Understanding how big WDW is

[andyman8]

While I think Disney World is great, and more than great, I actually think it is bigger than necessary. Most of it is trees and wasteland. I would actually love to be able to reach more by foot.

If I was going to design a new Disney World today, I would make a compact but diverse Downtown Disney in the centre, with a couple hotels, surrounded by the Theme Parks, all with the entrance facing the downtown, and a subway/monorail system to the Resort Hotels, the Deluxe being in walking distance to the park and the Downtown - further away the Moderate and Value resorts. The transportation system should work so great that parking is only going to be permitted far from the "core". And of course direct fast rail transportation to the airport - that is something that the current Disney World also need!

I completely agree! Being a developer, the design of WDW is somewhat of a "nightmare." No one ever knew what is was going to be. Like you said, in the center should be DTD, the next "level" out should've been the theme parks. In between the parks and DTD should be four large parking lots for the parks and one smaller one for DTD. Parking should be one flat rate. Past the parks are the resorts. The closest would be the Deluxe, second closest moderates, and furthers the values. After that, you could have the golf courses, water parks, and ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. These are the less popular attractions and might need to be reached by bus. A monorail could link DTD to the parks and SELECT (most likely the deluxe) resorts. The other resorts would provide pathways for "long walks" to the parks and could also provide bus services. The one point I don't agree on, as a developer, is the MCO Monorail one. DME is fine. In this scenario, roads are only needed to get to the parking lots, resorts, and DTD. Once "parked" at WDW, you don't need to drive your car until you leave.

That being said, with closer parks comes more people park hopping because they aren't driven away by the distance in between parks. With DTD in the center, more people will visit because its not "all the way out there." If Disney hotels were within "walking distance (regardless of being an hour walk maybe), guests were feel closer to the parks making them more enticed to stay onsite, and, with tons busses, those costs a lot.

 

[disnut8]

Parking should be one flat rate.

It is. You pay once for the entire day no matter which park(s) you visit. You stay onsite or have an annual pass, it's free. You are a day guest, you pay once, keep the receipt and can come and go as you like.

 

[Karl66]

Before my first trip in July 1976 I didn't know what to expect. Disney World was certainly "smaller" at that time. Yes, Disney still owned 43 square miles but Walt Disney World consisted only of the Magic Kingdom, Contemporary Hotel and the Polynesian Hotel. I guess I didn't understand as we drove down World Drive that we were in fact on Disney property but I was only nine. (My profile picture was taken during my first trip to WDW) It was always Walt Disney's goal to have the "blessing of size" for his Florida Project. He destested the way Disneyland was soon surrounded by motels and restaurants and he was determined to not let this happen when planning the Disney World. Certainly now that Disney World has developed more of its land it must seem to be a huge place, but there are some of us who remember when this was not the case.

"There's enough land here to hold all of the ideas and plans we could possibly imagine"- Walt Disney

 

[pgianna]

I know a lot of people think they know how huge Disney World is, but a lot are still suprised when they get there. I good rule of thumb would be when explaining the size is to compare it to the town or city they live in. I got a kick out of a someone's post last year that asked if there was a resort that was walking distance to all the parks. I thought to myself, this person has no clue how big Disney world is.


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[sadossey]

We went last month for the first time and I was amazed at the scale of the property. We stayed at POR and before our trip I was looking at DW maps. I kept thinking that Epcot looked to be walking distance from POR. Boy was I wrong! In the form of Tiny Elvis from Sat Night Live.... Look at Disney World, that place is huuuuuge!

 

[pgianna]

I completely agree! Being a developer, the design of WDW is somewhat of a "nightmare." No one ever knew what is was going to be. Like you said, in the center should be DTD, the next "level" out should've been the theme parks. In between the parks and DTD should be four large parking lots for the parks and one smaller one for DTD. Parking should be one flat rate. Past the parks are the resorts. The closest would be the Deluxe, second closest moderates, and furthers the values. After that, you could have the golf courses, water parks, and ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. These are the less popular attractions and might need to be reached by bus. A monorail could link DTD to the parks and SELECT (most likely the deluxe) resorts. The other resorts would provide pathways for "long walks" to the parks and could also provide bus services. The one point I don't agree on, as a developer, is the MCO Monorail one. DME is fine. In this scenario, roads are only needed to get to the parking lots, resorts, and DTD. Once "parked" at WDW, you don't need to drive your car until you leave.

