Rivers of America (plus Railroad & Dioramas) Re-Imagineered 2017

TP2000

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
As part of the massive Star Wars Land expansion of Disneyland during 2016-2019, the Rivers of America had to be re-routed. This shortened the length of the river itself, and also forced a very thorough re-Imagineering of the entire northwest corner of the park.

This thread can track those changes as they come online and reopen during the summer of 2017, and then likely culminate in the reopening of the Disneyland Railroad that also has a very different route and dramatically different scenery along the way.

Here's the official WDI artwork from 2016 of these changes.
1_16_WDI_9001.jpg


And roughly how they fit in and form the new berm separating Star Wars Land to its north and east.
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zooey

Well-Known Member
Looks like boats could start going pretty soon, I'm not sure if they will wait for railroad to be done to launch at the same time.
I'm excited to see this completed!
In that fresh baked video it looks like they took a lot of trees out on the hungry bear side maybe? I can't tell where they are exactly but I remember that old hungry bear trail feeling more wooded.
 

FerretAfros

Well-Known Member
Some good water pictures in the Fresh Baked update:

The photo at the 2:05-mark appears to show the outer walls for a new wheelchair lift to the canoe dock. The previous dock hadn't seen any major changes since the Splash Mountain reconfiguration of the area in the late 80's, predating ADA requirements, and was only accessed by narrow stairs at the entrance and exit. Presumably the changes to the path near the ride's exit stairs and Hungry Bear lower level were significant enough that they had to bring that whole area up to modern codes

I assume wheelchair users will still need to transfer out of their chair to board the canoe (which will not be an easy transfer by any means), but this will open the attraction to a group of guests who had previously been excluded from the experience

[As a side note, I saw an old Bear Country-era map that showed the Keel Boat dock at the lower level of the Hungry Bear. Does anybody know if this was actually the case? I had just assumed that they always docked south of Fowler's Harbor (at the current smoking section), but this would explain for the odd linear, dock-like design of the restaurant's lower level. Presumably it was moved during Splash construction, since the lower-level restrooms would get more traffic with the removal of the large restroom's on Splash's site, and to disperse foot traffic at the dead-end land to help counterbalance the new anchor attraction]
 

SSG

Well-Known Member
Looks like boats could start going pretty soon, I'm not sure if they will wait for railroad to be done to launch at the same time.
Given the crowding issues, I would think Disney will get the river attractions open ASAP to absorb people, rather than wait for the Railroad to be completed.
 

Stevek

Well-Known Member
Given the crowding issues, I would think Disney will get the river attractions open ASAP to absorb people, rather than wait for the Railroad to be completed.
And probably to begin more full rehearsals for Fantasmic!!
 

NobodyElse

Well-Known Member
And today, May 5th 2017, the water began to return to the Rivers of America after 18 months of demolition and construction.

Our favorite lady blogger has the latest from the park today...




A couple of observations / thoughts:

  • It sure looks odd seeing "fresh" water in the river. :)
  • It's interesting (to me) that the source of the new water is TSI. I don't remember the details of the last draining and refilling, but I seem to recall them making a big deal about pumping the water out and storing it somewhere until refill time. (Or at least doing some sort of mitigating swap.) I thought they might have used temporary hoses or pipes before, but this seems to be a permanent plumbing type of setup.
  • I'm starting to second-guess myself about what "dark-water" waterfalls look like, but that was the situation with the old Cascade Peak, and it looked fine, right?
 
D

Deleted member 107043

I'm starting to second-guess myself about what "dark-water" waterfalls look like, but that was the situation with the old Cascade Peak, and it looked fine, right?

Switzer Falls looks OK, so it should be fine.
 

Disney Analyst

Well-Known Member
A couple of observations / thoughts:

  • It sure looks odd seeing "fresh" water in the river. :)
  • It's interesting (to me) that the source of the new water is TSI. I don't remember the details of the last draining and refilling, but I seem to recall them making a big deal about pumping the water out and storing it somewhere until refill time. (Or at least doing some sort of mitigating swap.) I thought they might have used temporary hoses or pipes before, but this seems to be a permanent plumbing type of setup.
  • I'm starting to second-guess myself about what "dark-water" waterfalls look like, but that was the situation with the old Cascade Peak, and it looked fine, right?

The water will be dyed dark green :)
 

Disney Analyst

Well-Known Member
Yes, I realize that. (Side note, it might be cool to be around when they remove the dams, and the water begins the mixing process.)

Also, to answer your question... What Disney does when they drain is it gets put into essentially a city tank, where the city can then use the water... and then Disney is able to refill from as well. So instead of just draining the water where it would likely end up in the ocean or something, it gets recycled and reused. I assume they have a water source from the island, and they just attach a giant hose to it to fill the river.
 

TP2000

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
  • It's interesting (to me) that the source of the new water is TSI. I don't remember the details of the last draining and refilling, but I seem to recall them making a big deal about pumping the water out and storing it somewhere until refill time. (Or at least doing some sort of mitigating swap.) I thought they might have used temporary hoses or pipes before, but this seems to be a permanent plumbing type of setup.

When Disneyland drains large bodies of water like the River, Submarine Lagoon, Paradise Bay, etc. they drain it into the Orange County Water Department's (OCWD) sophisticated underground aquifer and groundwater basin system, which happens to be the world's largest water purification system. Disneyland's PR department has made a big deal about that the last few years due to the drought of 2014-16. But since the drought is very much over and California's reservoirs are now overfull, the cheesy PR spin on that has died down.

To access the great OC aquifer, Disneyland basically dumps the water into the storm drains, which funnels it to the large farms of Recharge Ponds in north Anaheim, where it settles 1,500 feet underground and then spends the next decade or so filtering its way deep underground towards Newport Beach, Costa Mesa and Huntington Beach.
orange-countys-groundwater-replenishment-system-expansion-by-denis-bilodeau-orange-county-water-district-4-638.jpg


There it is pumped back up to the surface via wells and sent to water treatment facilities like this one in Fountain Valley, where via reverse osmosis, ultraviolet light and more filtering and conditioning they turn millions of gallons per day into some of the safest and cleanest drinking water in America.
portfolio-gws.jpg


This groundwater system is why Orange County had minimal consumer impacts from the drought. Several OC cities didn't even impose mandatory water restrictions on citizens during the drought, because OC has this very effective and efficient groundwater system.This system is also why Disneyland kept all its waterfalls and water shows and fountains and swimming pools running full blast through the drought. No big drought problems in Orange County, thanks to the OCWD! :D
 

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