News New Haunted Mansion Grounds Expansion, Retail Shop Coming to Disneyland Resort in 2024

[Disneyland/DCA]

Ya the problem isn't that it's too large as in it's too wide, it's that its too tall. Still hope that it'll look nice once it's finished though. Is Kim Irvine attached to this?

 

[Mickey's Pal]

The exit was always partially blocked, and the view of mansion obscured.

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I could be wrong, but I don’t think this will make much a difference.

It is going to create a unnecessary bottle neck.

 

[Mickey's Pal]

Partially obscured by trees is very different than partially obscured by a disproportionately large new building. This was already discussed.

Exactly

 

[Disney Irish]

It is going to create a unnecessary bottle neck.

It may, especially at the beginning, but we'll have to see how it performs in practice. I'm sure that once it opens they'll find a way to have traffic flow continue without much of an impact overall.

 

[TP2000]

Again, it has to be "large" because it needs to have room to be a gift shop. It is incredibly small compared to basically every other gift shop in the park. It's smaller than It's A Small World Toy Shop, the Main Street Mad Hatter, Humphrey's, Avenger's Vault, Seaside Souvenirs . It's around the same size as Le Petit Chalet, Embarcadero Gifts, San Fransokyo Maker's Market, and The Briar Patch. I don't think we could have realistically gotten a smaller gift shop for Haunted Mansion. Unfortunately, Disneyland is cramped, so things have to be close together. I think something taking up Fowler's Harbor would have been a better location, but that's just not realistic.

It doesn't have to be that tall. That was a (bad) design choice.

The mass of it looks so tall, so hulking, so large. As someone who lived in the South and New England and who knows what a real carriage house looks like (in fact, in the early 90's I dated a younger guy who lived in a gorgeous old carriage house belonging to a crotchety old society woman struggling to keep her main house going while she pretended that she didn't actually need the rent money she collected each month from the carriage house), that looks nothing like a "carriage house".

Instead, it looks like a Drive-Thru Dairy that you used to see all over the suburbs 50 years ago...

I’m no architect or engineer but I don’t think the peak of the roof needs to be that high. That seems to be a design choice.

Ah, I see I'm not the only one. It's the height and the scale that is all wrong.

It's such a large, hulking structure and it throws off the scale of the "Mansion" it sits next to and allegedly serves as a carriage house for. Not to mention the E Ticket "salt dome" next to it, or whatever non-racist phrasing we use to call a "mountain" nowadays at Disneyland.

The scale and scope of this building is all wrong sitting between these two iconic E Tickets. Whoever designed this giant gift shop never actually has been to the park, it would seem.

 

[wityblack]

I have to disagree with the assertion the scale doesn't match real-life carriage houses. When I look them up, they all seem to be quite tall. This one looks especially similar:

I can acknowledge the criticism that it seems too large next to the Mansion, as I imagine carriage houses on larger estates, and this is quite cramped. We're looking at openings for carriages, so the doors in the concept art were always bound to be large. I think it can be executed well at this scale, we'll just have to see how it coalesces with the Haunted Mansion when it's complete. I'll also say, I believe a gift shop like this would work better with any of the other Mansions, because all of the rest of the Mansions are elevated. I'm mixed, but I lean towards this being a good addition.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

What "water constraints"? There are none in California today. At the end of a long summer, state reservoirs are at 113% of average currently, before the first raindrops of fall arrive next month…

As a resident of Las Vegas I have to point out that 25% of SoCals water comes directly from Lake Mead, thankfully it’s had a decent couple years also but is still sitting at only about 33% of total capacity, at its lowest in 2022 it was down to about 27%, conservation is working but we’ve still got a long ways to go before the water constraints are gone.

LA, LV, and Phoenix all live or die with Lake Mead, if DL putting in some fake grass keeps 20 million peoples faucets running I’m all for it.

As for the gift shop… I still think it’s too early to tell, I love the concept art, if it ends up looking like that I’ll be happy with it, until it’s done trying to gauge the scale is all guesswork.

 

[TrainsOfDisney]

If you get your golf ball into the top of the now turned off fountain…. You get a free churro!

 

[mickEblu]

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If you get your golf ball into the top of the now turned off fountain…. You get a free churro!

Sheesh. Looks really bad in this photo. At this point just scrap the idea of it being a lawn. It’s a narrow rectangular planter. Just put some real plants in there.

 

[Disney Irish]

Sheesh. Looks really bad in this photo. At this point just scrap the idea of it being a lawn. It’s a narrow rectangular planter. Just put some real plants in there.

Or at this point just accept its turf, pour one out if needed for the old lawn, and move on.

 

[Professortango1]

I have to disagree with the assertion the scale doesn't match real-life carriage houses. When I look them up, they all seem to be quite tall. This one looks especially similar:
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I can acknowledge the criticism that it seems too large next to the Mansion, as I imagine carriage houses on larger estates, and this is quite cramped. We're looking at openings for carriages, so the doors in the concept art were always bound to be large. I think it can be executed well at this scale, we'll just have to see how it coalesces with the Haunted Mansion when it's complete. I'll also say, I believe a gift shop like this would work better with any of the other Mansions, because all of the rest of the Mansions are elevated. I'm mixed, but I lean towards this being a good addition.

