Just some comments. After 9/11 they discontinued work on the POP Century resort - it was about half-way done. That property sat that way for a couple of years before tourism picked back up and they finished/opened it.
I suspect the same thing with the new section. When they reach a point where it is profitable to finish it, they will.
River Country was, I think, one of the first water parks in the U.S. Yes, it was fun, but most of those sorts of attractions can be found at the other water parks. RC just had that rustic feel. I also think, besides the water quality, there may have been some advances in safety ... if they were to try to reopen it, it would think they would have to redesign some of the slides in order to not get sued because of safety issues. It was a small "water park" ... nothing like what BB or TL offers.
Adventure Island did close at the same time at AK. I believe it is now a nature preserve. At the time we visited, the ticketing (at least what we had) allowed you to visit for free. The boats that were used are the ones (or similar) to the ones used today on the WL-FW-Contemporary & Poly-GF-MK routes. They had a couple of animal shows on the island - one with reptiles and then a bird show (similar to the one at AK).
The treehouses sat empty for years - at one point we were told that they were used for interns. They couldn't be open to the public because of handicap reasons. To reopen, we were also told they would have to do some handicap-accessible remodeling. I believe it is correct to say that only a certain % of the rooms need to be handicap-accessible. Anyway, they just (or are about to) reopen as part of the Old Key West resort.
If any of you visit Las Vegas, you will see with the current economic downtown a LOT of projects have been temporarily abandoned until the economy improves. I mean, except for City Center, I think pretty much everything has been put on hold.
Sign of the times and all that.