Disney announces 1920's theme for California Adventure rehab

The new entry way looks like the airlifted it from Disney Hollywood Studios and replaced the letters with California Adventure. Not bad, but boring.

Cars land looks sweet though.

I hope they roll back prices to the Roaring Twenties every other Tuesday.

I say open a monorail station in the park and charge one price for both parks (i.e., no premium pricing for a park hopper).

The plans look great though.I like the new pier look for the Sun--er Fun Wheel.

^I've always thought a Monorail station themed to a subway station in Hollywood Pictures Backlot would've been pretty cool. The Blue Sky Cellar, which will display models, pictures, and videos of the changes coming to DCA over the next 5 years opens this weekend at the Golden Vine Winery.

Looks good to me. Cars is such a huge franchise with boys, I'm surprised they haven't done more with it already.

Here's Mice Chats photo coverage of the opening of the preview center with far more WDI goodies.

http://micechat.com/disneyland-news/california-adventure-fix/

Why they are using Cars Land and not calling it Radiator Spring is beyond me.

Oh, I guess there sticking with California Adventure for now, which was also thought to be thrown on the trash heap

But I thought it was once said around here that nostalgia isn't a business plan?

I like the proposed changes. DCA was never a terrible park, it just lacked the attention to detail that has made most Disney parks so special. Dare I say that a little more charm and some new attractions will make DCA a success?

Rob Ascough said:
But I thought it was once said around here that nostalgia isn't a business plan?

This is fantasy nostalgia - the romaticized, Norman Rockwell, storybook kind. Artifically creating a time and memories that never really existed.

Big difference between a manufactured nostalgia at a 10 year old park costing a billion dollars and expecting people to flock to an old rundown park just because it's old and rundown now, but used to a nice place to go.

Ditto to that. The park will be new and shiny, with nostalgic style. Old stuff is still just... old.

Looks like Maliboomer is gone.

^With those horrendous "scream shields" or whatever they were called, it's no big loss. Was I the only one that read Gonch's last sentence and saw "Conneaut" written all over the place (but between the lines)?

ApolloAndy said:
Looks like Maliboomer is gone.

Apparently, but are parachute drops a good replacement? They're disappearing more and more with what I feel is low ridership. I just can't imagine even Disney making them 'that' appealing.

Woo hoo! Looks like they'll have Bellagio type dancing water fountains as well. That is a big plus for me. I will miss the California Screaming loop through Mickey's ears though.

That's really old...
http://coasterbuzz.com/news/9768/disney-plans-resort-for-oahu.aspx

Yeah, when I realized it, I tried to delete it before anybody caught on. You were too fast for me . . .

It just amazes me how Disney can drop a billion dollars on something and it won't put them anywhere into debt.

I still never understood them building this park in southern Cali. It's looked at the way it is because it's near their first park. I think they should have built this park somewhere else in the country that lacks a large scale park.

Like Seattle? or Salt Lake City?

It's a valid point, though. For a while, it seemed that Disney was scrambling to open additional gates at all of its properties regardless of whether those additional gates made any sense.

The problem with opening an additional gate, especially in Disney's model, is that you have to build a complete park. With California Adventure, they built a full park, and they promoted it appropriately, but the park completely failed to live up to the standards which were set not by the promotions for the park, or by anything else related to California Adventure, but instead by Disneyland, with its 40+ year head start. Disney could have tried to manage expectations a little better, but when you price your parks such that all parks are treated equally so far as admissions are concerned, you have to expect that people will be a little disappointed when the parks are not really equals in any meaningful way.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.