Recent updates and expansions at Walt Disney World and Disneyland have clarified The Walt Disney Company’s current position on their theme parks. No attraction is too sacred to guarantee its existence. If The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror isn’t safe, nothing is. Park planners are casting a critical eye toward the various rides, noting which ones lack the traffic befitting the resources required to maintain their operation. No matter how much you might love a piece of Disney lore, it might not be long for the parks if it’s not selling well enough to justify the cost of upkeep. Here are a few Disney theme park attractions that are possibly at death’s door.
Tom Sawyer Island
Image: DisneyLet’s start the list with a shocker. By now, you are probably aware that Disneyland has altered their venerable attraction twice since 2007. First, they introduced elements of Pirates of the Caribbean and now they’re performing updates to reduce the size of the land, thereby providing more space to the impending Star Wars Land.
When Disney strategists plan changes like this, something simple drives their decisions: a series of questions. How popular is the attraction? How much does it cost to maintain on a daily, weekly, and annual basis? How large a footprint does it require within the park? If they removed it, would something undeniably better become the replacement?
Image: DisneyTom Sawyer Island at Disneyland has survived two recent evaluations under these conditions. Yes, it lost some space and yes, it required new theming to tie in the more established Pirates of the Caribbean brand. It still survived, though. At Magic Kingdom, the situation isn’t as finite. Since this park didn’t open until 16 years after Disneyland, it doesn’t have the same pressure to maintain opening day classics from the Happiest Place on Earth. We already witnessed this with Snow White’s Scary Adventures, which Disney shuttered during the construction of New Fantasyland.
In recent years, plenty of speculation has involved the current space of Tom Sawyer Island. A boardwalk linking Big Thunder Mountain Railroad to The Haunted Mansion would solve a lot of current congestion problems. And an E Ticket attraction at the current position of Tom Sawyer Island would go a long way toward revitalizing an area that’s just sort of there right now. Such a change makes sense given that Tom Sawyer Island has slipped in popularity. Kids today just don’t care about it the way that they did decades ago. Plus, that whole area is kind of nasty. Disney could turn a blight into a New Frontierland, and this change seems likely over the next few years.
Tomorrowland Speedway
Image: DisneyHave you ever looked at an overhead view of Magic Kingdom? For that matter, have you ever studied a regular Magic Kingdom map? Tomorrowland Speedway takes up nearly as much land as the Peoplemover, Space Mountain, the Carousel of Progress and the Astro Orbiter, combined.
What does Disney get for that space? Well, they offer one of the golden age attractions. Autopia was once so popular at Disneyland that three different versions of it existed at various parts of the park. Walt Disney understood that kids loved the idea of driving, the ultimate symbol of adulthood. He empowered them with innumerable opportunities to do so. To a certain extent, the merchandise appeal of Cars reinforces how prescient Uncle Walt was in evaluating the inner workings of a child’s mind. Clearly, driving simulations have a place in Disney folklore and at theme parks. Is Tomorrowland Speedway the best use of that space, though?
Image via Flickr user danxoneil
Image: Flickr (license)
My answer is definitely no. Tomorrowland as a themed land has lost its way a bit in recent years. That’s because the park of tomorrow’s signature attractions hasn’t changed much during the 21st century. Disney needs to add something that will remind guests that its rides are historically always on the cutting edge. The one that springs into my mind from a foreign land is TRON Lightcycle Power Run at Shanghai Disneyland. It’s the perfect example of a quasi-futuristic ride done right.
An attraction like that would fundamentally alter the current perception of Tomorrowland. Currently, it seems trapped at a single moment in time. Adding a Lightcycle attraction will also provide a kind of driving experience to kids, although the difference in height requirements (2’8” versus 4’) would mean they’d have to wait a few more years.
Image: Disney
Finally, if you disagree about the change, consider something else from the Disney park planner’s perspective. The throughput on Tomorrowland Speedway is surprisingly weak. Research suggests that it’s capable of servicing only 6,300 guests during a 14-hour park day. Even Magic Carpets of Aladdin beats that! Many major attractions at Magic Kingdom double it. Tomorrowland Speedway is the blueprint example of taking up too much space AND having a low guest throughput.
Mission: Space
Image: DisneyChanges at Future World are happening soon. That much is undeniable. Disney has bold plans for the 35th anniversary of Epcot. Mission: Space was always controversial due to the stressful aspects of the simulation on the human body. Now, it’s the worst combination of unpopular and spacious.
Only a handful of Future World pavilions are massive in size. Mission: Space is one of them, which makes its lack of lines that much harder to ignore. At a park with a few major attractions, Mission: Space rarely has wait-times in excess of half an hour. The norm is much lower. Theme park tourists vote with their time. When something isn’t exciting enough to give repeat rides, it’s been found lacking, and that’s sadly true of Mission: Space.
