Disney's California Adventure
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| Disney theme park | |
  Grizzly Peak is the icon of Disney's California Adventure |
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| Disney's California Adventure Park | |
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| Location | Anaheim, California, USA |
| Opening Day | February 8, 2001 |
| Resort | Disneyland Resort |
| Theme | California |
| Website | Disneyland Resort Homepage |
| Operator | The Walt Disney Company |
| Disneyland Resort |
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| Year of a Million Dreams |
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Disney's California Adventure park |
| Hotels of the Disneyland Resort |
Disney's California Adventure Park is a Disney theme park in Anaheim, California, adjacent to Disneyland Park and part of the larger Disneyland Resort. It opened on February 8, 2001.
The park has a California theme -- the original proposal was to build a park sporting an experience similar to stepping inside a picturesque postcard. This concept spawned the idea for the park's entrance. Just beyond the gates of the park, the Disneyland Monorail passes over a miniature Golden Gate Bridge; various areas of the park were designed to recreate different California landmarks. The overall intention was to create a more adult-themed park than Disneyland, including faster, scarier rides; shows designed more for an adult audience; and a large number of restaurants. Unlike Disneyland Park, alcohol is served in California Adventure.
Disney's original plan was to build WestCOT, a west coast iteration of Epcot, upon land which was formerly Disneyland's parking lot. Disney's California Adventure Park was built on that land instead. Parking is now available in a space-saving multi-level parking structure a short distance away. The Mickey and Friends parking structure is the second largest parking structure in the world. The largest parking structure in the world is located at Tokyo Disney Resort.
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[edit] Dedication
"To All who believe in the power of dreams... welcome. Here we pay tribute to the dreamers of the past ... The native people, explorers, immigrants, aviators, entrepreneurs and entertainers who built the Golden State. And we salute a new generation of dreamers who are creating the wonders of tomorrow ... From the silver screen to the computer screen ... From the fertile farmlands to the far reaches of space. Disney's California Adventure celebrates the richness and the diversity of California ... Its land, its people, its spirit and, above all, the dreams that it continues to inspire." — Michael Eisner, February 8, 2001
[edit] Park layout
| Disney's California Adventure park |
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| Disneyland's 50th Anniversary |
| Hollywood Pictures Backlot |
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| "a bug's land" |
| Bountiful Valley Farm |
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| Flik's Fun Fair |
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| Golden State |
| Condor Flats |
| The Bay Area |
| Golden Vine Winery |
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| Grizzly Peak Recreation Area |
featuring the Magic of Brother Bear |
| Pacific Wharf |
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| Paradise Pier |
| Entertainment |
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[edit] Paradise Pier
Paradise Pier is the part of the park that looks most impressive from a distance, thanks to its large and colorful rides. Divided out into two areas, the first a California boardwalk themed based on popular coastal boardwalks like the Santa Monica Pier or the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, with a very large ferris wheel (the Sun Wheel), a large roller coaster (California Screamin’), a big shot style attraction (Maliboomer), and the Orange Stinger (a classic swing spinner attraction within a themed shell that resembles an orange). Construction walls have been set up under California Screamin', where a couple of food stands and a shop used to be. Also work has started behind the area backstage on a new attraction building. A sign at the Construction entrance calls the attraction "Toy Story Midway Mania", though Disney has not yet made an official announcement regarding the construction.
The second themed area of Paradise Pier is the Route 66 area, a desert road area that starts with Paradise Pier's crashed fireboat the S.S. rustworthy. Notable attractions are the Jumpin' Jellyfish, Golden Zephyr, and Mulholland Madness as well as the Sunglass Shack in the shape of a giant roadside attraction dinosaur.
[edit] Golden State
This "land" allows for guests to experience the Golden State of California as it is in real life. It is further divided into three sub-lands (Condor Flats, Grizzly Peak Recreational Area, and the Pacific Wharf). It features Golden Dreams, a film about the history of California.
[edit] Condor Flats
The aviation-themed area, Condor Flats features the flight simulator Soarin’ over California simulated hang-glider ride. It is a popular favorite for visitors.
