
I was just looking at DW's site and it still lists the Liberty Belle as being closed thru Aug 30th. Was the more recent refurb extension only from Jul 19th to Aug 30th, and it is indeed re-opening Aug 31st? Or is Disney just slow to updating the site? Technically fall isn't until Sep 21st, but maybe Disney just said "Fall 2018" since late Aug/early Sep is basically the beginning of their fall season at the parks.
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hopefully aug 31 it's back running! woo
 
Phil12

Phil12

Well-Known Member
Kman101 said:
Yeah there were park politics at play with 20K. They deliberately had it be in poor condition to justify it's closure. Wasn't there talk of an exec being deliberately loaded into a leaking sub? Shame. MGMT sucked back then too. EDIT: They basically found a way to get rid of it without having to spend the money to update it and keep it. Sound familiar? lol
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All of the subs leaked. Also, the air conditioners on the subs never worked properly. The windows were always a foggy mess. The entire attraction was in very poor condition due to poor design and the props were terrible.

It's a Disney tradition to close attractions for refurbishment and then extend the refurbishment time and then finally close the attraction.
 
splash327

splash327

New Member
DisAl said:
Anything is easy if you don't know what it takes to do it....
That being said the could probably close the gates on the canal and pump it dry with a big pump over several days but that would probably be much more expensive that having divers repair the track. I suspect a bigger issue would be the aesthetics of a drained river with the track and any other infrastructure exposed. That would take one long construction wall to hide the whole river!
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They didn't hide it when I was a kid. Almost every time we went the river was drained.
 
Phil12

Phil12

Well-Known Member
If they are building a connecting road over to TSI, they don't need to drain the river. Portland cement sets and hardens due to a chemical reaction so it can easily harden under water.
 
RobotWolf

RobotWolf

Well-Known Member
Phil12 said:
The entire attraction was in very poor condition due to poor design and the props were terrible.
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The only qualification I would add to that statement is that a systemic cycle of poor maintenance led this already challenged attraction into a quality tail-spin. (Ow-ee Yay)

It's a shame they weren't ever able to make that underwater concept work. When it did work, it was a lot of fun. But I would be very surprised if they ever tried something like that again.
 
Phil12

Phil12

Well-Known Member
RobotWolf said:
The only qualification I would add to that statement is that a systemic cycle of poor maintenance led this already challenged attraction into a quality tail-spin. (Ow-ee Yay)

It's a shame they weren't ever able to make that underwater concept work. When it did work, it was a lot of fun. But I would be very surprised if they ever tried something like that again.
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Having had the opportunity to ride the subs, I can tell you that they were very cramped, hot, humid and full of bad odors. And if someone had a protein spill inside, the CM's were seldom able to get all the smell out because it mixed with the water sloshing around in the bottom of the boat and by the time the cleanup was performed, the smell was in every part of the boat. All they could do was try to mask the smell with powerful disinfectant.
 
crxbrett

crxbrett

Well-Known Member
Disney finally updated their site, so it now shows the Liberty Belle coming back on Sep 30th. Took 'em long enough to update it. Sheeesh! :joyfull: I was prepared for it to be closed in Sep, so I am not too disappointed I guess. Glad I went on last summer!
 

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