A bunch of refurb news

[deejdigsdis]

One more time for the folks in the back:

If ride closures bother you, go during the summer.

While you can still get closures they are more rare. And when they happen, like HM and Splash this year, they were announced many, many months in advance.

Ride closures don't bother me. Giving guests one month notice when they have to book hotels and flights and park reservations is what bothers me. It's ridiculous.

 

[RainyDayPixie]

One more time for the folks in the back:

If ride closures bother you, go during the summer.

While you can still get closures they are more rare. And when they happen, like HM and Splash this year, they were announced many, many months in advance.

Also… totally ok for people to be disappointed. September is hardly off season these days.

 

[Shinji4u]

Our Trip from the 15th will be awsome:

No Parade, no WoC, limited night time entertainment, no Tiana, no Pooh, no (maybe) Canoes, no Lincoln, no small world, no jungle cruise, no Railroad, no Monorail.

All of this will build up the crowds on all the other attractions!

And even if closures are typical, the last years, they didn't stop doing parades or showing WoC while Halloween season is in the past. And Small world allways closes way later (this is why we have booked this trip earlier, to finally ride small world after 4 trips later in the season). We will be coming from europe, so we have to book much earlier and don't have the option to reschedule.

But hey: they kindly accapted 100% of our money at least.

 

[OlliePop27]

One more time for the folks in the back:

If ride closures bother you, go during the summer.

While you can still get closures they are more rare. And when they happen, like HM and Splash this year, they were announced many, many months in advance.

I agree with you - July in particular tends to have less refurbs and the other time of year is during the holidays Nov-Dec. That being said, they have started to add more refurbs after July 4th the past two years so even July isn't safe. They are surely aware of the lower crowd levels now during July. August has tons of refurbs seemingly all the time now.

One other note with the announcement about Small World going under refurb on January 20. This means Haunted Mansion Holiday will probably go down on January 6 to remove the overlay and return as regular Haunted Mansion on January 17. Historically it takes 11 days to remove the overlay and 18 days to install the overlay.

 

[foolish_mortals]

I know I will get flack for being a Disney defender, but honestly what are they supposed to do?

They likely can't reasonably announce earlier. The longer planned refurbishments are usually announced in advance. Notice they already know they will have Small World down for longer than usual in Jan.

"Short" refurbishments like this are usually not planned. Sometimes things happen and they can have a ride limp along for a month or two, but can't wait longer than that for safety. Juggling contractor availability is so difficult for the average person and they cancel so often, I can't imagine how difficult it is for Disney. It might be the choice between going now, or going 18 months from now, which might be too long from a maintenance/safety stand point.

 

[LKing]

no (maybe) Canoes

According to Gustin, canoes open on Monday, August 19.

I'm not an engineer so I might have gotten some of this wrong. At D23, they spoke about A1 (pneumatic) animatronics that were/are used in older rides such as Small World and Tiki Room. They take a long time to repair. Considering how many characters, lights and moving parts are in Small World (compared to something like Tiki Room), general maintenance and ride system maintenance (according to Gustin) takes time. Since they are opening for the holidays, a couple weeks of each closure is to undress/re-dress the characters and add/remove holiday decorations.

The vast majority of attractions at the California parks use A100 (hydraulic) animatronics. They said that The Little Mermaid was one of the last A100 rides. The imagineers said that maintenance on A100 can be a mess with oil leaks and the potential for damage to adjacent parts of the attraction. We went through the exhibit a couple of times and each time, the imagineers spoke about how people hate doing maintenance on A100s because the oil is so messy and takes a long time.

The purpose of the display was to show how advanced and easy A1000 (electric) animatronics are. They can be re-programmed and are easier and faster to repair than A100 or A1. The only attraction at the California parks with A1000 are those in SWGE. Tiana's will be A1000 as well.

Again, I'm not an engineer so if my lay person's understanding is off, please feel free to correct me.

 

[Huskyfan860]

I agree that refurbs are inevitable and needed, but I think two things in particular are at work with understandable reactions like what people are having in this thread. One problem is that if you buy a package, you can only get a refund up to 30 days before your trip. If they were more flexible on this (which would undoubtedly have impacts on their business, but ), that might take the sting out because people have options. They may not want to cancel, but at least they could.

The other problem is just a larger Disney Parks problem, which is that they've raised prices. Their job is to maximize value for their shareholders, and they know that people are willing to pay through the nose for a visit to a Disney Park. But the more money people pay, the more expectations are raised. People expect rides to be up no matter, they expect the parks to be, well, flawless (or close to it). In a certain sense, I get it - what is the money for if not for better parks? (It's more complicated than that but I get it). For folks who have to stretch even more to make a trip to their favorite Disney Park work, that trip is going to be even more stressful for lots of reasons.

