Will Disneyland USA suffer? ALL Of Disney's Theme Parks Now Closed - Reopening Dates Unknown

[TP2000]

It’s like they have blinders to anything more than 6 months down the line.

Well, you know, it's not like they can be sure this whole Disneyland thing is really gonna work out long term.

I mean, it's only been 65 years pulling in Billions of profit per year. It could all just be a fad, like Disco or those Lance Armstrong bracelets. Mr. Chapek is brilliant to assume the place will be closed in a few years and turned into condos.

 

[Darkbeer1]

Well, you know, it's not like they can be sure this whole Disneyland thing is really gonna work out long term.

I mean, it's only been 65 years pulling in Billions of profit per year. It could all just be a fad, like Disco or those Lance Armstrong bracelets. Mr. Chapek is brilliant to assume the place will be closed in a few years and turned into condos.

Hey, our RINA allotment is like 17,000 new homes in the next ten years....

That would help that issue, but where will they work? Riverside?

 

[Ismael Flores]

So when they loose millions on expensive Box office bombs they go ahead and continue making more and more hoping to balance out the sheets. Didn't Disny loose 170 millions in one quarter from the X-men Phoenix loss

When they loose a couple hundred million on parks and resort they decrease their plans for additions and maintenance. They basically create more costly repairs for the future and leave large gaps in the Calendar by not having large promotional lures for tourism. Also seems that Anaheim mostly gets the punishment.

I doubt that WDW will stop midway in all the additions being done, the cost of stopping and pushing back contracts with builders would be significant. Hong Kong and Shanghai are also in the middle of construction and additions and i doubt those will stop

 

[ThemeParkTraveller]

Relevant update from the other thread.

I've just been given confirmation that the Avenger's E-Ticket and Disneyland version of MMRR have been frozen in place. No work will continue on them until they are greenlit to be restarted. This is directly due to the Coronavirus. Walt Disney World cutbacks are being determined Tuesday... not sure when we'll get that info leaked.

 

[Phroobar]

Relevant update from the other thread.

He forgot to add that the Space Mountain emergency exit stairs and Tomorrowland front entrance have also been frozen too. I don't put a lot of stock in that guy.

 

[ProjectXBlog]

So when they loose millions on expensive Box office bombs they go ahead and continue making more and more hoping to balance out the sheets. Didn't Disny loose 170 millions in one quarter from the X-men Phoenix loss

When they loose a couple hundred million on parks and resort they decrease their plans for additions and maintenance. They basically create more costly repairs for the future and leave large gaps in the Calendar by not having large promotional lures for tourism. Also seems that Anaheim mostly gets the punishment.

I doubt that WDW will stop midway in all the additions being done, the cost of stopping and pushing back contracts with builders would be significant. Hong Kong and Shanghai are also in the middle of construction and additions and i doubt those will stop

it’s not really fair to compare the finances of the movie division to those of p&r, though. hollywood accounting is essentially a criminal act

 

[ProjectXBlog]

last night on the ratchat forums there was this post from user WestSider; i obviously can’t speak on accuracy (other than the forums there being what they are) but i thought it would be an interesting share since it dives in a little deeper:

Latest news from buddies in DLR Facilities - things are really hitting the fan this week. Freezes are under way to current projects already started at DLR. Cheapek is demanding all current projects not past a certain go/no go stage be frozen through at least Fiscal Quarter 3, maybe thru end of this Fiscal entirely.

Current response plan by TDA is to have MMRR site contractors wrap up current work and then put the site into deep freeze until it can (hopefully) be restarted later this year. The opening for MMRR will be delayed because of that, assuming it restarts work by the end of this fiscal year. Work for Avengers E Ticket is also now frozen. The current Avengers Campus work and Spiderman ride has been allowed to wrap up and will open on time - but then all future Avengers Campus work and the E Ticket gets frozen through this fiscal year at least. Magic Happens debut will continue as scheduled - but DLR Entertainment was asked to create a plan to cut staffing for that parade after it opens.

