Mt Fuji Rumor is back

[mitros]

The costs to open World Showcase 2 hours earlier would be astronomical when you look at the amount of staff hours that would be required this. I believe that cost plus the cost of building the new ride means it isn't going to happen! Also if you look at the unused (or underutilized) buildings in Future World the option of putting a new ride they're certainly looks more economical, which is what Disney is all about these days.

If anything is built in WS it'll probably be another country are two which would be more in keeping with the purpose of WS.

Good point, There is a whole show building behind germany {actually, part of the overall structure} which was originaly built to house a "Rhine-river" type boat ride, which, over the years has been used for things like storage and a show rehearsel area.

 

[KYMickey]

Good point, There is a whole show building behind germany {actually, part of the overall structure} which was originaly built to house a "Rhine-river" type boat ride, which, over the years has been used for things like storage and a show rehearsel area.

I'd forgotten about the building behind Germany, I can actually see that ride happening since it's more in keeping with the premise of WS. I was actually thinking about the Wonders of Life building which is basically vacant and the Universe of Energy building which is only used part time and doesn't draw many people. Also the Innovations buildings have a lot of unused space.

 

[mitros]

I'd forgotten about the building behind Germany, I can actually see that ride happening since it's more in keeping with the premise of WS. I was actually thinking about the Wonders of Life building which is basically vacant and the Universe of Energy building which is only used part time and doesn't draw many people. Also the Innovations buildings have a lot of unused space.

Yea, you keep hearing rumors about the old Met Life Wonders of Life building. It's going to be torn down, it's going to be re-habed, etc. etc. That's a tremendous waste of a whole building..........

 

[raidermatt]

The costs to open World Showcase 2 hours earlier would be astronomical when you look at the amount of staff hours that would be required this.

How is World Showcase different from any other area of any other park in this regard?

The only reason they open it at 11am is there aren't many attractions back there. Throw in an E-ticket and all of a sudden it would be worth it, just as it is in all the other lands of all the other parks.

That's not to say I'm in favor of this particular E-ticket, or that I disagree that adding a few more countries might be a better idea.

But I do disagree with the notion that opening WS at 9am wouldn't make sense if a major attraction or two were put back there. (Actually, I don't agree with opening it at 11am now, but that's another discussion I guess.)

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

How is World Showcase different from any other area of any other park in this regard?

The only reason they open it at 11am is there aren't many attractions back there. Throw in an E-ticket and all of a sudden it would be worth it, just as it is in all the other lands of all the other parks.

That's not to say I'm in favor of this particular E-ticket, or that I disagree that adding a few more countries might be a better idea.

But I do disagree with the notion that opening WS at 9am wouldn't make sense if a major attraction or two were put back there. (Actually, I don't agree with opening it at 11am now, but that's another discussion I guess.)

I agree with raidermatt.

As more and more hotel rooms are built in Central Florida, Disney has to increase overall capacity in one way or another (or risk losing business due to reduced guest satisfaction and the finite capacity of each park).

If Disney can fill up World Showcase with guests for an extra two hours each morning, they've just increased the overall capacity of their parks -- by just investing in a single new attraction. Disney would increase capacity not just by the capacity of that one attraction, but by the capacity of all of World Showcase.

I don't agree with KYMickey that, "the costs to open World Showcase 2 hours earlier would be astronomical."

Yes, World Showcase would need to be staffed for those two hours. But there's nothing wrong with staffing cashier positions in shops if those shops have guests shopping in them. The table service restaurants wouldn't open until 11 a.m. anyway. The counter service locations would be staffed only to the levels needed. (Imagine how many breakfasts the bakery in France would sell!) Some counter service locations would not open until 11 a.m. And, yes, there would need to be attraction operators for the few current attractions in World Showcase.

 

[DOOM1001]

I have to believe that this rumor is feasible as Disney has said they're probably not going to build a new park any time soon and thus have to focus on improving the current parks,so as far as EPCOT goes this obviously has to happen in the Wonders of Life/Universe of Energy area OR this rumor.They're probably thinking that people do want thrill rides,but if you go and put a coaster in Future World,people might start looking at Future World as not really about technology and more about thrill rides with Test Track and Mission Space next door.But putting it tucked away behind the Japan pavillion will give the park more balance by separating the thrill rides and add a sense of excitement to the World Showcase area with a type of attraction it's never had.I would be all for it as long as it's not something that disrupts the atmosphere in WS.

 

[Uncleromulus]

IF this is all true, I'll be interested to see if it's a true thrill ride (like Everest), or a more tame affair.
If it's a thrill ride it's almost sure to change the atmosphere in World Showcase--lots of screaming, etc, plus a huge entrance area needed to handle the long lines such an attraction will bring.

