What if Disney closed a park for maintenance or a revamp?

[yulilin3]

Plus the hundred of Cast Members that would be out of work...it's just not practical

 

[Robo]

I'd rather see things going up.

Loved watching the progress of Expedition Everest during construction.

 

[hakepb]

While closing would be impractical, WDW has enough land....why can't they build an attraction in a staging area, take it apart and reassemble within a few months in the real park?

WDW needs to promote their Christmas decoration manager to head of park construction

 

[jec6613]

Six Flags here in Georgia is planning on completely revamping their little-kids area, and adding a dozen new or revamped rides. And, they're doing this all before next year (they close during the winter).

Six Flags doesn't do their own rides - it's contracted out, and little-kid rides especially are designed to be off the shelf and portable. Many of them boast about 24 hour setup time, and ability to fit into a single 53' trailer.

While closing would be impractical, WDW has enough land....why can't they build an attraction in a staging area, take it apart and reassemble within a few months in the real park?

Because Disney rides are built in conjunction with the building. Believe it or not, ride assembly is relatively easy (though it must be done a piece at a time as the ride is being built), it's the building and infrastructure parts that take the time.

One of the biggest selling points of WDW attractions is that they're not off the shelf Six Flags type, they're custom tailored to the location. It's part of the magic.

 

[hakepb]

Disney also contracts with ride companies (there is/was an outdoor duplicate of RnR) and I've heard about more companies on other rides
But Disney does spend a lot of time on custom finishes.

As an example of finish time, I stayed at Jambo during the Kidani construction. During my 9 day stay, they roofed one turret. If you wanted a normal contractor to install normal roofing, that might be a 1 day job, but custom, rustic looking work took a long time

I think some of the extra time is safety...which brings me back to off-site construction. Instead of forming every 7DMT rock on the structure, build them more safely on the ground and "bolt" them on...

 

[disnut8]

I'd rather see things going up.

Loved watching the progress of Expedition Everest during construction.

Totally agree, especially with Expedition Everest. I watched that thing going up and up and up for a long time and I vowed I would never ride it since I don't like roller coasters with a long climb up and then a plunge to the bottom. And that's exactly what Expedition Everest looked like. On one trip, I told this to my daughter-in-law and she said the magical words - "how will you know if you don't like it unless you try it?" It's now one of my favorite attractions but I loved the anticipation of watching it go up.

 

[Bluegrrl]

What's frustrating to me is that right now Disney has construction everywhere. Universal studios did HP in 1/2 the time than Disney has done with other stuff. I don't understand why they can't focus on one project, get that done then move to another effectively. Nope, they'd rather spread themselves thin and do projects everywhere. We have hp in Uni, but no Avatar - yet I believe both projects were announced at same time. No lightshow at AK, SW will take forever, and dtd is hardly complete. Again, why not take it one at a time? And yes, r&r was an off the shelf coaster from, I think, Germany

 

[Jennytoon]

Plus the hundred of Cast Members that would be out of work...it's just not practical

I think Cast Members are not the only labor issue. The availability of able contractors and construction workers may also be a limiting factor in the timeline.

What's frustrating to me is that right now Disney has construction everywhere. Universal studios did HP in 1/2 the time than Disney has done with other stuff. I don't understand why they can't focus on one project, get that done then move to another effectively. Nope, they'd rather spread themselves thin and do projects everywhere. We have hp in Uni, but no Avatar - yet I believe both projects were announced at same time. No lightshow at AK, SW will take forever, and dtd is hardly complete. Again, why not take it one at a time? And yes, r&r was an off the shelf coaster from, I think, Germany

Software development is part of my job responsibilities. When I first started at my current job, I spent almost 100% of my non-administrative time actively developing new software. Now, I spend maybe 25% of my non-administrative time actively developing new software, because the other 75% is spent fixing software that I wrote five years ago that is having issues with the latest Windows update, or adding a tiny function to another package I wrote, or responding to user questions about how to use the software.

Although I have seen posts in other threads arguing that Uni isn't really faster than Disney, it's a matter of how much is done before the announcement, I think that this is the fundamental principle that applies to making Disney slower. It is easier to start with a blank slate and the ability to devote 100% of your labor force to a project. It's not so easy to maintain existing infrastructure and build new at the same time with a relatively fixed labor pool.

This kind of analysis applies to any situation really where you have a limiting resource. On the same income, I could take a lot more vacations to Disney if I didn't have to pay my mortgage and grocery bills.

ETA: I realize I didn't really address your point about spreading themselves thin. I think that the appearance of spreading themselves thin is a resource management strategy -- having different projects in different stages of development is a way to keep crews busy all the time. The electricians that are working on Project A will be needed on Project B tomorrow, but are not really needed anywhere else right now. I always have a few projects going in different stages of development for the same reason -- it evens out the workload. To us it appears as though they could get it done faster if they just focused, but I'm not sure that's the truth.

 

[JimmyV]

I'd rather see things going up.

Loved watching the progress of Expedition Everest during construction.

There is actually much to this. While people like to say that they hate seeing walls and construction projects, those walls and projects serve the important function of free advertising. I too remember making several trips to AK while EE was being built and it created a sense of anticipation that made me want to come back when it was finished. And I was at DCA when it was a complete mess, but couldn't wait to go back to see VoTLM, (my bad), and Cars Land. That level of excitement and "I want to come back" anticipation would be completely lost if the park were shut down. Yes, DHS 3.0 could be up and running faster if they shuttered it. But a whole lot of people are going to walk past "Re-Imagining Walls" behind which lurks a Star Wars Land being built and many of those people will drool and start planning their next trip. Or...6 more annual trips, the last of which will allow them to actually visit SWL.