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Goodbye C A L I F O R N I A
Once construction on the Carthay Circle Theater and the rest of
DCA's new entrance does finally get underway in early 2009, the plan for getting
folks into the park was reexamined. Now that TDA
has had some time to look at WDI's construction timeline more fully, and once
they realized just how much money they pull in each year renting out the old
Millionaire building to events like corporate dinners or cheerleading
competitions, the plan to bring in people through a hole in the fence on the
east side of the park was scrapped.
Instead, the plan now is to use the
same scenario but on the opposite side of the main entrance. The big utility
gates adjacent to La Brea Bakery will now be used as the temporary entrance into DCA during parts of 2009 and 2010, with temporary turnstiles and support
services installed on the road that leads along the east end of the Soarin' Over
California hangar.
There are still lots of details to work out, and it's not
going to be very pretty for awhile, but with the unprecedented task of
completely rebuilding the entrance to a Disney theme park at hand this is really
the only option. This type of massive reconstruction has never been done before
at any Disney theme park, or any major operating theme park for that
matter, and it only proves just how flawed the DCA design was to begin with.
Too bad people who knew better at that time, like Marty Sklar
over at WDI, were keeping quiet about these kind of boondoggles
back then. You have to wonder how anyone involved with such a
complete and total misfire can be taken seriously when they fire
off e-mails on misguided current projects?
Hello Cars
The rest of the plans for DCA continue to be tweaked, with most of
the emphasis placed on beefing up the rides themselves and scaling back some of
the shops and stores. The final and most impressive piece of the DCA makeover,
CarsLand and the Radiator Springs Racers E Ticket, recently finalized some plans
in regards to the ride system to be used.
WDI has decided to go with an updated
generation of the ride system first used in Epcot's Test Track and currently in
use in Tokyo DisneySea's Journey To The Center Of The Earth. With Radiator
Springs Racers however, the majority of the track will require cars exiting the
slow speed indoor portion of the ride to quickly slot into one of two parallel
tracks for the high speed race finale' to the attraction.
John Lasseter has been
pouring over the details of this one in particular, and he really wants the
vehicles to be able to do some nifty tricks during their high speed sequence
outside of the massive show building. At one point, the plan is for the two cars
racing side by side to swerve and move over to the opposite side of the road,
effectively switching tracks midstream for an added bit of drama.
The Imagineers
were not entirely sure that tricks like that could be achieved with the Test
Track ride system, and for a time this past winter they were considering
a modified roller coaster ride system. But
the new version of the Test Track ride system was given the green light early
this spring, once the Imagineers were convinced they could design a system to
handle all the bells and whistles John Lasseter wants to add to this mega-buck E
Ticket ride.
Hello Princesses
Meanwhile, the Little Mermaid attraction continues to morph into a
lavish musical dark ride on a grand scale. The building itself is being
finalized as an ornate Edwardian-era aquarium that could have been found at San
Francisco's 1915 World's Fair, while the clamshell Omnimover ride inside will
include some of WDI's most advanced animatronics to date performing in the half
dozen toe tapping musical numbers. In addition to the ride, an attached water
play area on the west end of the facility themed to King Triton is being fleshed
out with plenty of interactive bells and whistles.
While the area across the way from the Little Mermaid will begin
its transformation into a formal civic park conveniently terraced for nightly
viewing of the World of Color show on the lagoon, the fancy architecture of the
Little Mermaid building is now planned to sweep onwards towards the current
Ariel's Grotto restaurant. Tapping into the marketing success of the Disney
Princesses line, that restaurant is now slated to undergo a big makeover in 2010 with WDI's
current working title labeling it as the "Princess Palace."
The modern
edges of the current facility built originally as a hip Wolfgang Puck restaurant
will be replaced with frilly if not just plain garish Princess opulence that only a 7 year old girl from
the suburbs could truly appreciate. There will still be an attached bar for Dad,
and evening seatings on the waterside patio will be reserved for high cost
dining and viewing of World of Color shows, but the daytime at DCA's new
Princess Palace will be ruled by the rhinestone tiara set.
Hello Spud
Not to be forgotten is the one DCA attraction greenlit before the
billion dollars came along, and that's Midway Mania. The exterior of the new
building is already making it painfully clear just how cheap and bland DCA's
Paradise Pier was, with Midway Mania's ornate Victorian
architecture clashing quite vividly with the stucco and cement look of the rest
of the pier. But it's inside where the real fun is to be found, and while
programming of the ride effects continues at a frenzied pace inside, it is
close enough to completion that Imagineers are routinely taking full trips
through the functioning attraction.
Photo: David "Darkbeer"
Michael
The initial word on the ride now
that it's up and running is that it is extremely fast paced, and some who have
ridden Midway Mania are wondering if people over 40 or anyone not heavily into
the video game world might feel a tad overwhelmed with it all. There are even
some who think anyone past the 10th grade might not be able to keep up with the
hyper pace of the action, the 3-D effects, and the twirling tram cars careening
throughout the ride. This one is definitely not StorybookLand folks.
You'll have
your chance to ride Midway Mania and judge it for yourself in a soft opening
format by early June, once the Cast Member previews have taken place in mid to
late May.
Hello GardenWalk
While that gets us up to speed on DCA, there's still plenty going
on in the rest of the Resort. Just like the announcement of the DCA extreme
makeover, the messy Anaheim politics of 2007 were dictating the purposeful
release of information about other Resort expansion. We gave you the scoop on
the two new Disney operated hotels planned for GardenWalk, and while Disney has
been mum on that issue the developer who is partnering with Disney wasn't able
to be as quiet about it once we reported the news.
Photo: David "Darkbeer"
Michael
GardenWalk has its official
grand opening party in about two months, and Disney may be there to make the
announcement at that time. But with their victory in the city council chamber,
Disney is now in no rush to announce anything until every last signature is on
every contract.
Goodbye Towers
The other big news brewing is the major refurbishment of the aging
Disneyland Hotel. Originally, the plan to close each tower for a year of major
renovation was to have been announced by now. But once the WDI project team set
up shop in nearby trailers in the fall of '07 and began to come up with a
construction timeline they realized they had more than they bargained for with
the 40 year old towers.
There's a lot of sentimental attachment to the
Disneyland Hotel, especially for locals who remember when the hotel was the
biggest and fanciest lodging in Orange County right up to the 1980's. But no one
could disagree that the architecture and overall design of the Disneyland Hotel
itself is less than magical, especially by 21st century standards and
considering the prices that are charged to stay there. Let's be honest and admit that the
Disneyland Hotel is basically a 1960's generic Hilton with a few Disney
decorations spread around the property and hidden Mickey's in the carpet. But
like any 50 year old Hilton design, it's time has passed, even with all the hidden
Mickey's.
The first plan for the Disneyland Hotel was to close one tower at a time
while each building was stripped down to the walls to replace the elevators,
wiring, and plumbing before reopening each tower with modern amenities and a new
lease on life. But the problem is that after extensive inspections and detailed
studies none of the three main towers are going to be up to the task of handling
the demands of a 4 star 21st century hotel. The outdated plumbing and wiring are
the biggest headaches, and even with major modifications there is still no
guarantee that they could have an electrical system that could handle the rather
simple demand of coffee makers in each of the 1,000 rooms, let alone 40 inch
plasma screens on every wall.
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