If you search Carriage Houses on Plantations, you will see that most look like what they built. Large barns with gabled roofs. It makes sense as they have to be large enough to stable the horses and the carriages and had loft space for hay, spare wheels, etc.

Maybe they should have considered another structure to house the gift shop. Something that isn't traditionally as large. it could have been a crypt. Or a strange natural cave/cavern nestled between the Mansion and Bayou. They had options.

 

[J4546]

I think the new que is shaping up great! And also like the new HM gift shop. The fake grass isnt a big deal imo I thought it was fake already for years, but I also think it might look better as a flower bed instead

 

[TrainsOfDisney]

I do agree that we can’t fully judge this project until it’s finished. We don’t know for sure the fake grass isn’t temporary or semi-temporary.

But I also agree that I think there are some poor decisions being made with this project based on what we’ve seen so far

 

[mickEblu]

I do agree that we can’t fully judge this project until it’s finished. We don’t know for sure the fake grass isn’t temporary or semi-temporary.

But I also agree that I think there are some poor decisions being made with this project based on what we’ve seen so far

Right I’m not fully judging the project. I’m just saying that aesthetically the front yard portion of the queue is a downgrade (for reasons including but not limited to the astroturf) and that we can say as it is completed.

 

[DavidDL]

The gift shop does look a little big from what I've seen so far but it and the new queue I will wait to judge until I see the finished products for myself.

 

[TP2000]

If you search Carriage Houses on Plantations, you will see that most look like what they built. Large barns with gabled roofs. It makes sense as they have to be large enough to stable the horses and the carriages and had loft space for hay, spare wheels, etc.

Maybe they should have considered another structure to house the gift shop. Something that isn't traditionally as large. it could have been a crypt. Or a strange natural cave/cavern nestled between the Mansion and Bayou. They had options.

As someone who has lived in old East Coast cities that still had/have many old "carriage houses" that are now tony, upscale rental homes, I had to remember that this is supposed to be the carriage house for a plantation. To most east coasters, the term "carriage house" means a building in an urban setting, but I get your point that this would be the carriage house for a rural plantation instead.

Like you say, they shouldn't have tried to build a giant (yet fairly realistic) carriage house here. Instead, this should have been a smaller crypt or something creepy and appropriately sized and scaled.

What they are building here now looks stupid and tacky.

The man I dated in South Carolina decades ago who lived in a carriage house looked much like this Charleston carriage house for sale... (I could try Google Earth or Zillow to see what the actual home looks like today, but then I realized that's kind of creepy )

In my vernacular, this is a carriage house; at least one large doorway to pull in a carriage and enough room to board two or three horses, plus an attic for supplies and servants. Now, it's just an expensive VRBO or hip rental home.

 

[TP2000]

Thinking more about how ridiculously out of scale and stupid that hulking "carriage house" looks...

Instead of building a full scale two-story carriage house sized for multiple carriages and a half dozen horse stalls, why not build a smaller facade that is the "Caretaker's Cottage" just beyond the gates and exit crypt of the ride itself?

This ride's lone human animatronic and his scared dog have been an iconic set piece since the ride opened 55 years ago.

The exit gift shop should have been the small cottage where this man and his dog live. Talk about REAL storytelling! Instead of making up ridiculous garbage like Time-Traveling Latinas of Fabulous Wealth to run the Christmas shop on Main Street USA, or forcing statistically non-existent Filipinos of 1920's New Orleans into the story of Tiana's Bayou Adventure, they could have plussed up and given more depth to the backstory of this poor guy and his dog!...

Sell some Caretaker merchandise along with the usual Haunted Mansion stuff. Can you just imagine the line of Scared Sam Dog Treats they could sell here?!? In a small and humble caretaker's cottage just beyond the Mansion's gates.

I just came up with that cutesy little idea in 2 minutes on my patio. It didn't take a single Immersion Trip to the New Orleans Ritz Carlton, and it required no reserved parking space in Glendale with a Tesla charging port.

The people running Disney's theme parks right now are idiots, I'm convinced of that.

 

[TP2000]

I just found a photo taken this past weekend of this construction, from the latest Micechat update.

Yup, it's still huge. And it's getting bigger and less see-through.

 

[Figments Friend]

Gah….

WHY is this being built so dissappropriately sized…?!


Is Bob trying to overcompensate for something ….?
Like that wimpy guy we all knew in High School that had a big car….

-

 

[wityblack]

I just found a photo taken this past weekend of this construction, from the latest Micechat update.

Yup, it's still huge. And it's getting bigger and less see-through.

When you're walking from Bayou Country, you are elevated and walking down, so it looks larger. I think it would work better if they added the cypress trees back. When walking from the mansion, you see the mansion as closer and larger, with the carriage house in the background, which I think works. It feels too big when you're right in front of it, but again, I want to wait until walls are down to make a final judgement call. I also think the fact we didn't get people in the concept art misled us on scale. The concept art does match up with the correct scale, it's just hard without good reference points. I wonder how much of the plaint is from a subversion of expectation.