Not to throw a wet blanket on everyone's bash-Disney-execs party, but Disney IS a publicly traded company that has to answer to shareholders. Can't really toss out budgets and spend whatever whenever wherever, or there will be a shareholder revolt. The company stock price has doubled in the past 20 months or so, and I'm really happy about that.
Personally, I'd say that this is in part a prime example of the problem with the way Wall Street views things and the current Disney management's priorities.
Way too many money people focus so much on the short term gains (in most companies and industries) that the long term suffers. We've all see how various aspects of the park experience has suffered over the past several years as Disney cuts back on staffing, maintenance, or quality in order to increase their profit margins.... which is done almost entirely for the shareholder benefit and to justify the pay/bonuses going to those at the top of the management ladder.
Disney Management isn't helping since they are so beholden to those stockholders that they are more afraid of their immediate displeasure than the long-term stability of the company. While it's a fine line, I'm of the belief that if Disney management showed more creative influence, vision, and guts, in their decisions that ultimately the markets would be willing to withstand some short-term pain in return for the long term gain that Disney could be capable of producing for them.
Now, the other side of this, as someone who visits WDW one week a year, I don't really find the AK to be a poorly planned or executed park. Could there be some upgrades? Sure. But the park has the 2 best stage shows on property in Festival of the Lion King and the Finding Nemo show. It has a very enjoyable 3D show, one great thrill ride in Expedition Everest (whether the Yeti works or not, though they do need to get that fixed), a few other good rides in Primevil Whirl and Dinosaur, an enjoyable water ride in Kali River Rapids, and some excellent wild animal viewing, in the safari, the trails, Discovery Island, and the Rafiki Planet Watch.
There isn't anywhere else that you can get this sort of diverse experience from shows to rides to animal viewing/interaction.
Maybe not ALL the aspects.... but several of them you can get, and some to a better degree, over in Tampa at Busch Gardens. And not every guest is interested in stage shows. i'll admit the shows aren't bad though, but if you look at the left-over parade float centerpieces of FotLK it's obvious that the shows are almost an afterthought added to quickly and easily add capacity and things to do to "flesh out the park".
For example... Look at the early history of MGM. As they needed to add more capacity to the park they put in several stage shows and other scripted entertainment (the crimestoppers act on the old Backstage Tour....The Hunchback Theater, etc)..... but unlike with AK, They actually invested in the park and added Sunset Blvd... and the Muppets.... etc, and continued to invest to "fix" the problems with the park.
Not going to make any definitive statements here, but just taking a wild guess, the people who've said they'd return after the park was finished probably didn't spend much time at all on Discovery Island, probably didn't go to Rafiki's Planet Watch, and probably didn't go to see both shows. Likely just went to the Safari, walked over to Asia, rode Expedition Everest, walked through Chester/Hester's, maybe rode Dinosaur, walked to the Tree of Life, maybe saw Bugs Life, then left. If that is the case, and it's pretty likely it is, then they came nowhere near experiencing the entire park.
And that right there is why some us feel the park does not qualify as a total success. There is a large number of Disney Guests who are looking for the headlines on the park map to see what's going on. They go from attraction to attraction. They are so focused on "experiencing everything" and "Seeing Disney", that they completely miss the small details and aren't going to take the time to explore. So much of what Animal Kingdom is left with due to it's cutbacks and lack of continued investment are those details that you really need to slow down and enjoy. It's those details that those of us who like the park really enjoy to the point that they become a headline in and of themselves.
But we are also not the norm. We are people who enjoy going to Disney, have likely been before, and know we'll be back again in the future. We aren't afraid to take time out of our "ride time" to explore the nature trails on Discover Island... or try and see how many animals we can identify on the Tree of Life. We are the type who will just sit and people watch, or notice that small little detail in the graffiti in Harambe that helps tell the story of the small african village our safari will be departing from. We are the people who actually know who that weird guy walking around with the 300 rings and feathers hanging from his ear is. We need to remember that not every guest to the Walt Disney Resort is going to judge a park's merits on the same details and history that we do.
Now whether the initial vision for the park was never realized is another issue, but things get in the way sometimes, and you can't really just toss budgets and monetary concerns out the window. They stayed pretty close to the original intent, and have a big opportunity ahead with Avatar.
The question should be what are we considering the Original intent of the park?
