Disneyland Resort - President's Day Weekend
Disneyland Resort, Anaheim, CA
They must be trusting me more and more around here. First I got to go cover Knott’s Berry Farm, and now I get to cover for Albert while he’s still off having a life? Yeesh. This intern ought to ask for a permanent spot on the team if I keep getting tasked with such responsible duties!
Anyway, here’s photos of Disneyland to satisfy your nerdy little weekly needs.
By the time I got a chance to write this, the hearts are probably gone. But then, we’ll see springtime Eastery stuff, then summery fourth of July MURICA stuff, then HALLOWEEN! It’s the cycle of park life.
Whoops. That photo was a bit premature. Let’s track back to where I parked my car. Or more accurately, Jim’s car. Don’t tell him, but I had to get to the park somehow, and his is the only company car, and I’m NOT about to Uber. I mean, have you heard the allegations? Anyway. Here’s construction garage stuff.
Pixar’s Pinocchio Pal-A-Round and Fox and Friends and Friends and Associates Parking Structure featuring Marvel Motorpool and Star Wars Shuttle Stops and Other Acquired Licenses aka the Cleo Structure
If you rotate your computer screen, you’ll get the full panorama view.
Construction over here is moving at a massive clip-rate. They’re getting a lot of this done as fast as they can, because Disney knows they’re gonna have A LOT of landspeeders and podracers to park before June(?).
Looking down over the new parking garage courtyard. I’m really curious to see how this’ll look and how crowds will flow from both sides before heading over to the trams. If you’ve got any idea, HMU at @WC_Intern on twitter. I GOTS TA KNOW.
Escalators are pretty much installed.
Back over there, cars will ramp up to the levels like they do in mickey and friends. But there’s also a good width of road between the two structures, so I’m curious if this is going to just become one big@$$ Mickey and Friends structure, or if half of it will have a different name, and a different entrance. THESE ARE THE THINGS THAT KEEP ME UP AT NIGHT.
One might say things are…ramping up.
So this big round thing laying on the ground. Chances are that this thing is gonna be used by Mr. rate, and pulled up to the top of the round part of the structure.
Photo courtesy of a google search and Disney’s blog. But see, that’s a big ol’ parking UFO up top. Also, in the photo below, you’ll see the cutout for the bridge that’ll span over the road and down to Downtown Disney, alleviating street traffic for guests.
So what I’m curious about is if guests will have to scale various escalators to get down to cross the bridge, or how that’ll work out. Regardless, it’s a great improvement to the resort, and a lot of fun to wonder how this’ll all work out once it’s finalized.
Architecturally, it’s pretty cool to see this being added on. I know far, far less than Albert does on these things, but I’m always amazed at just how large these projected are scaled and executed at.
And finally, a close up shot of escalators, because we know that one dude in the midwest needed to see this for his own reasons. It’s cool dude, you do you.
That’s the gist of the parking garage. I’m intrigued how it’ll flow between Mickey and Friends, and this new one. Will it be one large garage with one name, a separate with separate entrances, so on and on my brain goes with questions. I know it’s just a parking garage and not as ‘exciting’ as Star Wars Land, but it’s still awesome to see how the place as a whole manages themselves.
Inside the Park
Walls are still up, but they’re moving around a bit as they finish projects.
Right now, as apart of ‘project stardust’, Disneyland has a lot of things up behind walls and scrims. Not a lot of attractions are down, but there’s an incredible amount of beautification going on with the park. From planters to curbs, they’re working on finding little ways to maximize the space for guests, and it’s all in anticipation for Star Wars Land.
Which, if we’re being honest, is awesome to see. It’s great to watch them take a 60+ year old park that’s small compared to its other castle park counterparts around the world, and finding creative solutions to maximize the space, while retaining the show.
For instance, the curbs on Main Street U.S.A. are being sloped in areas to better accommodate guests in ECVs and wheelchairs (and I guess parents with strollers too…).
They’re taking the two entrance curbs at town hall and sloping them down at the corners to allow for a ease of access up to the curbs. Also to note the elevation change as well as (I’m assuming here) markers for parade sitting as well, by having those yellow bricks break up the pattern. It’s a little change, but it’s needed and welcomed.
Now that the west side is done, they've moved things over to the east side to do the same thing.
It’s been noted before elsewhere, but we wanted to take time to point this out. The Main Street Cinema got repainted in a subtle, cute, and sort of obvious way.
They repainted the entire thing to represent Mickey, and it’s basically the coolest. Yellow on bottom for the shoes and black, white and red up top!
Covered Castle
The castle is lookin’ a little scrim today…
As great and fun the castle coverings are, it’s taken its toll on the roofs. That’s why they’re returning to reroof the entire castle. It’s anticipated to be complete by the opening of Star Wars Land. Over the weekend with the storms that rolled through, they had to pull the scrims down to avoid the entire thing falling over because at that point it’d basically be a giant parachute of scaffolding and union workers.
And then on the backside of castle…
Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge
Batuu is becoming more and more detailed as the weeks go by. Additionally, it’s more evident as to how seamless a galaxy far far away will blend into the Frontierland years of far, far, ago.
It’s really, truly incredible.
Here’s a variety of shots from all over the west side of the park. From Critter Country to Tom Sawyer’s Island, here’s how the park looks with the new land arriving soon.
From the parking garage, not much is visible. You can see some painting and final plastering going on, but that’s about it.
Pixar Pier
It’s been…I don’t know…16 months since the carousel closed? It’s been a long time and we’re just now seeing progress on the new ‘neighborhood’.
As great as some aspects are from Pixar Pier (Lamplight Lounge), there’s a lot that’s wrong with this project, and this is one of them. We’re just waiting for DisTwitter to lose their collective minds once a giant Jessie doll towers over the midcentury modern entrance of her Incredible neighbors.
Along with other projects, Grizzly River Run is down for its scheduled refurb time.
The little car by the gas station in Grizzly Peak is behind walls.
Marvel Land
It’s hard to get views of Marvel Land, but there’s some progress on the construction/demo of It’s Tough to Be A Bug’s building.
Downtown Disney
Blacktap is tapping along. We’re not sure of an opening date, but it’s…getting there.
ESPN Zone is soon to be host of a popup instagram Disney exhibit. “Pop-Up Disney!” will debut soon, according to the Disney Parks Blog.
It’s pretty busy over at the resort right now, as you can see. We’ll be back soon to check out more, but for now, we’ll leave you with an exclusive preview of Marvel’s latest and greatest show-stopping character from their highly anticipated film, Captain Marvel. I present to you, Goose.