Rehabs now in progress - mainly Mansion and Snow White - are continuing as supplies and job numbers were already charged but future DLR rehabs for this fiscal year are being cancelled or scaled back for anything not in ride maintenance Safety scope - no Show upgrades or plussing from WDI, etc. Plan to reintroduce a plussed up Eastern Gateway to City of Anaheim later this year is now frozen - no more work will be done on Eastern Gateway through at least Fiscal Quarter 3.

In Glendale planning for Coco D Ticket and New Tomorrowland are on hold for Anaheim now. Some strategic layoffs are possible for TDA just so TDA can claim they helped out if WDW does bigger layoffs - but DLR management has heard Cheapek is focused most on high paid Imagineers at the Glendale campus and mostly at WDW and the massively bloated salaried armies out there. Salaried layoffs in Glendale and WDW will happen if the HKDL/SDL closures go into April and beyond.

Just like u could see work stopped on the Hong Kong expansions last December before the HK park closed due to Corona Virus - we will be able to see work stopping on most Anaheim projects within a month. Contractors are working on safely and effectively putting those sites into sleep mode and that will take a couple weeks to do correctly.

Stuff is gettin real at DLR this week. Not a joke.

 

[Mac Tonight]

I think I can sum up my sentiments...

 

[choco choco]

last night on the ratchat forums there was this post from user WestSider; i obviously can’t speak on accuracy (other than the forums there being what they are) but i thought it would be an interesting share since it dives in a little deeper:

How does anyone feel proud to work for this company? They leverage their industry-best position by treating their main strengths (the creatives) like so much flotsam. It's so embarrassing.

 

[Mac Tonight]

How does anyone feel proud to work for this company? They leverage their industry-best position by treating their main strengths (the creatives) like so much flotsam. It's so embarrassing.

Best guess is they just remember it wasn't always this way...

I'm of course referring to anyone who can boast a pre-Iger career. Though with each day that number of people gets lower and lower...

 

[George Lucas on a Bench]

It’s like they have blinders to anything more than 6 months down the line.

It's like cutting the number of lifeboats on Titanic.

 

[PiratesMansion]

I'm so tired of corporations that are bathing in cash crying poor and taking it out on their customers and employees every time they hit a speed bump.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

I'm so tired of corporations that are bathing in cash crying poor and taking it out on their customers and employees every time they hit a speed bump.

What R u a SOCIALIST?!

Go back to Germania, you German!

 

[TP2000]

He forgot to add that the Space Mountain emergency exit stairs and Tomorrowland front entrance have also been frozen too. I don't put a lot of stock in that guy.

I'm not familiar with him either, but I think it's worth noting how easy it will be to see if this actually happens.

Mickey's Runaway Railway construction is very easy to see from outside the park; on either the Harbor Blvd. overpass or from the top floor of Mickey & Friends. Anyone with an iPhone will be able to get a good photograph of that construction site and be able to tell if work has been stopped on it. Here it is as of a few weeks ago...

Meanwhile, in Cars Land, they are building what appears to be a back of house building behind Luigi's. Is it just an office building that will be lightly themed on the Cars Land side and will still continue because its construction doesn't cost much? Or is it an integral part of the Avengers E Ticket expansion of Marvel Land, and thus will soon stop construction because that E Ticket is on hold? We should know soon. Here is the state of that construction as of a couple weeks ago...

Both of these photos are from the Westcoaster site, which has been around for years and always has some of the highest quality photographs and great updates from entertainment spots all around SoCal. https://www.westcoaster.net/home/2020/1/21/disneyland-resort-update-keeping-up-with-the-batuuians

 

[Mickeyboof]

I'm not familiar with him either, but I think it's worth noting how easy it will be to see if this actually happens.

Mickey's Runaway Railway construction is very easy to see from outside the park; on either the Harbor Blvd. overpass or from the top floor of Mickey & Friends. Anyone with an iPhone will be able to get a good photograph of that construction site and be able to tell if work has been stopped on it. Here it is as of a few weeks ago...

Meanwhile, in Cars Land, they are building what appears to be a back of house building behind Luigi's. Is it just an office building that will be lightly themed on the Cars Land side and will still continue because its construction doesn't cost much? Or is it an integral part of the Avengers E Ticket expansion of Marvel Land, and thus will soon stop construction because that E Ticket is on hold? We should know soon. Here is the state of that construction as of a couple weeks ago...