That being said, with closer parks comes more people park hopping because they aren't driven away by the distance in between parks. With DTD in the center, more people will visit because its not "all the way out there." If Disney hotels were within "walking distance (regardless of being an hour walk maybe), guests were feel closer to the parks making them more enticed to stay onsite, and, with tons busses, those costs a lot.

I sounds like a great idea to have built Disney this way. It makes a sense, but here where you might run into a problem if you did it this way. The parks may be too close to eachother, so you may have contractions while in one park. For example, you wouldn't want to be in Future world in Epcot and be able to see Cinderella's castle in the distance. That is what walt wanted to avoid at all costs. Another potential issue would be, if you wanted to expand one theme park, you may only be able to expand in one direction, in other words away from the center, not side to side. Just my opinion, I could be totally wrong.

 

[goofyernmost]

Originally Posted by m86
While I think Disney World is great, and more than great, I actually think it is bigger than necessary. Most of it is trees and wasteland. I would actually love to be able to reach more by foot.

If I was going to design a new Disney World today, I would make a compact but diverse Downtown Disney in the centre, with a couple hotels, surrounded by the Theme Parks, all with the entrance facing the downtown, and a subway/monorail system to the Resort Hotels, the Deluxe being in walking distance to the park and the Downtown - further away the Moderate and Value resorts. The transportation system should work so great that parking is only going to be permitted far from the "core". And of course direct fast rail transportation to the airport - that is something that the current Disney World also need!

I completely agree! Being a developer, the design of WDW is somewhat of a "nightmare." No one ever knew what is was going to be. Like you said, in the center should be DTD, the next "level" out should've been the theme parks. In between the parks and DTD should be four large parking lots for the parks and one smaller one for DTD. Parking should be one flat rate. Past the parks are the resorts. The closest would be the Deluxe, second closest moderates, and furthers the values. After that, you could have the golf courses, water parks, and ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. These are the less popular attractions and might need to be reached by bus. A monorail could link DTD to the parks and SELECT (most likely the deluxe) resorts. The other resorts would provide pathways for "long walks" to the parks and could also provide bus services. The one point I don't agree on, as a developer, is the MCO Monorail one. DME is fine. In this scenario, roads are only needed to get to the parking lots, resorts, and DTD. Once "parked" at WDW, you don't need to drive your car until you leave.

That being said, with closer parks comes more people park hopping because they aren't driven away by the distance in between parks. With DTD in the center, more people will visit because its not "all the way out there." If Disney hotels were within "walking distance (regardless of being an hour walk maybe), guests were feel closer to the parks making them more enticed to stay onsite, and, with tons busses, those costs a lot.

That's not too far off from Walt Disney's original plan. His was that EPCOT would be the center of the property and transportation would travel out from there. I don't think he wanted everything to be crammed into a small area when he went to all the trouble and expense to purchase 25000 acres though.

EPCOT would be a planned community with residential and commercial (DTD) located in it. He knew, based on what he had been recorded saying, that there would be more, but I don't think he had gotten past EPCOT and MK at that point. He did know he didn't want one thing interfering with the other.

I also don't think that buses were part of the original plan. People movers, boats, monorails and trains were going to be the main sources of transportation.

I like the expanse of WDW. It makes it so unique. I'm not walking the entire 25000 acres anyway, just the parks and those would probably be about the same.

Due to my own idiosyncrasies, I always have independent transportation available and except for the monorail and ferry I use just my vehicle. I do that whether or not I stay on-site. I like it better that way, I feel that I can get to my car and back to my room so much faster then using buses and I don't have to share with crowds of sweaty, tired people, crying kids and folks arguing about why they cannot fold the stroller cause the little one is asleep.

I vividly remember driving on site on my first trip in 1983. I honestly thought I had taken a wrong turn someplace because it took so long to get to MK. I kept thinking, I must almost be there, but I wasn't. Thankfully, they used the short distant radio signal for guidance back then and tuning in pretty much told me where I was and that I was on the right road. That generally gave me the mindset needed to not even think about it anymore. It all seems natural and the way it should be.

 

[Robo]

Fil... thinks he knows all about wdw because he went to dl once 20 years ago. I told his the entirety of dl fits in the parking lot for mk at wdw. He doesnt believe me.

I created this a couple of years ago.

The scale of the Disneyland and MK images are the same-

Again, below (different scale, of course) is the bulk of the WDW developed property.