Spaceship Earth Rehab (Update)

[DisneyExplorer]

what does ... and ,,, mean?

d.

 

[raidermatt]

what does ... and ,,, mean?

d.

Its like .. but taken to another level.

 

[YoHo]

...,,,sigh

 

[crazy4wdw]

WDW has officially announced that Spaceship Earth will be closed on the following dates:

May 7-10
June 22-23
July 9-November 1, 2007

 

[Mickey76]

This bums me out. SPaceship Eart is one of my favorite rides. I'm going to be on my Disneymoon July 10-19 and we obviously won't be able to go on it if it's going to close July 9-November 1. Bummer...

 

[Another Voice]

Naturally, EPCOT Center's signature attraction won't be open on October 1 - the park's 25th anniversary.

If Epcot was a dog, Disney would have kicked it to death by now.

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

Naturally, EPCOT Center's signature attraction won't be open on October 1 - the park's 25th anniversary.

If Epcot was a dog, Disney would have kicked it to death by now.

Shhhhhhh.... Nobody is supposed to know about the 25th anniversary of the opening of EPCOT Center.

That would draw attention away from the magnificent Year of a Million Dreams.

 

[Another Voice]

All across America families are receiving their tax refund checks and family meetings are called...

"So, what should we do with the money - buy that widescreen plasma TV set we want...or blow it all on a trip to Disney World where there's a chance we could WIN A FREE CHURRO!!!!!!!!!"

I wish someone would point out to Rasulo that he could make more profit by selling that hideous wand-o-idoits for scrap than he'll make from his inane Year of a Million Diet Cokes.

 

[raidermatt]

This also means that two of the biggest "people eaters" on property will be closed during most of the summer.

 

[MasterShake]

All across America families are receiving their tax refund checks and family meetings are called...

"So, what should we do with the money - buy that widescreen plasma TV set we want...or blow it all on a trip to Disney World where there's a chance we could WIN A FREE CHURRO!!!!!!!!!"

I wish someone would point out to Rasulo that he could make more profit by selling that hideous wand-o-idoits for scrap than he'll make from his inane Year of a Million Diet Cokes.

Do not underestimate the power of free churro's!

 

[Cricket2]

Do not underestimate the power of free churro's!

The only thing better than churros are free churros

 

[KSoda]

OHH SURE...Disney takes my $8000 and then decides to close two of my favorite attractions, Haunted Mansion and now Space Ship Earth? Then I learn my favorite restaurant (4 YRS AGO) Alfredo's is going belly up in August, what else is next?

 

[CanadianGuy]

So cancel now while you still can.. and get all your money back..

And then go when these things are open... Just understand that something else might be closed then.

Knox

 

[Donaldsfan176]

Whats next? they will announce the parks will be closed all summer to refurbish all the attractions at the same time. (Just like the first Vacation movie with Chevy Chase) Oh, and that money you gave them? Gone too!

 

[SimonV]

The real kicker, though, is Diney's 'special website' to highlight all the changes at Spaceship Earth, which turns out to be a major free commercial for Siemens with nothing about SE at all. What a joke.

 

[ChrisFL]

The real kicker, though, is Diney's 'special website' to highlight all the changes at Spaceship Earth, which turns out to be a major free commercial for Siemens with nothing about SE at all. What a joke.

And what would really be bad is if the ride itself turns into one big Siemens ad as well...I shudder just thinking about it

 

[KSoda]

My daughter just reminded me that Spaceship Earth was closed the last time we went as well as the big pool at the CBR.

 

[raidermatt]

And then go when these things are open... Just understand that something else might be closed then.

I understand the frustration. When you book a summer trip, there are certain negatives you expect, like the heat, thundershowers, crowds, etc.

But one of the positives is little to no refurbs going on. We were there last summer and the only thing I remember being down was part of the lazy river at TL for unexpected maintenance.

Now, for a significant portion of this summer, two major attractions will be down, HM and SE. Besides just not being able to experience them, the people there are also going to hit longer lines at other attractions. Given the number of people that go through these two attractions, as well as the length of these attractions, it will actually be a fairly significant impact.

