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Construction began in 1967, less than a year after Walt Disney's death. The property opened on October 1, 1971, with the Magic Kingdom, and since has added Epcot, Disney-MGM Studios, and Disney's Animal Kingdom theme parks.
In addition to the four main theme parks, the resort contains two water parks, six golf courses, a sports complex, an auto race track, twenty resort hotels, and numerous shopping, dining, and entertainment offerings. The 47-square-mile (122 km²) property is the largest theme park resort in the world. It is accessible from Central Florida's Interstate 4 via Exits 62B (World Drive), 64B (US 192 West), 65B (Osceola Parkway West), 67B (SR 536 West), and 68 (SR 535 North).
President Al Weiss has overseen the resort since 1994. In late 2005, Weiss was named to the new position of president, worldwide operations, for Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, giving him oversight of Disney's California, Florida, Paris and Hong Kong resorts.
Concept
In the mid-1960s, Walt Disney envisioned a theme park that would be larger and more elaborate than Disneyland as a draw for the Florida site. Also planned were various housing facilities for resort guests, along with an industrial park, main resort terminal, and a futuristic airport, but most importantly was the "Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow," or EPCOT (also known as Progress City). Plans for EPCOT would drastically change after Disney's death. EPCOT became EPCOT Center, the resort's second theme park, which opened in 1982. Much later, concepts from the original idea of EPCOT would be integrated into the community of Celebration.
Walt Disney focused most of his attention on the "Florida Project" both before and after his participation at the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair, but he died on December 15, 1966, almost five years before his vision was realized.
There is no official documentation showing that the Walt Disney World Resort was originally to be spelled "Disneyworld," for it was already going to be very different from "Disneyland." However, Walt Disney did make reference to the Walt Disney World Resort as both "Disney World" and "The Disney World," with both of these versions using the same font that was used in the spelling of Disneyland.
After Walt Disney's death, the title of "Disney World" was selected and to be presented in a modern font instead of the original Disneyland font. To reinforce the updated name and image, Disney World's official symbol was to be an oversized "D" with the face of Mickey Mouse depicted as the lines of latitude and longitude of this new World.
While Disneyland has kept its original font, it has lost nearly all references to its official symbol. Walt Disney World put an end to use of both its original font and official symbol at the conclusion of its 25th anniversary in 1996. The official symbol, however, can still be found in many places around the resort as well as in recent merchandise that uses it once again.
Roy O. Disney, Walt Disney's older brother, dedicated the property and declared that it officially would be known as "Walt Disney World" in his brother's honor. In his own words: "Everyone has heard of the Ford cars. But have they all heard of Henry Ford, who started it all? Walt Disney World is in memory of the man who started it all, so people will know his name as long as Walt Disney World is here."
Properties
A popular misconception is that the resort exists in Orlando. In fact, the entire Walt Disney World property is outside Orlando city limits; the majority sits within southwestern Orange County, with the remainder in adjacent Osceola County to the south.
Most of Walt Disney World's Central Florida land and all of the public areas are located in the cities of Bay Lake and Lake Buena Vista, located southwest of Orlando and a few miles northwest of Kissimmee. The land within Walt Disney World Resort is part of the Reedy Creek Improvement District, which allows the Disney corporation to exercise quasi-governmental powers over the area.
Walt Disney World Resort features four theme parks, each represented by an iconic structure:
- The Magic Kingdom (Cinderella Castle)
- Epcot (Spaceship Earth, the geodesic sphere.)
- Disney-MGM Studios (The Sorcerer's Hat; formerly the "Earful Tower". Note: The earful tower is not a water tower.)
- Disney's Animal Kingdom (the Tree of Life)
There are also two water parks, Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach (a third, River Country, operated from 1976-2001), and the Disney's Wide World of Sports athletic complex.
The Downtown Disney area, consisting of three sections (Marketplace, Pleasure Island, and West Side), contains many shopping, dining, and entertainment venues. This includes DisneyQuest (an indoor "interactive theme park"), the House of Blues, and a permanent Cirque du Soleil show (La Nouba).
Walt Disney World Resort covers a total of 47 square miles (122 square kilometers), about the size of San Francisco or twice the size of Manhattan. Less than half the property has been developed. A quarter has been set aside as a wilderness preserve.
