D23 has come and gone with lots of major announcements that have fans excited. One thing fans had hoped for was a “fifth gate” or another theme park to add to Walt Disney World to match what Universal is doing with Epic Universe. Instead, Disney’s announcements were expansions and retheming of existing attractions. Many would argue you could preserve the existing attractions at the existing parks and simply roll all the new together to make a pretty amazing new park. This way you increase capacity at Disney world rather than keeping the status quo of real estate and attractions. The question is why?

The first and probably most important reason is cost. Supporting each land and attraction is a lot of generic infrastructure. Every themed restaurant is backed by a kitchen, air conditioning units, electrical and plumbing. To simply change out a facade and some decorations is way easier than starting from scratch. Universal recently did this when the Monster’s Cafe became the Minion’s Cafe. The same can be true for rides where Epcot’s Maelstrom became Frozen or Ellen’s Universe of Energy was cannibalized and added to in order to make Guardians of the Galaxy. By using old ride buildings, restaurants and shops you can save a bunch of money compared to starting with bare ground.

The second consideration is replacing something in an existing park that has exceeded its shelf life or has structural/mechanical issues. Sometimes an IP is just no longer compelling to fans and sometimes an attraction has aged mechanically. Operating in the moist and hot Florida climate for 12+ hours a day 365 days a year will be harsh on machinery, paint, fabric and just about anything. There comes a point when things need to be repaired or replaced. In the case of Universal’s Hulk roller coaster, they essentially replaced 100% of the track with identical new track, but often times it can make more sense to replace an attraction with something totally new. This can be a way to reinvigorate a slower area of the park and swap out a less popular attraction for something new and exciting. However, even when you replace a less popular attraction, it’s still going to have fans and be someone’s favorite ride, resulting in controversy.

This is coming into focus at the Magic Kingdom where The Rivers of America and Tom Sawyer Island are making way for the new Cars attraction with an official announcement the day after D23. For Disney Studios rumors abound that Muppets and Star Tours may be demolished to make room for Monsters Land while others hope for it to replace the Animation Courtyard and Launch Bay area. For Animal Kingdom Disney flat out said in their D23 Presentation that they were replacing Dinosaur with Indiana Jones and Encanto and Bugs with Zootopia, so I guess they weren’t fearing as much backlash there. Here’s the announcement from Disney related to Frotierland with a similar announcement expected soon for Disney Studios.

“To make way for this completely new frontier, the Rivers of America and Tom Sawyer Island will be transformed into vast and rugged terrains for a rally race with some of the world’s most iconic racers,” 

-Disney

Rivers of America and Tom Sawyer Island are not highly popular attractions at Magic Kingdom, but they are historic and add to the ambiance of the park. They have no long queue and are extended experiences, but they take up a lot of real estate. Fans will mourn their loss for sure, but bean counters at Disney will see underutilized real estate becoming reinvigorated. Muppets has its fans too as the attraction is special being it was the last project Jim Henson worked on before his death and probably the best 3D theater experience in existence. Star Tours popularity has also waned since the opening of Galaxy’s Edge with the ride system also reportedly being expensive to maintain. If these are indeed going to be replaced fans will be outraged, but bean counters will look at queue line lengths and financial metrics to say an area of the park could be performing better.

I do indeed miss the Universe of Energy, but Guardians is a great coaster. The back lot tour at Disney Studios was cool, but Galaxy’s Edge is pretty awesome. I am appreciative of things like the Carousel of Progress still being around even though it is less than popular, but theme parks are not museums and as Walt Disney himself said, “Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world.” I guess a lot of fans wish we could “grow” and be additive without subtracting and replacing the old, but economics and available real estate often dictate otherwise (notable exception of Villain’s Land appearing to be going on a green swampy expansion pad beyond Big Thunder Mountain). Walt Disney also said, “Here in Florida, we have something special we never enjoyed at Disneyland… the blessing of size. There’s enough land here to hold all the ideas and plans we can possibly imagine.”

“Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world.”

“Here in Florida, we have something special we never enjoyed at Disneyland… the blessing of size. There’s enough land here to hold all the ideas and plans we can possibly imagine.”

-Walt Disney

Disney’s last theme park addition was Animal Kingdom in 1998 while Universal added Islands of Adventure in 1999, Volcano Bay in 2017 and Epic Universe in 2025. Universal had some catching up to do starting with just one park, but Universal will have built 3 parks in Orlando in the last 25 years versus 0 for Disney. When will we see another theme park from Disney? Back in June, The Central Florida Central Florida Tourism Oversight District (The former Reedy Creek Improvement District) authorized Disney to build one major theme park and two minor parks (think water park or indoor interactive facility like DisneyQuest) over the next decade. Will this actually happen? I guess we need to wait until another D23 to find out. The good news is there still appears to be time to enjoy some of these attractions before they become an episode of DefunctLand.