Liberty Belle to Be Permanently Docked?

[orangefan15]

Was at the parade in MK a few weeks ago and a family with a VIP tour guide was next to me. The VIP guide was explaining that they are planning to permanently dock the Liberty Belle and turn it into a restaurant so that they can create an alternate walkway from Fantasyland to the BTMRR/Splash area over the Rivers of America to help ease foot traffic on the current walkways.

While I can see the need for an alternate walkway, the idea of turning the Liberty Belle into a restaurant seems rather bizarre. I'm also having trouble imagining where exactly such a walkway would go (across Tom Sawyer Island?).

Anybody else heard this rumor anywhere?

 

[OKW Lover]

Was this VIP Tourguide a Disney CM? Wearing Plaid?

I'm having just as hard a time believing (or even understanding) this as you are. A few things that come to mind:

• The Liberty Bell isn't really that big to make into a restaurant, especially once you build a kitchen.
• Perhaps it would be used as a seating area for a shore-side CS restaurant?
• Don't know why they would need another restaurant, especially in the Liberty Square section.
• If they just need more dining there is a whole unused facility over in AdventureLand.
• Any walkway from FantasyLand to the BTMRR/Splash area would probably have to cross Tom Sawyer's Island (as you suggest), but I don't think that would be any better than the current route along the water. Perhaps we need a Robo map of the area to visualize.

 

[Tonka's Skipper]

The Steamboat is a Disney classic attraction, a landmark of the park, like the castle and well attended. I do believe there would be a uproar if they tried..

Add to the fact there is nothing else on the river, they would not need a bridge to SM and BTRR, just black top the river over!

There has not been anything about this on other sites.

These rumors pop up now and then. If its not a CM is a bus driver.


AKK

 

[OKW Lover]

I went to look at the MK on Google Maps and was amused to see two Liberty Belle ships plying the waters around Tom Sawyers Island.

 

[orangefan15]

Was this VIP Tourguide a Disney CM? Wearing Plaid?

[/LIST]

Yes it was. That's why I was so surprised at what he was sharing. He was very definitive in saying this is being looked at and will be done. If it was a bus driver saying this, I would have written it off without a second thought, but coming from a VIP tour guide, I figured it was worth asking if anyone else had heard anything.

 

[RES1536]

It's way too small to become a restaurant. I've seen kitchens that will take up that much room. Also making it a restaurant would drastically reduce capacity on the boat which would likely reduce capacity of the park.

Also, you could have misinterpreted what he was saying (not saying you're a horrible listner or anything). Here are two possibilities:

He could be talking about a perminate docked "ship" in Downtown Disney that looks similar to the Liberty Bell (the one in Downtown is called the "Lilly Belle") that houses the crab house.

The Magic Kingdom used to have another steam ship in the Rivers of America called the Admiral Joe Fowler (this one was different than the ferry). It was destroyed in a mishap at drydock in the 80s.

 

[Tonka's Skipper]

I went to look at the MK on Google Maps and was amused to see two Liberty Belle ships plying the waters around Tom Sawyers Island.

Hi OKW,

There were 2 when the MK opened. The Admiral Joe Fowler and the Richard Irvine The Fowler was being dry-docked in 1980 and fell off her blocking and broke her back and was scrapped.

The Irvine was renamed the Liberty Belle.

AKK

 

[Son of Gadsden]

I went to look at the MK on Google Maps and was amused to see two Liberty Belle ships plying the waters around Tom Sawyers Island.

All I can think is it's probably a result of GPS shooting multiple images and as a result you end up with two boats.

Similar to if you use google maps and follow the road, you can sometimes pass the same car twice.

 

[ErinTwinmom]

I have heard this before. There was a little imagineer blurb in either the 2013 or 14 Unofficial guide, I think they credited the rumor to Jim hill. But the jist was they were going to call it Medusas like the boat in the rescuers and make it a villain character dining experience.

 

[Donut23]

Awwwwww no.

If this is true, it's my bet Burbank is cutting budgets again. Somebody's great idea to avoid......maintenance costs for the boats and another way to keep the flow from our open wallets going! Turn a drain in the bottom line into $$$$$.

DH hasn't gotten another budget cut; but the year is young!

 

[kristainohio]

No idea if this could be tied into the Liberty Belle rumor but when we were there over Xmas one of frontierland chip n dale's handlers got to chatting with us. He said that rumors were floating around that tiana might be getting her own restaurant...at least an eatery themed like hers in the movie. He said it would be going in around liberty square.

 

[manning]

Awwwwww no.

If this is true, it's my bet Burbank is cutting budgets again. Somebody's great idea to avoid......maintenance costs for the boats and another way to keep the flow from our open wallets going! Turn a drain in the bottom line into $$$$$.

DH hasn't gotten another budget cut; but the year is young!

They will succeed in keeping the flow from my open wallet.....somewhere else.

Question of the day.

Is this Disney?

Who?

 

[VikingInMouseEars]

All I can think is it's probably a result of GPS shooting multiple images and as a result you end up with two boats.

Similar to if you use google maps and follow the road, you can sometimes pass the same car twice.

Must be, cause the picture is less than 2 years old, you can see all the new Fantasyland construction going on.

 

[massmickeypal]

Hope this isn't true. Good memories of the Liberty Belle. Honestly though we have not set foot on her in several years. Time to revisit. Nice to hear they are aware of the foot traffic issues in the area. We had a real tough time getting through the last few visits.

 

[Whatsthegoodword]

Love the Liberty Belle - and miss the Mike Fink Keelboats & canoes! Please don't takeaway my steamboat! We. Never. Miss. It.

 

[lugnut33]

Maybe they will make it into a fastpass kiosk?

 

[Lewisc]

Kitchen issues wouldn't prevent implementation of the plan. A counter service restaurant wouldn't need much of a kitchen. A buffet restaurant could prepare food at a remote kitchen.

Rumor doesn't make much sense. Disney has other locations to open up a new restaurant.

 

[tcpiii]

It's been a while but I like the Belle.

 

[tjkraz]

If they just need more dining there is a whole unused facility over in AdventureLand.

And Tomorrowland Terrace.

2-3 years ago I took the Discovering Future World tour at Epcot. For the first couple hours, the tour guide impressed us with quite a bit of info about the park that I had not heard before.

Then he started telling us how the Dolphin and Swan were designed to allow the monorail pass through.

Credibility...gone.

 

[k5jm]

CM at the IG at EPCOT decided to tell the group of 50 of us at the gate that Disney had secured the land and ROW to put in light rail all the way to MCO. I coughed a "Bull stuff." Then he started into how magic bands were going to be used to control who could come in the IG, stating that "Resort guests will be the only ones who can use the IG and MBs will be your key to using the IG." He then made the TOTALLY untrue statement about how "MB's have your CC# encoded ON the BAND." I told him he needed to stop giving these folks bad info. I informed him that I work with and design RFID systems for my employer and that is not how RFID works in this scenario. The CM came back with "I am a share holder too." I shook my head and headed to TT. Even my 10 year old knew that what the CM was saying was not true.