On-Site Disney Resorts
Another notable aspect is the large number of hotel resort complexes on the Walt Disney World property. The non-themed hotels are owned by private, non-Disney hospitality companies such as Starwood, Holiday Inn, and Hilton. The themed resorts include:
- Disney's All-Star Movies Resort
- Disney's All-Star Music Resort
- Disney's All-Star Sports Resort
- Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge
- Disney's Beach Club Resort
- Disney's BoardWalk Inn
- Disney's Caribbean Beach Resort
- Disney's Contemporary Resort
- Disney's Coronado Springs Resort
- Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort & Campground
- Disney's Grand Floridian Resort and Spa (formerly known as Disney's Grand Floridian Beach Resort)
- Disney's Polynesian Resort
- Disney's Pop Century Resort
- Disney's Port Orleans Resort Riverside (formerly known as Disney's Dixie Landings Resort)
- Disney's Port Orleans Resort French Quarter (formerly known as Disney's Port Orleans Resort)
- Disney's Wilderness Lodge
- Disney's Yacht Club Resort
On-Site Disney Vacation Club Resorts
- Disney's Beach Club Villas
- Disney's BoardWalk Villas
- Disney's Old Key West Resort (formerly known as the Disney Vacation Club Resort)
- Disney's Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa (formerly known as The Disney Institute)
- The Villas at Disney's Wilderness Lodge
On-Site Non-Disney Resorts
- Lake Buena Vista Resort Hotel (formerly known as the Travelodge Hotel, the Viscount Hotel and as the Best Western Lake Buena Vista Resort Hotel)
- Doubletree Guest Suite Resort (in Walt Disney World) (formerly known as the Pickett Suites and as the Guest Quarters Suite Hotel)
- Grosvenor Resort (formerly known as the Americana Dutch Inn)
- The Hilton Resort (in Walt Disney World)
- Holiday Inn in the Walt Disney World Resort (formerly a Howard Johnson's and a Courtyard By Marriott)
- Royal Plaza (formerly known as The Royal Inn and The Royal Inn Plaza)
- Shades of Green (formerly The Golf Resort and The Disney Inn; named because of its location between two golf courses; it is owned by the United States Department of Defense and used for vacationing active and retired military personnel, their families, and DoD civilians only)
- Walt Disney World Dolphin (operated by Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide)
- Walt Disney World Swan (operated by Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide)
- Buena Vista Palace Resort & Spa (known as the Wyndham Palace Resort & Spa for a brief time)
Also at Disney
The Walt Disney World resort also includes six world-class golf courses. The five 18-hole golf courses are the Magnolia, the Palm, Lake Buena Vista, Eagle Pines, and Osprey Ridge (the last two are part of the Bonnet Creek Golf Club). There is also a nine-hole walking course called Oak Trail, designed for young golfers. Together, they are known as Disney's "99 holes of golf." There are two miniature golf courses, Fantasia Gardens and Winter Summerland.
Walt Disney World paved the way for many other theme parks and attractions in the area, including SeaWorld and Universal Studios, and helped make Orlando a popular tourist destination for people from all over the world.
When the Magic Kingdom opened in 1971, the Walt Disney World Resort employed about 5,500 cast members. Today it employs more than 58,000, spending more than $1.1 billion on payroll and $478 million on benefits each year. The largest single-site employer in the United States, Walt Disney World Resort has more than 3,000 job classifications.
The Walt Disney World Resort also sponsors and operates the Walt Disney World College Program, an internship program that has American college students live on site and work for the resort, providing much of the theme park and resort "front line" cast members.
In a March 30, 2004, article in The Orlando Sentinel, Walt Disney World president Al Weiss gave some insight into how the parks are maintained:
- More than 5,000 cast members are dedicated to maintenance and engineering, including 750 horticulturists and 600 painters.
- Disney spends more than $100 million every year on maintenance at the Magic Kingdom. In 2003, $6 million was spent on renovating its Crystal Palace restaurant. Ninety percent of guests say that the upkeep and cleanliness of the Magic Kingdom are excellent or very good.
- The streets in the parks are steam cleaned every night.
- There are cast members permanently assigned to painting the antique carousel horses; they use genuine gold leaf.
- There is a tree farm on site so that when a mature tree needs to be replaced, a thirty-year-old tree will be available to replace it.
There is a fleet of Disney-operated buses on property, branded Disney Transport that is free for use by resort and park guests. They are not to be confused with the Disney Cruise Line and Disney's Magical Express buses, which are run by Mears Transportation. Taxi boats link some locations.
A fleet of 12 monorails also operate at Walt Disney World Resort linking the Magic Kingdom, Epcot, the Contemporary, Polynesian, and Grand Floridian resorts, and the Transportation and Ticket Center (TTC). An express monorail line connecting the TTC and the Magic Kingdom also exists. Disney World's monorail is perhaps the most well known monorail system in North America.
According to Disney's "MouseMail" e-mail newsletter, during the Christmas season, 150 truckloads of holiday decorations adorn the Walt Disney World Resort and 300,000 yards of ribbon and bows drape over 1,500 Christmas trees. A popular attraction during the holiday season is The Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights, which displays over 5 million lights located in Disney-MGM Studios. Walt Disney World pastry chefs use more than 476 kilograms of honey, 45 kilograms of sugar, and 22 kilograms of dark chocolate to bake gingerbread houses and other decorations for the holidays.
Popular attractions
- The Magic Kingdom
- Disney-MGM Studios
- Disney's Animal Kingdom
- Kilimanjaro Safaris
- Expedition Everest
- Kali River Rapids
- DINOSAUR (formerly named Countdown to Extinction)
- Pangani Forest Trail
- Maharajah Jungle Trek
- Festival of The Lion King
- It's Tough to Be a Bug!
- Primeval Whirl
Park history and development
In 1959, the Walt Disney Company, under the leadership of Walt Disney, began looking for land for a second resort to supplement Disneyland, which had opened in Anaheim in 1955. Market surveys revealed that only 2% of Disneyland's visitors came from east of the Mississippi River, where 75% of the population of the United States lived. Additionally, Walt Disney disliked the businesses that had sprung up around Disneyland, and wanted control of a much larger area of land for the new project.
