Disneyland Resort (DL, DLR, DCA) Discussion Thread

^Yeah, he did. But its not like they can move the castle, or main st to make wider walk ways. All they can do it add non-walk way capacity. Like you said, fill the queues and keep people off the walk ways. The new land will help that a lot. Because, like cars land, its expected to have lots of wide open spaces to fill people with.

They could certainly open up the central hub like they did in Orlando. Maybe not to quite the same size but the Disneyland hub is awful. There's a ton of space but 50% of it is fenced off to prevent guests from climbing trees.

Tomorrowland should finally rip out the old Peoplemover / Rocket Rods track. The supports take up a ton of space down the main aisle, not to mention how huge the loading platform is in the dead center of Tomorrowland.

The Nemo lagoon could be halved and not take away anything from the ride experience aside the the overlong intro prior to the indoor section. The lagoon and waterfall can still exist, just tighten the ride track's initial turnaround and expand the walkway. The bottleneck between the dining area and Matterhorn is pointless.

Speaking of Matterhorn, there's way too much "noise" going on in front of it. Just like the central hub there's too much fenced off, useless junk. It's a checkerboard of walkways between the Matterhorn station, food stands, smoking area, monorail supports, Small World, lighting rigs, and gift shops. That could all be improved immensely.

That whole back corner of the park, in fact, is horrible. Basically everything from the Fantasyland Stage (Magical Map) to Matterhorn can be opened WAY up rather than having random fenced-off chunks and food stalls. Open it up, push the food stands and gift shops to the sides.

Fantasyland is a lost cause. Hopefully with the development of Star Wars land they'll be able to figure out a better flow of traffic, but I'm not gonna hold my breath. Everything behind the castle is tighter than anchovies, the area immediately surrounding the Mad Tea Party in particular.

They did a nice job with the Rivers Of America plaza renovation a few years ago. That area and Critter Country are actually pretty decent. The plaza between Haunted Mansion and the DLRR could certainly be opened up a lot more, though. Again with the pointless fences.

Adventureland is about as bad as Fantasyland. Unless they move the storefronts back, there's no help. The bottleneck from the Pirates bridge, Tarzan's Treehouse, and the restaurant cause a huge problem. Unless they rip out the treehouse which sits right in the middle of the walkway, there's no help even if they move the store fronts.

Not saying you dont have some valid points, but all those fences you reference have bushes and trees inside of them. Without the greenery that Disney is know for, you end up with swaths of concrete. There are changes that can be made, and hopefully they make them in the future, but removing all the planters to add more walk ways is not the solution.

^ I'm not saying eliminate the greenery. There's plenty of ways to rearrange landscaping to make the park more conducive to traffic flow. If I wanted the pave the park I'd never leave King's Dominion.

^I agree, removing all of the "pointless fences" would make those areas lose a significant bit of their theming and charm. Not to say that there aren't ways for foot path improvements, but ripping out all of the planters isn't necessarily the answer. Planters and greenery are the difference between nice theming/shade and the empty pit of hell that is Full Throttle Plaza.

I'm pretty sure Disney is capable of ripping out the current planners while still employing a talented landscape designer to re-do the features...

Moving all the confounded ODV carts out of the walkways would be a huge improvement alone.

Moving all the confounded ODV carts out of the walkways would be a huge improvement alone.

Another great point on how they could better utilize the existing spaces they have! Disneyland was not designed to handle the things that make for a successful theme park in the modern era, including ODV carts. Really feels like there was no master plan for the park and they are paying for it now. I am terrified of how bad things will be by the time Star Wars land opens if major overhauls are not made...

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-disneyland-star-wars-20151226-story.html

Photo source: Los Angeles Times

Moving all the confounded ODV carts out of the walkways would be a huge improvement alone.

Or put them all up on the old people mover/rocket rods tracks, and have a middle walkway created,

from that first exit and entry parallel tracks, for any of the gp to stroll along, to buy, etc.

All I have to say is once Star Wars Land opens, I am throwing all of my money at Disney.

^ You know, they might have a KickStarter account set up, hmmm?

Moving all the confounded ODV carts out of the walkways would be a huge improvement alone.

 

Another great point on how they could better utilize the existing spaces they have! Disneyland was not designed to handle the things that make for a successful theme park in the modern era, including ODV carts. Really feels like there was no master plan for the park and they are paying for it now. I am terrified of how bad things will be by the time Star Wars land opens if major overhauls are not made...