Image: DisneyWith a premise as fertile as outer space exploration, Disney should have the ability to come up with something much more profound than what currently resides at this pavilion, a simulation where a person pushes a button a couple of times. Mission: Space needs updating in a world where smartphone apps offer more engaging space adventures. Whether Disney discards the current premise and builds something entirely new or updates what they have is up for debate.
Personally, I would move away from Mars since the ride’s shelf life would be less than a decade by the time Disney finished renovations. Trappist-1, here we come! That’s the kind of ambitious exploration prototype more representative of the culture and tradition of Disney Imagineering.
Stitch’s Great Escape!
Image: DisneyThe top two selections on this list are the obvious ones. It doesn’t take a lot of insight to understand that Disney’s decision to reduce this attraction to part-time signifies it’s at death’s door. The fact that loud rumors already exist about its replacement also doesn’t help the perception that it’s on borrowed time. Given the quality of Stitch’s Great Escape!, Disney’s right to weigh options about its replacement.
From the very beginning, many theme park tourists harbored a grudge over the attraction. It replaced a vastly superior experience, the legendary ExtraTERRORestrial Alien Encounter. Since Disney deemed that attraction too intense for some park guests, they introduced a much sillier premise using some of the same mechanics. The end result was disappointing, and I say that as someone who has spent more money on Stitch merchandise than food this year.
Image: DisneyIn October of 2016, Disney finally acknowledged the obvious. Stitch’s Great Escape! had the smallest crowds at Magic Kingdom. Honestly, the rides were small even if we compare the attraction to regular theme parks rather than the most trafficked one on the planet. People just don’t like it as a rule, and that’s a black mark on the otherwise pristine ledger sheet of Disney’s Parks and Resorts division.
While we don’t know what’s coming next, rumors involve characters from the Wreck-It Ralph franchise in a virtual reality driving simulation. That would make sense in that it would fit in the small space of the current attraction. Plus, it would offer a driving experience for people of all ages (including those under 4-feet tall) if/when Disney does get rid of Tomorrowland Speedway. I should mention that this rumor has been disavowed by some folks as considered and discarded, but the point remains. No matter what winds up at Stitch’s Great Escape!, it definitely won’t be the current attraction. Disney knows they have a lemon here.
Ellen’s Energy Adventure
Image: DisneyAs originally envisioned, the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow would become a world leader in innovation and technology. A thriving Disney business would operate in this capitalist utopia. After Walt Disney died, the reality became something else. His brother and Imagineers tried to honor his stated goals for Epcot. Alas, finances forced sacrifices, ultimately leading to the introduction of an inferior yet still spectacular version of the park to become the reality.
One of the original pavilions/attractions was Universe of Energy in 1982, which was later replaced in 1996 by Ellen’s Energy Adventure. For many people, it’s a charming piece of edutainment featuring beloved talk show Ellen DeGeneres playing a game of Jeopardy against scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis. Yes, I’m serious. Bill Nye the Science Guy even makes an appearance. It’s super-weird in theory but works well in execution. It’s also super-slow, which is why a lot of savvy theme park tourists consider the attraction a wonderful place to take a catnap during the middle of a long day at Epcot. What it’s not is exciting or a major draw. Given the massive size of the pavilion, that’s problematic.
Disney knows the troubling situation at Ellen’s Energy Adventure. That’s why the rumor of a Guardians of a Galaxy roller coaster coming to Epcot makes perfect sense. It’d replace a flagging attraction with a wildly popular intellectual property from the Disney library, effectively doing for the front of the park what Frozen Ever After has done for the World Showcase.
Image: DisneyOut of all the reasons listed for shuttering the attractions listed here, the one for Ellen’s Energy Adventure makes the most sense. Disney is currently wasting energy powering a facility intended to draw awareness to the subject. Even as they switch to green, renewable sources, Ellen’s Energy Adventure remains a dated attraction that’s extremely well-intended but simply not a major draw. The attraction rarely has wait-times in excess of 15 minutes, even on the most trafficked days at the park. Its current existence is a burden on the company.
Conversely, a hot roller coaster attached to a great IP would add a fourth E Ticket attraction to Epcot, joining Soarin’ Around the World, Frozen Ever After, and Test Track. A switch from the potential energy of Ellen to the kinetic energy of the Guardians of the Galaxy will revitalize Epcot moving forward, even as it alters the overall theme of the park from the Future World of old to a more generic but important one: packing Epcot with guests each day.
Disney’s running a business, and their recent decisions are untethering their connections to the past in order to provide a better overall experience to the next generations of theme park tourists. To make that happen, they’re going to have to break a few eggs first, though. The five attractions listed above are the ones whose continued existence is difficult to justify on a ledger sheet, even if some of them maintain reverence among Disney fans. This is a transitional period for Disney theme parks, and the changes are going to seem controversial even if/when they make sense.