[edit] Grizzly Peak Recreational Area
A wilderness/forested area, Grizzly Peak Recreational Area features Grizzly River Run a fast-paced river rapids ride around Grizzly Peak, similar to other river rapids rides found in other local parks such as Knott's and Six Flags Magic Mountain. The Travel Channel claims Grizzly is currently the fastest, largest, and tallest rapids ride in the world. However, River Quest in Phantasialand, Germany has since out-done it. Nearby is the Redwood Creek Challenge Trail; an interactive playground area and amphitheater featuring characters from Disney's Brother Bear as well as a special entrance to Disney's Grand Californian Hotel.
[edit] Pacific Wharf
Pacific Wharf, based on Monterey's Cannery Row area, especially as depicted in John Steinbeck's novels (but also resembling San Francisco's Fisherman's Wharf). Pacific Wharf contains a couple of restaurants, along with a beer truck and Margarita stand, plus a Mission tortilla factory (which features peep-shows on how tortillas were once made, and working corn and flour tortilla machines), and a Boudin sourdough bakery (which has nearly the entire bakery visible behind glass), with Rosie O'Donnell and Colin Mochrie as video tour guides.
[edit] Hollywood Pictures Backlot
Hollywood Pictures Backlot is an area styled to appear as Hollywood streets and movie studios, with Hollywood-themed attractions. A version of the Tower of Terror attraction from the Disney-MGM Studios opened in the Hollywood Pictures Backlot in 2004. Recently, a new attraction, Monsters, Inc. Mike & Sulley to the Rescue! based on the characters from Monsters, Inc. opened in the attraction building which used to house Superstar Limo. The 2000-seat Hyperion Theatre currently plays host to Disney's Aladdin: A Musical Spectacular.
The entrance to the area with the sign Hollywood Pictures Backlot featuring two ceramic elephants scupltures atop columns is a homage to a huge set constructed for the epic 1916 Hollywood film "Intolerance" directed by D.W. Griffith. This homage is echoed at the Hollywood and Highland entertainment complex in Los Angeles which currently houses the Academy Awards ceremonies at Kodak Theatre (which opened the same year, 2001) which also has elephant scupltures atop columns.
[edit] A bug's land
Featuring Flik's Fun Fair, It's Tough to be a Bug! and the Bountiful Valley Farm, based on the Disney-Pixar film A Bug's Life, opened in 2003, and offers kid-friendly rides sorely lacking from DCA's initial roster.
[edit] Performance Corridor
The Performance Corridor is the primary parade route through the park, and as-built curves around Sunshine Plaza, passes the entrance to A Bug's Land and the Golden Vine Winery, past the Golden Dreams attraction, and halfway around the Paradise Pier water feature, exiting adjacent to California Screamin'. The Performance Corridor has hosted three major parades: Eureka! (opened with the park, now closed), Disney's Electrical Parade (currently on hiatus) and Disney's Block Party Bash (currently operating).
The palm trees in The Sunshine Plaza cost $13,000 each to purchase.
[edit] Initial lack of success
Disney opened the park with high hopes, but the opening day's crowds were far below predictions. Although anticipation had been high prior to the park's opening, bad word-of-mouth from early visitors about few and poor selection of attractions discouraged visitors.
A Los Angeles Times news article from January 14, 2001 stated that company projections show Disneyland Park attendance falling by 500,000 per year, to about 13.3 million, and California Adventure visits rising to 7 million. It has never reached those levels. In 2002, Disney's California Adventure Park had 4,700,000 visitors as reported by Amusement Business Magazine.
In 2003, Disney's California Adventure Park saw a 13% increase in attendance and was the only amusement park in America to see a double-digit gain, but offered the "Pay for one park, get the other for FREE!" for 9 months in 2003, which was a major driver of the additional attendance. In 2004, the park had a 6% increase with 5.6 million visitors. Partial credit for the increase may go to the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror attraction in Hollywood Pictures Backlot. While these numbers are encouraging, Disney's own internal tracking reveals that the amount of return customers is still below that of its sister parks.