The ODV Carts are a problem. Some of them are located withing planters, and therefor take up no walk way (except its queue, if it has a line). But most aren't. especially the ones in the hub of the park, they are all over the place and in the walk ways. It would be better if they were all pushed back into the planters and had cut out areas for them.

I have to think that they know the park will be slammed, so we will have to wait and see what they do... if anything.

Okay, I'm back from my Disneyland Christmas experience. I went on Christmas Day, and here is my review:

It was fun. I got to get on everything and more because a member in the family needed a wheel chair and liked all the rides, so we got to go in through the exits on all the rides.

The crowds were immense, but it wasn't difficult to navigate through them. Plus they had some cast members directing "people traffic" as I call it, and that helped a lot.

There were two parades, a fireworks show (which was cut short due to high winds), and a showing of Fantasmic ( all of which I skipped out on so I can get to rides faster).

Food prices were reasonable, and the food was great. I was surprised to find Disneyland's food was cheaper compared to Knott's Berry Farm depending on what you get (I went to Knott's the next day).

Now, in regards to the park in general:

I have to say, the park and "lands" seemed a lot smaller to me compared to when I last went 16 years ago (I was 10 when I went last time). I guess it's true what they say about things being bigger when you're a kid. Some of the rides and areas needed attention to detail. Toon Town looked pretty run-down. Some of the animatronics in the older rides looked dirty and some animatronics and special effects weren't functioning at all. But it's all good. I understand that Disneyland isn't perfect, and at the end of the day, it's just a theme park.

The cast members were awesome. So many cute female cast members I had heard that the cast members have been treating guests badly and being rude... I did come across a few who had attitudes or looked grumpy (I would too if I worked on Christmas), but I just smiled and said: "Merry Christmas and thank you for working here to make this a special day for everyone".

They seemed to lighten up after I told them that.

It was a lot of fun. Disneyland may seem smaller than I remembered, but the magic is still there. I felt like a kid again.

The ODV Carts are a problem. Some of them are located withing planters, and therefor take up no walk way (except its queue, if it has a line). But most aren't. especially the ones in the hub of the park, they are all over the place and in the walk ways. It would be better if they were all pushed back into the planters and had cut out areas for them.

 

I have to think that they know the park will be slammed, so we will have to wait and see what they do... if anything.

Things get messy when the question of where to draw the line between guest inconvenience and sales opportunity is asked. Of course the park wants to maximize sales by putting carts in high traffic areas, but when the carts are causing foot traffic to jam up like cars on an overcrowded freeway, that doesn't seem to be viewed as a problem. They just seem OK with the traffic. That's what I wish they would address.

Right, thats why one solution would be to build indents into the planters they are in front of, and push the cart into the new pad and out of the walk way. Some carts already have a space like this made for them.

Indents for cart+cored stanchion for a queue=problem mostly solved.

TPR was invited to a sneak preview of the Disneyland Resort's 2016 Tournament of Roses parade float! The massive float is made of three sections themed to Frozen, the Diamond Celebration and Star Wars. The Frozen section will feature Anna, Elsa, Kristoff and Olaf; while the Star Wars section will have Stormtroopers, R2-D2, Chewbacca and Kylo Ren performers, as well as a flying Millennium Faclon. We got a chance to check out the build and see the floats.

Check out the photos:

The Frozen portion of the float.

Chris Buck, director of Frozen, was on hand to help decorate.

Definitely super cool getting walk around and stand on these Rose Parade floats!

On to Star Wars!

The Star Wars section was mostly based on concept art for the new land.

The Centerpiece of the float themed to the Diamond Celebration.

The bridges that connect each section of the float.

Lots of volunteers on hand to help "flower" the float.

And here is what the final product will look like!

Look out for the Disneyland float during the Rose Parade on New Year's Day!

It's looking really good, there.

Can't wait to see it on tv, on Friday.

Park is insanely packed today, walking through Tomorrowland and Indiana Jones area is really painful.

Cool report on the floats! The floats look really nice, and the park looks way too packed!

. . . the park looks way too packed!

No kidding! This is one day I wouldn't want to be at Disneyland.

^ Probably not at Knott's, Universal, or Magic Mountain either.

Today was absolutely crazy, I think park reached capacity in the morning! Hyperspace Mountain and Star Tours line hit 150 minutes almost all day and Indiana Jones keeps breaking down. Only 5 hours to go and wish they a perfect ending of 2015.

Happy New Year TPR!

^ Probably not at Knott's, Universal, or Magic Mountain either.

 

Universal didn't do anything for NYE. Wasn't too busy.