Both of these photos are from the Westcoaster site, which has been around for years and always has some of the highest quality photographs and great updates from entertainment spots all around SoCal. https://www.westcoaster.net/home/2020/1/21/disneyland-resort-update-keeping-up-with-the-batuuians

I’m sure it doesn’t help matters that the previously completed red wall facade of Spider Man was completely removed after the long and dreary rainy day this week.
Setbacks like this can’t feel good.

 

[TheDisneyDaysOfOurLives]

I'm so tired of corporations that are bathing in cash crying poor and taking it out on their customers and employees every time they hit a speed bump.

This. You're cutting off your nose to spite your face here, Disney. You're going to minimize costs this year to offset (potentially) less in terms of profit while hampering your ability to make additional profits down the road. Disney habitually announces projects that they never follow through on because they announce them far too early and then ax them at the first sign of a difficult couple of months. Laying off staff because of this? Ridiculous and just reminds everyone that you are always willing to put dollars ahead of supporting your workers that enable you to have those profits.

 

[TP2000]

I’m sure it doesn’t help matters that the previously completed red wall facade of Spider Man was completely removed after the long and dreary rainy day this week.
Setbacks like this can’t feel good.

It must also be a bit nerve-wracking for the team working on this project, now that they likely know they are the only major expansion project actively underway at the Disneyland Resort.

I've been chatting online about Disney theme parks for about 25 years, since the Usenet days with a 28K dial-up modem. (I'm coming up on my Silver Anniversary soon!) And I can not think of a single analogy or previous experience that equals what is currently happening to Disney's theme park portfolio. Disney currently has one third of their theme park properties closed, and they closed suddenly without warning and have no current plans to reopen them, aside from suspicious PR statements that are clearly designed to appease the Communist Politburo in Beijing rather than reflect actual reality or any sort of operational plan.

Then they evacuated all the American CM's out of the country and have fired all the part-time CM's.

This is a situation without precedence. The attacks on 9/11 and the subsequent crash in tourism that stretched into 2002 approaches this current situation, but even that tragedy does not equate to this level of impact as DCA's Tower of Terror continued construction from late 2001 into mid 2002 before things normalized again, and they broke ground on Flik's Fun Fair in October, 2001 and got it open within a year. I even went back to the 1973 Gas Crisis, which was AWFUL for those of us that remember it, and it had an apparently negligible impact on WDW expansion for 1974-75.

It will be interesting to watch these two construction projects in Anaheim the next few weeks to see if they both continue. I think the Mickey's Railway site will be the one to watch most closely, which actually has better views from the Harbor Blvd. side rather than the parking structure view I posted above.

Whatever it is they are building behind Luigi's may just be a new office building, as it seems rather far removed from the Marvel Land footprint to have anything to do directly with the Avengers E Ticket. Either way, we should have some photographic proof within a few weeks if Mickey's Railway is at least being put into mothballs for now.

Again, this situation is without precedent when it comes to Disney theme park operation and stopping projects already underway. If anyone can think of a time something like this has happened, do let us know. But I can't think of one.

 

[ProjectXBlog]

It must also be a bit nerve-wracking for the team working on this project, now that they likely know they are the only major expansion project actively underway at the Disneyland Resort.

I've been chatting online about Disney theme parks for about 25 years, since the Usenet days with a 28K dial-up modem. (I'm coming up on my Silver Anniversary soon!) And I can not think of a single analogy or previous experience that equals what is currently happening to Disney's theme park portfolio. Disney currently has one third of their theme park properties closed, and they closed suddenly without warning and have no current plans to reopen them, aside from suspicious PR statements that are clearly designed to appease the Communist Politburo in Beijing rather than reflect actual reality or any sort of operational plan.

Then they evacuated all the American CM's out of the country and have fired all the part-time CM's.

This is a situation without precedence. The attacks on 9/11 and the subsequent crash in tourism that stretched into 2002 approaches this current situation, but even that tragedy does not equate to this level of impact as DCA's Tower of Terror continued construction from late 2001 into mid 2002 before things normalized again. I even went back to the 1973 Gas Crisis, which was AWFUL for those of us that remember it, and it had an apparently negligible impact on WDW expansion for 1974-75.