Disney's chief executive officer, Robert Iger went on record during the company's annual stockholder meeting on March 10th, 2006, when someone asked about a potential third park being built in Anaheim. "We're still working to assure the second gate is successful", Iger said, referring to California Adventure. "In the spirit of candor, we have been challenged."
Much of the park's attendance is from guests who have Annual Passports and Park Hopper tickets. A much higher percentage of guests use Annual Passports to enter Disney's California Adventure Park as compared to Disneyland. The majority of other park guests are made up from those who have bought a ParkHopper that allows visits to both Disneyland and Disney's California Adventure Park, and free admissions that come as a perk for Disney employees. The park sells very few one day tickets that allow admission to just Disney's California Adventure Park. On the other hand, unofficial sources has the one day, one park ticket sells for Disneyland at around 20% of the total admissions for the day. (The other 80% is made up of Multi-Day tickets, Annual Passports, Comps and Cast Member sign -ins).
[edit] Criticisms
A large number of people on the internet, including many in the main stream media, have criticised the park in general as well as specific aspects of it.
[edit] Theme
One complaint is that the California theme is not a clever or engaging one, and furthermore not one that interests Californians. Since Californians account for a very large proportion of visitors to Disneyland Resort (60%, according to research) this is a major drawback.
It was designed to be a living showcase of California past and present, for tourists who have come to the Golden State.
Allied to this is the criticism that the park is "not Disney enough." Rather than capitalize on the success of Disneyland itself and Disney's successful products, very little of the park (especially at opening time) had much to do with Disney themes. Similar criticisms were said about Epcot, Disney's second Florida park, when it opened in 1982.
A November 2002 Marketwatch.com article reported that the cost of building Disney's California Adventure was $650 million. Disney did spend $1.4 billion to convert the area from just Disneyland Park to a resort, but the other $750 million was spent on the Downtown Disney mall, the Grand Californian Hotel, and other resort improvements. John Cora, who was vice president in charge of Resort Development when DCA was being built said in the article that Disney's highest priority in developing the park was to keep costs down.
The Imagineers who designed Disney's California Adventure had a limited theme to work with. The history of California is set in stone, and design creativity was limited at risk of being historically inaccurate. Compare this to Disneyland's design, where Imagineers were allowed to create practically anything they could imagine, maintaining the appropriate theme.
[edit] Emphasis on shops and food, not on attractions
Disney's California Adventure is also rather light on rides and attractions in general, and a number of the rides that have been created are limited in their capacity (chiefly Soarin' Over California). Disney management insisted that the park be built to a budget 20% under what the firm would have previously considered adequate, and it is the view of detractors that the savings have come largely out of the parts of the park that are considered "loss leaders"-- the attractions, in other words. In their view, Disney spent much more time and effort on the shops and restaurants than they did on the attractions, though the latter is most peoples' main reason to visit.
On the other hand, Disney's California Adventure does have as many or more attractions than other Disney theme parks around the country such as Disney's Animal Kingdom and Disney-MGM Studios in Florida (both are several years older than Disneyland Resort's second gate). It was the inevitable comparison to its neighbor, the 60-attractions filled Disneyland, that makes California Adventure's offerings seem minuscule since it offers only about half as many attractions.
One major difference between Disneyland and its sister park is that California Adventure serves alcohol. Many restaurants offer beer; the Pacific Wharf area has both a beer truck and a margarita stand. The Golden Vine Winery offers wine tasting, and as part of the Ariel's Grotto restaurant, the Cove Bar has a large selection of cocktails, along with beer and wine. Disney tried to get a major beer company to sponsor the park, but failed to do so. A deal was made with San Diego based Karl Strauss Brewing Company to be the official beer supplier of the park and sponsors the beer truck in the Pacific Wharf area. It also has seven different types of their beer on tap at the Cove Bar.
[edit] Price
The admission price was highly criticized upon launch. Disney charged separate admission for Disney's California Adventure at a rate equal to the Disneyland entry fee. To many guests, the price (then $43) was better spent on the larger, more attraction-loaded, and proven formula just across the entry plaza -- the original Disneyland. Disney's California Adventure seemed to offer less value for money than the original park.
