Now, Disneyland's narrowed that window — to the summer of 2017. Disneyland announced today that the Mark Twain riverboat, the Sailing Ship Columbia, the Davy Crockett Explorer Canoes, Tom Sawyer Island, and Fantasmic! will return next summer. The Disneyland Railroad will resume its Grand Circle Tour around the park then, too.
The 14-acre Star Wars Land construction site occupies several acres of previously back-of-house land north of the park's boundary, as well as the old Big Thunder Ranch area and part of what was the Rivers of America. Disney is digging a new channel for the rivers on the north side of Tom Sawyer Island, cutting off some of the previously unoccupied section of the island north of the fort. Along the far side of the river, the Disneyland Railroad will travel along a new section of track, perched upon an elevated trestle, as it steams past the rivers on its tour around the park.
Tom Sawyer Island was my former attraction at the Walt Disney World Resort, and I've long felt it underrated by fans as the first truly immersive, self-contained, multi-attraction themed area within a theme park. (I mentioned it last week in our list of unique Disney attractions and I have included gobs of stories about my time working on the island and driving its rafts in Stories from a Theme Park Insider.) The entire Rivers of America creates what might be the most visually engaging and delightfully kinetic scene in any theme park land, with multiple types of watercraft and the secluded wooden play area on the island. Its presence has been missed at Disneyland this year, and I am looking forward to its return next summer.
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City Walk may draw the after work crowd, but they need something inside the park, I think they really need a cool night time spectacular like Paint the Night. But maybe there are reasons like complaining neighbors that are hindering them from doing so.
As far as shortening the ROA, I think it's fine, when I rode the Mark Twain before, there were long stretches with not much to see. The ships move very slowly, so I think ride length will still be ok, especially if they can add more interesting sights.
Before it was a moose here, a couple of deer there, a bear scratching his back on a tree, an Indian village. If they can add as many animals as they had on the old Mine Train Thru Nature's Wonderland, battling elks, bears fishing in the river, etc. then you can have an interesting ride. The waterfalls look interesting, but you need more animatronics.
Uh, no. Wait times have been crazy all over USH this month, and Hogsmeade has been packed. Attendance is definitely up, and significantly so.
Totally agree on the need for nighttime entertainment at USH. But the park has to get over a fear of crowding out people coming to CityWalk in the evenings. With that big ET parking structure, though, there should be room for all. And that Hogwarts projection show from the premiere night would be a perfect evening show for the park.
As for Star Wars Land, my money's on last six months of 2018/first six months of 2019 as the most likely opening time in Anaheim, with Orlando 12 months after the Disneyland opening.
Comcast recent quarterly earnings back-up this fact. When you reverse out the revenue/earnings for UJ [51% ownership allows for consolidation] domestic theme parks were up 5+/-%. That shows a LACK of WWOHP delivering when compared to the numbers after WWOHP opened at UO.
Again, these are FACTS as published by COMCAST.
USH also hasn't been dropping blackout days on existing APs. It stopped selling SoCal resident APs with a significant number of blackout days in favor of a lower priced seasonal pass.
Potter has been a huge hit for Universal in Hollywood. Period. And no amount of wishful thinking by critics changes that. Has it been as successful as the first Potter land? No, just as Diagon Alley and Japan weren't as successful in pushing attendance as Hogsmeade v1.0. But none of those other parks were working from a baseline as low as IOA was at before Potter opened, either.
(Possible related, possibly not: Why some Disney fans think that theme parks are a zero-sum game where anyone else's success threatens them personally remains beyond me.)
New quality rides/attractions in any theme park within a regional zone helps generate excitement for all quality parks.
Spiderman, Forbidden Journey and Escape from Gringotts are universally (pun intended) regarded as the three best theme park attractions in the world. Add to that Transformers and Kong. And Disney has what? Maybe the new Pirates of the Caribbean ride can match, but it's in Shanghai !?!!
Star Wars Land had better be up to par, or in the words of Owen Lars, "There'll be hell to pay".
Plus... Only Disney can succeed. Universal is no threat except when they do threaten Disney and it must be stopped. Universal can only build theme parks when it beats Disney's lowest attended theme parks. Thus ensuring no one will threaten Disney and Disney can skate by with cheap attractions that they would do if not for competition.
For anyone still worried about the reduced river, I saw an image a couple weeks ago (that I'm having a hard time finding...will edit this if I see it) showing an aerial view comparing the original and new routes. The length reduction appears to be only about 15%, not the 30-50% originally speculated. To be honest, I doubt casual visitors will realize it is shorter and I'd be surprised if there are many fans who seriously feel the Rivers of America are no longer satisfactory.
As for USH, if you hear anyone saying that attendance is down, that is incorrect. If you hear anyone saying the park is dead, that is incorrect. If you hear anyone saying that Wizarding World of Harry Potter is a failure, that is incorrect. If you hear anyone saying that they are below what they originally estimated, that's closer to the actual story. USH had pretty extreme predictions for the attendance boost they would get from Harry Potter, but they overestimated how many people would actually be willing to buy a $90+ one day ticket in order to visit. Additionally, this has not been a big summer for long distance tourism due to the number of unfortunate events that have occurred recently and the general uncertainty about the future of this country. As a result, they are revising their pass program once again in order to encourage more locals to purchase passes and visit several times. The passes currently being sold are cheaper and have fewer blackout dates, plus additional benefits are available. Attendance is definitely up at USH, it just isn't up as much as it was expected to be this year.
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