I'm not saying I'd cancel, but like I said, I understand the frustration. We're going in June, and fortunately for us, SE will still be up (except for 2 days), but HM will be down. I'm not cancelling, but I would like to have a little chat with whoever made the decision to not refurb HM during a slower period sometime over the last 2 years. Its not like the need took them by surprise.

 

[CanadianGuy]

I'm not cancelling, but I would like to have a little chat with whoever made the decision to not refurb HM during a slower period sometime over the last 2 years. Its not like the need took them by surprise.

Unfortunately, I almost expect the next few years is going to see two and three ride closures a season if they actually do the maintenance and service that's REALLY required right now.

Knox

 

[KSoda]

So cancel now while you still can.. and get all your money back..

And then go when these things are open... Just understand that something else might be closed then.

Knox

With all due respect, and I'm not trying to be a wize guy here, but try and tell that to my three kids after investing not only a huge sum of money for probably a once in ten year vacation, but after investing the last nine months, if not the last year planning every detail of our trip, and after we first investigated Disney's plans and operating hours for closings and rehabs, making special note of Disney having little if any closings when we made all our plans. My beef is that these rehabs were dropped upon us suddenly, we were not warned by Disney and her website in "a reasonable amount of time," but only until we were well into our planning stages and multiple reservations and c/c deposits, which included many, many hours, weeks and days making dining reservations. A good example of what makes these WDW closings unacceptable to us is we had also planned on viewing the Space Shuttle STS118 launch on June 28th, which ended up getting rescheduled because of STS117 repair delays from a hail storm in March while on the launch platform. Although this was a huge part of our plans and excitement, but now disappointment, we can understand and accept that no one could have forseen this hail storm and it's damage to the external fuel tank. Sure, we had already rescheduled and paid the difference in our flights, spent time finding a motel in Titusville, reserved a car and changed our Disney reservation and dining plans around the Shuttle date, but, what happened to STS117, which affected STS118 and operational schedules was UNFORSEEN, UNPLANNED and an act of nature upon NASA and every associated flight control centers, I can understand this, I accept this, but I cannot accept large rehabs and closings to what was to be some of our favorite attractions, and after even speaking to Disney many times about "planned or scheduled" rehabs, they stated there were none, and the Haunted Mansion was not noted on their website until the last couple months, I just learned of Spaceship earth this week, and I only learned of Alfredo's (once or fav restaurant) downfall and closing only through the DISboards. So, to cancel our plans and get our money back now is out of the question, we came too far, worked too hard and waited too long to back out now. Doing so would only cause "great" dissapointment to my children, not to mention cost me more money to change flights again, thus defeating any savings we had in Jetblue's low cost; we'd have to rebook within a year or loose out. Another reason I cannot plan another trip is because I face major cervical spine surgery which is scheduled when we return from WDW, it would be a long time before I'd be able to travel again. My disappointment is not only the closings and rehabs of major attractions, it is the lack of "timely" information especially and poor planning on the part of Disney, these rehabs should begin in value season and not when parks will be at peak attendance in summer. Historically, it is true that holidays WDW is at peak, but summer season has the longest stretch of high attendance. I understand repairs need to be done, but WDW, please don't inform us in the last couple of months before our vacation, visitors should be informed well enough in time in order to adjust vacation plans and schedules. Do we think Disney would compensate us in the slightest for major closings, NOT! I only hope there won't be anything else coming up that they aren't telling us. I'd like to say this...I am greatful to these DISboards and members for all the posts and updates to everything going on in WDW, without DISboards, we'd be unable to rely on any valuable information being volunteered by Disney in a reasonable amount of time, and a reasonable amount of time does not mean two or three months before our arrival dates, and after ALL our plans have been carefully planned out, and after paying our phone bills for the many hours of long distance calls to Disney for reservations. So, in my opinion, and I'm only one man with one opinion, notifying the public of plans for rehabs should mean the year before, because in many cases, it takes that long to carefully plan everything out. So, in ending here, we'll make the best of it and still look forward to a wonderful trip, I'll just suck it up and plan for different attractions, but we'll miss the ones that we are fond of, because it'll be another five years before we can return pending the outcome of surgery.