Disney also announced that its guests who held Annual Passports for Disneyland would not get entry to its new park. A Two-Park Passport would be available, but at a much higher rate. In fact, Disney suspended sales of all its annual passes just before the opening, and did not restart sales for three months. It was widely rumored that Disney was planning to either scrap the popular Annual Passport program altogether, or to withdraw single-park passes and force everyone to buy more expensive two-park passes.
Disney refused to offer admission discounts to its high-end opening restaurant sponsors (Mondavi, Wolfgang Puck), forcing sponsor restaurant patrons to pay full-admission-price just to access the restaurants (both of which ultimately failed).
With the unpopularity of Disney's California Adventure obvious soon after launch, none of this took place. The price differential between single park and two-park passes eroded, and eventually Disney merged the two, at the lower price, effectively giving entry to Disney's California Adventure to annual pass holders for no additional charge.
Although the park admission remains the same as Disneyland, the relative price for entrance has been drastically reduced by special promotions. The 2fer Ticket, which has been offered for many months in the last few years, allows Southern California residents to "Pay for Disneyland, get Disney's California Adventure Park for FREE!" (this is an exact quote that Disney uses in its marketing campaign for ticket sales), and other promotions such as one offering two "free" days to visitors from around the world planning to buy at least a three-day ticket are not uncommon. As two-fer tickets approach expiration, Disney's California Adventure becomes very busy and has on more than one occasion closed for capacity.
[edit] Transportation
Unlike the original Disneyland, the only mode of transportation around the new park is on foot. There are no buses, trains, monorails, or vehicles of any kind available to the public. (The Disneyland Monorail passes over Disney's California Adventure, but does not stop there.) The park itself is actually much smaller than Disneyland, and so covering it by foot is not difficult.
Guests staying at the Disney's Grand Californian Hotel have their own entrance to the park, which can be used by any of the three Disney owned hotel guests for first entry, and any park guest that wants to re-enter the park. A special entrance has been closed that used to be available to the guests that stay at Disney's Paradise Pier Hotel.
[edit] Attractions
A large number of the original attractions were criticized as disappointing, including most of the attractions and restaurants in the Hollywood Backlot area as well as the Paradise Pier area which has been criticized as lackluster and generic. (In a number of cases, the Paradise Pier attractions are quite literally generic: Mulholland Madness is in fact an off-the-shelf Wild Mouse roller coaster with minimal theming, and a number of the others are equally standard.) At the same time, though, given that Paradise Pier is themed as a sort of sanitized, nostalgic version of an old-style seaside amusement park, the generic nature of some of the rides is a part of the area's theme.
One of the original Hollywood Backlot attractions was Superstar Limo; at the time it was the only dark ride in the entire park. Its plot revolved around the guest as a celebrity who has just arrived at Los Angeles International Airport, and who is taken for a ride through Hollywood in a limousine. The humor was based on inside jokes ("Madame Leota" from The Haunted Mansion makes a cameo appearance) and obsessed fans and paparazzi, and much of it very likely went over the heads of many guests. The attraction was criticized for crude sets and characters, and was the first attraction in the park to close. It was open for less than a year, and a Monsters, Inc.-based attraction was constructed in its place. Monsters, Inc. Mike & Sulley to the Rescue! opened on January 23, 2006, following its soft opening in late December 2005.
The Hyperion Theatre, also in the Hollywood Backlot area, initially opened with a show called Steps in Time. Contrary to the implications of its title, it was neither based on Mary Poppins nor on any sort of Disney retrospective; critics generally regarded it as a waste of time, and despite a last-minute rewrite it quickly closed. It was first replaced with an abbreviated version of the Blast stage show, then with the current Aladdin show.
The Orange County Register mentioned Disney's California Adventure Park in an article listing the top 20 Business stories in the last 20 years on September 3rd, 2006. Disney's California Adventure was ranked the 6th top story, and said "California Adventure was doomed to a slow start from opening day in 2001. The gamble that atmosphere and dining would mask a shortage of rides was a flop."