 

[minnie61650]

If a Mountain is built in WS the "mountain" might have a dark ride in it or a ride that is kind of like the Spaceship Earth ride, a Horizones type ride or a World of Motion type of ride.
I am talking about the way the ride could be laid out not the actual remaking of one the old rides.

Just because the outside might look a mountain does mean a E-ticket ride needs to be inside the "mountain".


BTW:

Just before the Mt. Fuji rumor started the IAAPA was held in Orlando in November. Many "bigwigs" involved in amusement and theme parks were in town.The Haunted Mansion closed early at 7:30pm for a private event.According to rumor Iger himself was there.
Rumor has it that when Iger attended the HM event he was overhead saying to expect a big announcement soon.

I found it quite interesting that the newspapers reported that Meg Crofton in her keynote address specifically avoided talking about anything new for WDW.

These "bigwigs" were spotted in the parks during the days surrounding the IAAPA conference:

Iger

Lasseter

Fitzgerald

Carruthers

Ryan

Rohde

MacPhee

It has been reported that Bob Iger was in EPCOT on November 14th filming a lot of things.

Then a couple of weeks later a few forums stating posting the Mt. Fuji Rumor.

Are these events related?

Would anyone with some inside info care to share?

Just my 2 cents.

 

[minnie61650]

Here is a copy of the news story about Meg Crofton's keynote address that was posted in the Orlando Sentinel

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/orl-iaapa1507nov15,0,3082457.story

Walt Disney World's president delivers the keynote address at IAAPA conference
Scott Powers | Sentinel Staff Writer
November 15, 2007
Walt Disney World President Meg Crofton told 400 leaders of the amusement-park industry, gathered Wednesday for a convention in Orlando, that their work is not just a business but a "worthy cause."

Crofton's keynote address to owners and general managers at the annual International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions conference was billed as a review of Disney's "Year of a Million Dreams" marketing campaign and a look at Disney's vision for the future.

But while Crofton detailed the "Dreams" promotion, she offered the gathering no new hints of what the company might have in mind for Disney World.


She noted new attractions in the works in Hong Kong and Paris, the company's planned overhaul of Disney's California Adventure, the recent order placed for two new cruise ships, the recent announcement of a new resort in Hawaii and the growth in Adventures by Disney package-vacation tours.

The only future attraction she mentioned for her own resort was the Toy Story Mania ride, announced in January and under construction at Disney-MGM Studios.

While reviewing the "Dreams" campaign, she drove home the point that among the industry's strengths are the more-intimate experiences that tap into visitors' dreams.

"Our job is to amuse and to entertain, and our product is to make people's wishes, hopes and dreams come true," Crofton said. "This is a worthy cause."

Disney saw early on that the challenge of the "Dreams" campaign was not just finding ways to deliver a million (now more than 2 million) sweepstakes prizes, but getting thousands of company employees to buy into the program.

At Disney World, she said, "We hosted hundreds of town-hall meetings across our property. . . . We blasted e-mails to every inbox, posted pages of information on our company's intranet site and blanketed backstage areas with all sorts of collateral," such as motivational posters.

Scott Powers can be reached at spowers@orlandosentionel.com or 407-420-5441.

 

[MJMcBride]

I agree with raidermatt.

As do I. I don't see why the cosy would be astonomical. It was closed early because it didn't make financial sense to open it at 9 when there was nobody there. Throw in a e-ticket and all of a sudden it could get crowded in WS early.

 

[Another Voice]

There has been a long term interest at Corporate and (somewhat) at WDW to split EPCOT into two different parks. The thought is the park is "too large" for the same ticket price that Disney can charge for the Studios or Animal Kingdom.

If one searches, you can find lots of older postings here about 'Project Gemini' - the idea to beef up the offerings in Future World (starting with 'Mission: Space' and 'Soaring') and then rename the park "Discoveryland" or something like that. World Showcase would become a super-sized Downtown Disney type development or a whole separate park on its own. This was back in the days before Disney charged for park hopping, so the thought was that since 50% of the guests were on multi-park tickets anyway - they wouldn't mind having to have a ticket for WS.

One of the key elements to the split was sponsorship. Disney was not going to pay for all the additions to the park - they wanted someone to pay for them. There were strong rumors that Disney was really pitching the idea to Microsoft; one wonders if Apple might be interested now.

 

[mitros]

There has been a long term interest at Corporate and (somewhat) at WDW to split EPCOT into two different parks. The thought is the park is "too large" for the same ticket price that Disney can charge for the Studios or Animal Kingdom.

If one searches, you can find lots of older postings here about 'Project Gemini' - the idea to beef up the offerings in Future World (starting with 'Mission: Space' and 'Soaring') and then rename the park "Discoveryland" or something like that. World Showcase would become a super-sized Downtown Disney type development or a whole separate park on its own. This was back in the days before Disney charged for park hopping, so the thought was that since 50% of the guests were on multi-park tickets anyway - they wouldn't mind having to have a ticket for WS.

