So maybe Walt is to blame after all for choosing a poor plot of land?
Yeah, but it wasn't EPCOT. It was a nice thought, but they probably would've been better off letting go of EPCOT much sooner if they weren't going to commit to it. The concept has basically been dying a slow, painful, drawn out death for the last 40 years. All that's really left now is the name.
Don’t forget the “idiot nephew” Roy E Disney-a firefighter who puts out his own fires.
Yeah, I've always wondered what might have happened had they gone that route. It left open the possibility for them to actually build the real EPCOT and it also might have a established a more contained theme park resort area.Well, World showcase was originally south of the TTC.
You're right, this is true for land development across the country. Most ordinances require a certain % of green space as well as dedicated drainage and water retention areas, particular in Florida. You're also correct in that most neighborhoods in Orlando have clearly allocated such areas. Even WDW you can tell where these are. However, this doesn't explain the lack of coherent urban planning across WDW property. WDW has complete reign over their property and could have designated land development areas in such a way that they can easily be interconnected. They managed for over a decade, then things started to slip until now almost nothing is connected in a convenient way.
A million dollars a mile. (Note: for what they spent on MDE/MM+/MBs, they could have built a monorail to Washington, DC.)
Often quoted figure but is it accurate?
It’s never accurate to estimate the cost of a transit system per mile. There’s so many factors, trains, stations and variations of what is needed in different areas.
It's sort of a double problem when comparing. As you say the 1M number is probably beyond 20 years ago and the MDE number has been grabbed out of the air on the discussion boards. It started out at a high, but, understandable estimate and every single time it was mentioned the number got higher and higher and higher until it would have been cheaper to buy a small country then that system. Want to know the funny part, and I would bet the farm on this, not a single one of those estimates were given by anyone that actually had direct access to any cost numbers at Disney itself. Just wild a$$, shock intended numbers pulled out of that very same butt. What did it cost? I don't know and I doubt that anyone will ever know and it not only doesn't matter it quite frankly is no ones business other then Disney's.
The MDE number wasn't just grabbed out of the air. Disney is a publicly traded company and they have public conference calls every quarter so that they can explain things exactly like that, large expenditures, profits, losses, etc. Countless reputable news organizations also quoted the number it definitely didn't come from discussion boards. And yes it is other peoples business, specifically investors.
They've actually pretty much continually had some land selling project going on since they opened. They are selling off the land they're just doing it slowly. Celebration was one of the larger land selling projects. As for RCID anytime they are planning to sell they simply de-annex that area from the district. Actually they sold the majority of the land to RCID itself long ago. Most of what they call conservation land was sold to the district. Disney actually owns far less land than most people realize, which makes sense because you just don't need that much land for a theme park resort. I agree it would've been nice if they could've done something like the industrial park. I just don't know that the EPCOT elements really work when they're not all part of the same plan. Much like Celebration being just a housing development, I wonder if it would've just been an industrial area and nothing special.
Perhaps eventually it became public, but, initially it was not verified, it was just spewed out as fact. It was not and I don't think that there was any way for anybody to know exactly what parts of that system were isolated and explained. When it was being reported and the last number we have has never, to my knowledge, been proven to be the correct number. It is just what those opposed to upgrading a system that was much in need of upgrading could use to illustrate erroneously, how much the new FP system costs, when it was so much more then just FP, but, nothing that anyone wanted to acknowledge for fear that it might make more sense with the actual facts. Things in those reports are listed under headings without any real solid individual example of costs. Besides the investor is only interested in the bottom line and how much of a dividend they are going to get. How it got there is of very little physical concern. The rest of the public should have no concern about it at all. All they have to know is that the resort exists and how much it is going to cost to go there. The rest is irrelevant.
This number is not remotely close to accurate. I doubt that would even cover the beam, let alone stations and trains. If it cost only $1M per mile, we’d have monorails everywhere.
Don’t forget property acquisitions and right of way, which Disney doesn’t have to worry about.