[edit] Attractions for small children
The park as first built had few attractions geared towards younger children, surprising those used to Disneyland's child-centric attitude. Currently, all of the attractions built for small children can be found in the a bug's land area, and there are only two rides outside of this area: Monsters, Inc.:Mike & Sulley to the Rescue! and Jumpin' Jellyfish. While on one hand this makes life easier for tired parents or grandparents who don't want to have to walk very far between attractions that their kids can ride, it's very inconvenient for parents who wish to experience more than just one tiny area of the park.
However it should be noted that California Adventure was originally designed to be more mature and adult themed than its sister Disneyland park.
[edit] Changes since opening
Since opening, a large number of changes have been made to the park. A large proportion of the attractions and restaurants in the Hollywood Backlot area have been closed, and some re-opened with less-California, more-Disney themes. Most of the farm area at the center of the park has been rethemed upon the Fall 2002 opening of a nearby area for young children themed around Pixar's A Bug's Life movie (distributed and marketed by Disney.)
One of the first attempted "fixes" was the building of "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire - Play It!" attraction, which was a copy of the same attraction being offered at Disney-MGM Studios Park in Orlando. But Disney decided to not bring over the pre-show to the California version. The timing of the opening of the attraction was unfortunate, as it was scheduled for early September, 2001. The scheduled media opening was cancelled due to the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. It remained open until August 20, 2004, when it was closed to allow the labor costs to be shifted to other entertainment in the park. There was also the persistent rumor that the attraction was shuttered due to Annual Passholders repeatedly attempting to win the big prizes. (The sister Orlando attraction closed August of 2006.)
In 2002, the park added Disney's Aladdin: A Musical Spectacular to the Hyperion Theatre in its Hollywood area. The show has become a favorite for many, with a script and original lyrics that are high above the standard theme park fare. The effects are also impressive; children love to see Aladdin and Jasmine take flight right over their heads on the magic carpet. The show performances have been cut back, with the show dark two days a week during the summer and other peak periods (to allow the need for only one main cast). Also, the show tends to have smaller crowds as many regular park guests have seen it, and are not returning.
A number of restaurants operated by outside firms have closed or been taken over by Disney as their sponsors pulled out. One example is Avalon Cove on Paradise Pier, which was once operated by Wolfgang Puck; after he walked out on his contract, Disney converted it into Ariel's Grotto, a family restaurant where kids can dine with characters. Also, many restaurants that Disney operated when the park opened in 2001 are currently closed, including Hollywood & Dine, Lucky Fortune Cookery and the ABC Soap Opera Bistro.
Disney relaunched the well-known Main Street Electrical Parade, formerly at Disneyland Park, as Disney's Electrical Parade in Disney's California Adventure Park. This did not find favor among many Disney fans, who had been promised that the parade had been retired permanently (and who had purchased expensive commemorative items based on its permanent retirement, which were replicas of the parade's twinkling lights). However, guests generally welcomed the return of this thirty-year-old "California Classic," and still line up to see it. Disney's Electrical Parade is currently on hiatus, and will only perform for a few weeks during the peak Christmas and Easter times, before it comes back in late June for the summer of 2007.
Disney also attempted many different types of events to drum up business, but all have been cancelled. Some of the more publicized events were Fiesta Latina days, Super Soap Weekend (still offered at the Disney-MGM Studios at Walt Disney World), ABC Primetime Preview Weekends, Rockin' the Bay (a summer music series), and the X-Games Experience.
On May 5, 2004, Disney's California Adventure Park opened the Twilight Zone: Tower of Terror attraction in the Hollywood Pictures Backlot area of the park. This attraction is similar to the ride of the same name at Disney-MGM Studios in Florida. This is a thrill ride, based on the premise of an elevator car falling free when the cable breaks. On its first weekend, it pushed Disney's California Adventure attendance to one of its highest points since the park's preview days.