One of the key elements to the split was sponsorship. Disney was not going to pay for all the additions to the park - they wanted someone to pay for them. There were strong rumors that Disney was really pitching the idea to Microsoft; one wonders if Apple might be interested now.

Doesn't the story go that when the park was in developement, both WS and FW were supposedly laid out as 2 seperate parks, and someone at the Disney Corp. Pushed the two models together and decided to make it into one park, or was that one of those "fairytale" {untrue} {made-up} {false} stories?

 

[Another Voice]

The tale, like a lot of things Disney is semi-true.

The initial version of World Showcase was designed as the tourist mall for the city of E.P.C.O.T. It would have taken up about half of the "covered downtown" surrounding the community's central hotel. And it would have been basically what we have today - a collection of shops, restaurants and attractions from various nations around the world.

Another section of the original E.P.C.O.T. was an industrial park. Here corporatations would research and develop new products, test them using the residents of the city, and demonstrate them to the public through factory tours, exhibitions and other "World's Fair" type attractions. Factory tours have always been popular (Hershey, Pennsylvania anyone) and here was an opportunity for many corporations to set up their own show.

While the idea of E.P.C.O.T. faded very quickly after Walt's death, the individual pieces hung around and remained in development. The residential area evolved into the Community of Lake Buena Vista, a planned vacation home, corporate home, and time share development that, in turn, evolved in the Disney Villas.

World Showcase also stuck around. In the late seventies, as WDW recovered from the first oil shock, a version of World Showcase was designed to go adjacent to the TTC. It was a large enclosed space designed around to semi-circles, each country would have the same amount of "front acreage" facing a large courtyard and the pavilions would have all been indoors. The renderings that survive show a rather stark complex compared to what we have today.

Also at the same time, Disney was still working on the concept for a "future workplace". The huge success of WDW was bringing in sponsors; it occurred to Disney that they could "sell" entire pavilions to companies instead of just a single ride or shop. The pavilions would be a more direct sell to the guests than the current "we'll put your sign on the wall" type of sponsorship Disney had been offering.

As the plans for World Showcase continued, Disney's management began to worry whether or not the project was large enough to capture the public's imagination. WDW had opened with a park, hotels, lakes, beaches, monorails and an entire resort - opening a couple of restaurants just seemed a little lacking. The idea of a "world's fair" was already floating around - so it only seemed natural to really make a world's fair with both the country and the technological pavilions.

But more than that, most of the senior people at Disney at the time had worked on the hugely successfully 1964 World's Fair. This new project would be the first major enterprise without Walt. It seems natural that they would have gone back to someting they were already comfortable with, something they already knew could be a success. While EPCOT Center would be a very different park than the Magic Kingdom, the combination of World Showcase and a "future world" would be in the company's comfort zone.

Whether two people actually pushed models together...like Walt said, never let too many facts get in the way of a great story.

 

[Tink-n-Belle]

I agree with raidermatt.

As more and more hotel rooms are built in Central Florida, Disney has to increase overall capacity in one way or another (or risk losing business due to reduced guest satisfaction and the finite capacity of each park).

If Disney can fill up World Showcase with guests for an extra two hours each morning, they've just increased the overall capacity of their parks -- by just investing in a single new attraction. Disney would increase capacity not just by the capacity of that one attraction, but by the capacity of all of World Showcase.

I was just thinking that too. With the western beltway and all the hotels they are building, where are they going to put everyone? Disney has been filling up the parks and frankly I was thinking that there will be no OFF Season anymore. I have never been to AK when it wasn't packed, but I think AK was poorly designed to begin with-- there isn't enough open space.

Instead of a 5th gate- they really need to expand the AK and put some E-tickets in Epcot to handle the crowds. Your idea makes perfect sense!!!

 

[MJMcBride]

Instead of a 5th gate- they really need to expand the AK and put some E-tickets in Epcot to handle the crowds. Your idea makes perfect sense!!!

There is no chance of a 5th gate for sure. I agree that DAK needs another land or two to make it more of a single day ticket option. I think Epcot is fine as is, I would love to see another country/attraction or two, especially in the abandoned Wonders of Life area. But I feel more needs to be done at MGM than at Epcot. I would remove the Backlot Tour entirely and add a "land" or "boulevard" there.

 

[GrimGhost]

Doesn't the story go that when the park was in developement, both WS and FW were supposedly laid out as 2 seperate parks, and someone at the Disney Corp. Pushed the two models together and decided to make it into one park, or was that one of those "fairytale" {untrue} {made-up} {false} stories?

While AV is correct regarding the big picture. Marty Sklar and John Hench actually did each get on a side of the two models and physically push them together. Unless Marty Sklar is lying.