It will be interesting to watch these two construction projects in Anaheim the next few weeks to see if they both continue. I think the Mickey's Railway site will be the one to watch most closely, which actually has better views from the Harbor Blvd. side rather than the parking structure view I posted above.

Whatever it is they are building behind Luigi's may just be a new office building, as it seems rather far removed from the Marvel Land footprint to have anything to do directly with the Avengers E Ticket. Either way, we should have some photographic proof within a few weeks if Mickey's Railway is at least being put into mothballs for now.

Again, this situation is without precedent when it comes to Disney theme park operation and stopping projects already underway. If anyone can think of a time something like this has happened, do let us know. But I can't think of one.

thanks for the insight. as someone who’s been on various disney forums since the early ‘00s i was wondering if anyone else thought this outweighed the impacts of 9/11 and the economic downturn of ‘08. glad i’m not alone in thinking this is unprecedented but still very concerned for the impacts this will have over the next decade

 

[RobWDW1971]

last night on the ratchat forums there was this post from user WestSider; i obviously can’t speak on accuracy (other than the forums there being what they are) but i thought it would be an interesting share since it dives in a little deeper:

Westsider has a tremendous track record and is not hyperbolic, just relaying what he is hearing. He’s the only reason I ever go to that site so thanks for posting, saved me a click.

 

[RobWDW1971]

It must also be a bit nerve-wracking for the team working on this project, now that they likely know they are the only major expansion project actively underway at the Disneyland Resort.

I've been chatting online about Disney theme parks for about 25 years, since the Usenet days with a 28K dial-up modem. (I'm coming up on my Silver Anniversary soon!) And I can not think of a single analogy or previous experience that equals what is currently happening to Disney's theme park portfolio. Disney currently has one third of their theme park properties closed, and they closed suddenly without warning and have no current plans to reopen them, aside from suspicious PR statements that are clearly designed to appease the Communist Politburo in Beijing rather than reflect actual reality or any sort of operational plan.

Then they evacuated all the American CM's out of the country and have fired all the part-time CM's.

This is a situation without precedence. The attacks on 9/11 and the subsequent crash in tourism that stretched into 2002 approaches this current situation, but even that tragedy does not equate to this level of impact as DCA's Tower of Terror continued construction from late 2001 into mid 2002 before things normalized again, and they broke ground on Flik's Fun Fair in October, 2001 and got it open within a year. I even went back to the 1973 Gas Crisis, which was AWFUL for those of us that remember it, and it had an apparently negligible impact on WDW expansion for 1974-75.

It will be interesting to watch these two construction projects in Anaheim the next few weeks to see if they both continue. I think the Mickey's Railway site will be the one to watch most closely, which actually has better views from the Harbor Blvd. side rather than the parking structure view I posted above.

Whatever it is they are building behind Luigi's may just be a new office building, as it seems rather far removed from the Marvel Land footprint to have anything to do directly with the Avengers E Ticket. Either way, we should have some photographic proof within a few weeks if Mickey's Railway is at least being put into mothballs for now.

Again, this situation is without precedent when it comes to Disney theme park operation and stopping projects already underway. If anyone can think of a time something like this has happened, do let us know. But I can't think of one.

Will be interesting to watch as the fiscal year plays out as the Disney Theatrical machine will have horrible comps this year lapping Captain Marvel/Avengers/Aladdin/Frozen/Lion King/Toy Story 4/Star Wars with Onward/Mulan (with no singing or romance)/Soul/Black Widow, etc.

That will be an expected brutal comp which they were counting on Parks and Disney+ to help offset. The lack of bump from the two Star Wars lands and the closing of the Asian parks is an added pressure they didn’t need so they will milk that Parks cash cow dry.

Delaying the stoppable park capital projects to Q1 (October) will help their cash story, but OI is going to be a horrible comp story. They will throw everything into the “it’s the Coronavirus” basket with the analysts to explain it away, but expect the Shorts to pick up in the next quarter.