As part of the Happiest Homecoming on Earth, Disney's California Adventure Park opened Turtle Talk with Crush based on the characters from Finding Nemo, and a replica of the attraction opened last year at The Living Seas at Epcot. This attraction features "living" character technology, where Crush interacts in real time with the guests in the theatre. Similar technology is also used to talk with Stitch in Innoventions in Tomorrowland. Also recently opened as part of the celebration is the brand new dark ride called Monsters, Inc. Mike & Sulley to the Rescue!, which occupies the venue formerly housing Superstar Limo.
On May 5th, 2005, Disney's California Adventure also premiered its new Disney's Block Party Bash parade. Unlike most Disney parades, the Block Party Bash is a very upbeat parade, that uses all non-Disney songs except for one Disney song. A specially recorded version of "Celebrate" plays as kids in colorfully clad costumes dance and show faces of enthusiasm. The parade stops at two different spots along the park's "performance corridor" and once in place, an 11 minute impromptu party begins (dark two days a week in the off season). As of September 2006, Disney has decided to cut the performers from 120 to 80 and remove part of the Bug's Life portion, along with some minor parade units. However, the music, choreography, and 11-minute show stop will all remain the same; the only actual cuts being made to the show are in the physical "length" the show occupies along the parade route.
Disney's California Adventure Park newest show is a mobile song and dance routine themed after "High School Musical," the extremely popular Disney Channel original movie. The show features live singers and dancers performing versions of the movie's popular songs. The show takes place along the "performance corridor" with 2 stops, similar to Block Party Bash. Currently the show is offered Friday thru Sunday, with additional showings to be offered on Peak weekdays and holidays. This event has a cast of about 20.
[edit] Future Plans
Starting in 2005 the people at TDA began to brainstorm a major placemaking project for the park after the small placemaking project had worked so well for the Backlot Studios section of the Hollywood pictures backlot. The original project featured a major renovation of the current main entry way with the Golden Gate BrIdge, the facades, murals, plaza, and sun fountain torn out and replaced with craftman style archatecture similar to Disney's Grand Californian Hotel. The Plaza was planned to be rebuilt into a transportation center similar to the Main Street U.S.A. Vehicles. The point was to make it look as it had been when Walt Disney first arrived in the 1920's. Smaller projects would follow as more scenery and attractions would be added to other lands. Another idea was to add curbs to the street as well.
That plan was later scrapped for a more extended project. Now, the newest project is to first, tear out the Route 6 section of Paradise Pier and replace it with a ride base on Cars featuring Lombard Street and would be part of the Bay Area District. Another plan was to have an incredible's style roller coaster in the same area or by the Bay Area District. The rest of Paradise Pier would be given a complete overlay with the Characters from Toy Story. The Maliboomer attraction would become a Green Army Men attraction and would have its drops toned down. California Screamin would be villians themed and the Sun Wheel was unknown what would become of it. Everything from Orange Stinger down would be demolished. This would further push Disney's Califonia Adventure into Disney's Pixar Adventure. Other lands would also be rethemed as well.
Another recent idea brought on by imagineer Tony Baxter was to get rid of California Adventure all together. Tear out the Gates and only keep the E-Ticket Attractions that would be able to be ridden on if you show your park ticket. Therefore, the rest of the space would go to more Downtown Disney Shops and Resturants. This idea is unlikely because it would actually lose more money to get rid of the park all together. It would also turn Disneyland out of resort leagues. The Placemaking project concerning the redo of Paradise Pier and the Bay Area Section as well as the Main Entry Area is set to be done by 2010. Construction is to begin after the opening of the Midway Mania Attraction.
According to Jim Hill Media, the Disney company doesn't own all of the land on which the former Disneyland parking lot--now California Adventure--is situated[1]. Disney only controls the land through long-term leases from third parties. Although many of the leases aren't set to expire for a long time, issues regarding land ownership may hinder any further expansion of California Adventure.
[edit] Cultural References
- When The Simpsons visit Sideshow Bob in prison, Marge says she doesn't think prison is "a great place to bring the children", to which Lisa replies "It still beats Disney's California Adventure."
[edit] See also
- Disney's California Adventure entertainment history
- List of current Disney's California Adventure attractions
- List of past Disney's California Adventure attractions
