Just after New Years' Disneyland was visited by none other than Michael Eisner himself, and it wasn't a very pleasant visit unfortunately.
Eisner was hosting John Lasseter and Lasseter's young son for a visit to the Magic Kingdom. Mr. Lasseter Jr. wanted to go over to Tom Sawyer Island, as any strapping young American boy would understandably want to do. When they got over there however, Eisner was appalled and embarrassed in front of his guests when the condition of the Island and its individual attractions was discovered.
The young Lasseter Jr. was saddened to learn just a few minutes after arriving on the Island that the suspension bridge was 'temporarily closed for repairs.' That suspension bridge has been 'temporarily' closed since the spring of 1999 when one of the supporting cables came loose from its decaying foundation. The cost to repair the entire bridge was estimated at just over 100,000 dollars, and so a 'temporarily closed' sign was placed on each side of the bridge and that part of the Island slipped into Yesterland. It's a shame that it still hangs there, enticing little kids to run up to it only to have their parents explain that they can't cross it.
Denied access to the suspension bridge, the Eisner / Lasseter group headed down the hill after Lasseter Jr. spotted the wobbly barrel bridge that sits nearby. But again, the group was met by a sign that stated that bridge was also 'temporarily' closed for repairs. The barrel bridge has met hard times as well, and the understaffed Disneyland maintenance department tries to do patch- up fixes to that bridge when they can. But for the last year or so the barrel bridge has been closed more often than it is open, and for most of the last month it has been closed.
As the group and the Guest Relations tour guide assigned to the VIP visitors moved to the north end of the noticeably ratty looking Island, a visit to Fort Wilderness revealed a wood rot filled structure that has had the air guns removed and the turrets and climb through catwalks sealed off to visitors. A few minutes later when young Lasseter Jr. found an Island tunnel darkened by burned out light bulbs and a dangerously decayed section of the tunnel sealed off by Disneyland Facilities CM's with tacky plastic yellow 'danger' tape worthy of an urban crime scene, Eisner began to get visibly upset.
When John Lasseter was a young man, he had actually worked at Disneyland for a time as a Jungle Cruise Skipper and has fond memories of the Disneyland of his youth. Lasseter politely mentioned to Eisner that it was obvious that parts of Disneyland were not being allowed to age gracefully, and that things would never have been allowed to deteriorate this poorly when he had worked at Disneyland.
Now that Eisner was suitably embarrassed in front of his important guests, [Parks & Resorts Chairman] Paul Pressler and [Disneyland President] Cynthia Harriss were both called immediately via Eisner's cell phone, and Eisner assured the Lasseters that 'answers' would be found as to why the Island was in such awful condition.
That next Monday morning, in a search for information about the Island and it's lack of upkeep, the Island scandal quickly rolled downhill from Pressler and Harriss' office to their immediate Vice Presidents at the [Team Disney Anaheim] building. The Vice Presidents of course made frantic calls and emails to their Directors, the Directors quickly phoned their senior managers, the senior managers hurriedly got the word out to their lower managers, and the lower managers rushed to find their Leads (hourly foremen in Disney- speak) for answers.
The lower Attraction managers and Leads were able to produce entire binders full of 'work order requests' dutifully faxed into the Disneyland Facilities department over a period of months and years, all requesting that repairs and fixes be made to the Island's many problems.
Now that the Attractions managers in charge of Tom Sawyer Island had proof that they had done their job, the calls and emails began in reverse back up the management food chain in a grand scramble to save face to everyone's boss. By the end of the business day the paper trail uncovered pointed a clear finger to the lack of action at the Disneyland Facilities department. Ultimately it was Disneyland Facilities' Senior Vice President who got nailed with the blame by Harriss and Pressler.
Eisner was reached in Burbank by Pressler and assured that there was an executive 'plan in place' to restore the Island and bring it back up to old Disneyland standards in a hurry. Of course there really is no such plan, after a brief flurry of activity that week that was able to patch up the barrel bridge for at least a few days worth of operation. After a half decade of neglect, it would take an expensive and complete closure several months long to repair all that is broken and restore Tom Sawyer Island to it's former glory. And that type of expense just isn't in anyone's budget.
Ultimately, we can hopefully expect more timely patch jobs to the few attractions on the Island that still work, but don't expect the suspension bridge to reopen or Fort Wilderness to get any real attention any time soon.
But at least they took down the crime scene tape from inside Injun Joe's cave!
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