Are we looking at the intent from Disney's business perspective? If that's the case, I'll agree it's a failure. Disney built the park with the expectation that it would be a big enough draw that it would increase the overall length of stay and impact the resort in a way similar to the way the opening of EPCOT impacted the resort. AK did not do this however..... though that's not entirely the park's fault as some of those expectations were unrealistic. The Economy, timing (the park's opening and initial growing pains weren't long past when 9/11 and the resulting travel decline happened), and the average american's available vacation time/budgets all conspired to limit the increases that Disney was expecting. Disney however I believe has managed to readjust what they are expecting out of the park, and with those readjusted expectations, it's doing an admirable job doing what they expect of it today.
Are we looking at it fro a creative intent? If that's the case, an argument can be made that it's pretty close to the original intent.... at least, some of the individual areas. The original creative intent was to include the "animals that never were".... which the closest we have is a nonfunctional Yeti in an area based on an actual geographic area.
i am however really hopeful about the Avatar Expansion and it's potential to salvage and revive certain aspects of the park...
Another point I saw in this thread was about the construction times and not going 24/7 to get things done ASAP. Well, for new Fantasyland, if you went in summer 2012, you saw the new Dumbo, the Casey's Jr. area, and the Barnstormer. You'd have to return to see Little Mermaid ride and the Beasts Castle/Belle. If you returned in spring/summer 2013 to see that, then you'd have to return again to see Seven Dwarfs mine train and Fairytale Hall, likely in spring/summer 2014. If they just opened all at once, there would be no extra incentive to return to see more. It's good business to open in phases, not just for this purpose, but also for cost control, not having to pay for 24/7 construction.
I'm not going to really buy that entire line of thought. I don't have an issue with them not going 24/7.... but they are taking much more time building everything than you could say was just due to the actual build. Let's look at what the neighbors across town have accomplished since 2010, which is when the WWoHP opened and construction on the New Fantasyland started...
Jan 2012 - New nighttime lagoon show at the Studios
March 2012 - Refurbed "Hi-Def" Spiderman 3D ride reopens.
May 2012 - Spongebob Storepants opens [rethemed and redesigned replacement store in kidzone]
July 2012 - Despicable Me Attraction Opens.
Summer 2013 - Transformers attraction and Store open at Studios Park
rumor'd summer 2014 - Harry Potter Phase 2 opens
Also current under construction but I'm not aware of opening dates.... most likely sometime this year... New restaurants, stores, and other attractions/games around the Simpsons attraction themed around Springfield... such as Moe's Tavern and Krusty Burger.
There are also already major rumors starting to float about potential further additions or projects getting ready to start around the universal parks in the coming months, such as in the Jurrasic Park section.
So it's totally possible to get the new attraction/new things to see thing by simply having multiple projects going at once and not working at a snails pace... IF you are willing to invest the money and put the effort into it. Disney hasn't really showed either in their handling of Fantasyland as evidenced by the fact its taken so long to open the area... and other than the coaster, there isn't anything really groundbreaking or overly complicated from a construction or design standpoint in the new fantasyland. [Little Mermaid is a clone of the California ride, so all the show programming and audioanimatronics were built and done before the California version was opened months before the buildig was even ready in Florida].
Even with Avatarland, Most of the talk that fed the "Avatar is Dead" rumors and wishful thinking all stemmed from some version of "Disney doesn't want to spend the money".
Yes.... Disney is a huge publicaly traded company who has to answer to shareholders. But we are seeing them treat the parks and resorts as giant piggy banks and not really showing the guts to invest in the parks to help continue their long term growth.
When you compare that to Universal... Now owned by Comcast... ALSO a publicaly traded company... and you see a Company who is also seeing massive stock price increases while seeing their parks as something more than just a piggy bank and investing heavily in improving them.
Another big difference is that often Universal has waited until construction is well underway and maybe even a few months to open before they even announce "Oh! Guess what we are bringing to you!". Even if the rumors by that point are so strong that it's not really anything new to those who follow the rumors, it's MUCH different than what Disney has been doing where they drag out the "Look what we are doing!" PR message from almost the start of the project to pat themselves on the back for actually putting money back into their product.
But, if you can prove to me that long term quality thinking couldn't be just as profitable as the current short term dollar at every turn philosophy does, then it'll be a discussion.