Side note - I know DISboards is a small but passionate group of Disney fans but between this board, Reddit, Twitter, etc., it's amazing how little trust people seemingly have in Disney Parks to do the right thing. Whether that's with new attractions, park policies, refurb schedules - you name it, people either don't trust it because they've been burned by bad decisions or social media amplifies bad reactions and all they hear about is the distrust so now they distrust leadership as well. If I worked at Disney Parks this would be keeping me up at night, trying to think of ways to solve this.

 

[kessieann]

Not mad at a refurb but can I just share my disappointment? My daughter knows I adore It's a Small World and have ever since I was a child. She is flying me to CA and treating me to a one day visit to DL on my bday and I was very much looking forward to my favorite ride. Can you guess what day my bday is? Yup 09/16 I don't want to show her an ounce of disappointment for a first world problem but I thought you all would understand.

 

[StarlitNight05]

Not mad at a refurb but can I just share my disappointment? My daughter knows I adore It's a Small World and have ever since I was a child. She is flying me to CA and treating me to a one day visit to DL on my bday and I was very much looking forward to my favorite ride. Can you guess what day my bday is? Yup 09/16 I don't want to show her an ounce of disappointment for a first world problem but I thought you all would understand.

I totally understand your disappointment. That stinks to just miss it too... adds insult to injury!

Hopefully you can still have a great trip with your daughter. Sounds like a blast. I'm taking my Mom for her birthday next March and am so excited! We haven't gone to DL together since 2019. Hope you have a great trip, and Happy early Birthday!

 

[DisneylandFan22]

Not mad at a refurb but can I just share my disappointment? My daughter knows I adore It's a Small World and have ever since I was a child. She is flying me to CA and treating me to a one day visit to DL on my bday and I was very much looking forward to my favorite ride. Can you guess what day my bday is? Yup 09/16 I don't want to show her an ounce of disappointment for a first world problem but I thought you all would understand.

I feel for you. I am taking my mom late September and she hasn’t been for a decade. Might be her last trip. I understand refurbishment but I’m sad that Small World and the Jungle Cruise will be down for her. If it was just me and my family I wouldn’t mind as much. I’m still hoping WOC will be showing.

 

[AstroBlasters]

When did you schedule your trip? How far in advance would be adequate?

11m, same as my DVC booking window….

 

[LKing]

11m, same as my DVC booking window….

Have they ever announced maintenance that far in advance? How far in advance did they announce that Splash was being shut down?

 

[AstroBlasters]

Have they ever announced maintenance that far in advance? How far in advance did they announce that Splash was being shut down?

I would guess not…. I was just showing that some of us DVCers have to book their DLand & WDW trips pretty far in advance.

 

[Snap Crackle Pop]

This is what they did the year before the 60th, I think they are trying to minimize the amount of refurbs that will happen for the 70th. It really sucks for people that are visiting but there isn't really a good time to do refurbs now. Should they be more spread out? Maybe. Would it be great if they could say in six months we will be having a refurb? Yes, but again... that doesn't always happen.

 

[DisneylandFan22]

I give Disney a lot of grace but it’s mid August and we still have no idea if WOC will be playing after 9/8. Personally I don’t think that is right. They have to know something and should communicate it. We made the decision to miss F! for OBB on Sunday and instead do the OBB Dessert Party on Monday. But we have no information 3 weeks out.

 

[sky13]

Right now I think I'm most disappointed about WOC - as the last time I went to Disneyland in 2018 was when WOC was down for an extended period!

Hoping Jungle Cruise will be back up by the time I am there in October (during high crowd days though, didn't really have a choice with my dates)...

 

[VicgirlBC]

I give Disney a lot of grace but it’s mid August and we still have no idea if WOC will be playing after 9/8. Personally I don’t think that is right. They have to know something and should communicate it. We made the decision to miss F! for OBB on Sunday and instead do the OBB Dessert Party on Monday. But we have no information 3 weeks out.

WOC is showing on the refurb list if you change the language at the top of the website to Canada (English).

 

[DisneylandFan22]

WOC is showing on the refurb list if you change the language at the top of the website to Canada (English).

Which is frustrating. Is it an error? Is it being refurbished? Disney hasn’t announced anything and no one who covers Disney has reported anything. I still have been holding out hope.

 

[LKing]

Which is frustrating. Is it an error? Is it being refurbished? Disney hasn’t announced anything and no one who covers Disney has reported anything. I still have been holding out hope.

It may not be official from Disney, but it is all over social media.

 

[VicgirlBC]

Which is frustrating. Is it an error? Is it being refurbished? Disney hasn’t announced anything and no one who covers Disney has reported anything. I still have been holding out hope.

I’m assuming it’s not an error. It also shows up in the refurbs if you change it to United States (Spanish). Likely just some tech glitch that’s causing it not to show up under United States (English), as similar issues have happened before with the language settings. It is odd that there has been no announcement by Disney though.