Walt Disney first flew over the Orlando site (one of many) on November 22, 1963. The airplane he traveled in would be used by future Disney executives to travel to the resort from the company headquarters in Burbank, California and now can be seen at the Disney-MGM Studios. He saw the well-developed network of roads, including Interstate 4 and Florida's Turnpike, with McCoy Air Force Base (later Orlando International Airport) to the east, and immediately fell in love with the site. When later asked why he chose it, he said, "the freeway routes, they bisect here."
To avoid a burst of land speculation, Disney used various dummy corporations and cooperative individuals to acquire 27,400 acres (111 km²) of land. The first five-acre (20,000 m²) lot was bought on October 23, 1964, by the Ayefour Corporation (a pun on Interstate 4).
In May 1965, major land transactions were being recorded a few miles southwest of Orlando in Osceola County. Two large tracts totaling $1.5 million were sold, and smaller tracts of flatlands and cattle pastures were purchased by exotic-sounding companies such as the Latin-American Development and Management Corporation and the Reedy Creek Ranch Corporation. In addition to three huge parcels of land were many smaller parcels, referred to as "outs."
Much of the land had been platted into five-acre (20,000 m²) lots in 1912 by the Munger Land Company and sold to investors. In most cases, the owners were happy to get rid of the land, which was mostly swampland. Yet another problem was the mineral rights to the land, owned by Tufts University. Without the transfer of these rights, Tufts could come in at any time and demand the removal of buildings to obtain minerals.
After most of the land had been bought, the truth of the property's owner was leaked to the Orlando Sentinel on October 20, 1965. A press conference soon was organized for November 15. At the presentation, Walt Disney explained the plans for the site, including EPCOT, the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow, which was to be a futuristic city.
The Reedy Creek Drainage District was incorporated on May 13, 1966, under Florida State Statutes Chapter 298, which gives powers including eminent domain to special Drainage Districts. To create the District, only the support of the landowners within was required.
Walt Disney himself died in December 15, 1966, before his vision was realized. His brother Roy Disney postponed his retirement to oversee construction of the resort, passing away in December 1971, barely two months after it opened.
On February 2, 1967, Roy Disney held a press conference at the Park Theatres in Winter Park, Florida. The role of EPCOT was emphasized in the film that was played, the last one recorded by Walt Disney before his death. After the film, it was explained that for Walt Disney World to succeed, a special district would have to be formed: the Reedy Creek Improvement District with two cities inside it, the City of Bay Lake and the City of Reedy Creek (now the City of Lake Buena Vista). In addition to the standard powers of an incorporated city, which include tax-free bonds, the Improvement District would have total immunity from any current or future county or state land-use laws. The only areas where the District had to submit to the county and state would be property taxes and elevator inspections.
The laws forming the District and the two Cities was signed into law on May 12, 1967. The Florida Supreme Court ruled in 1968 that the District was allowed to issue tax-exempt bonds for public projects within the district, despite the sole beneficiary being The Walt Disney Company.
Construction of drainage canals was soon begun by the Improvement District, and Disney built the first roads and the Magic Kingdom. Disney's Contemporary Resort, Disney's Polynesian Resort, and Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort & Campground were also completed in time for the park's opening on October 1, 1971.
Roy Disney read the resort's dedication a few weeks later, after which he asked Walt's widow, Lillian, what she thought of Walt Disney World. According to biographer Bob Thomas, she replied, "I think Walt would have approved."
Walt Disney World had its own aircraft runway located just east of the Magic Kingdom parking lot. When the resort opened in 1971, Shawnee Airlines began regular passenger service from Orlando's McCoy Airport directly to Disney World's STOLport (Short Take Off and Landing) on a daily basis, with flights lasting only a few minutes. Today, the runway is mostly used as a staging area for buses and is no longer in service for aircraft.
Park history and development timeline
Tickets
Magic Your Way
Disney's "Magic Your Way" park ticket pricing, introduced in January 2005, is intended to make guests spend more days on Disney property instead of visiting competing attractions in the area; additional days at Disney can be much less expensive than a day at another park.| Length | Adult ticket price (in U.S. dollars) | . The price increase to add this day |
|---|---|---|
| 1-Day | $67.10 | $67.10 |
| 2-Day | $133.33 | $66.23 |
| 3-Day | $192.77 | $59.44 |
| 4-Day | $207.68 | $14.91 |
| 5-Day | $211.94 | $4.26 |
| 6-Day | $215.13 | $3.19 |
| 7-Day | $217.26 | $2.13 |
| 8-Day | $219.39 | $2.13 |
| 9-Day | $221.52 | $2.13 |
| 10-Day | $223.65 | $2.13 |
"Magic Your Way" also offers options such as the Park Hopper Option ($40 per ticket, allowing a guest to visit more than one park per day), the Water Park Fun & More Option ($50 per ticket, giving a guest between 2 and 5 visits to water parks, Pleasure Island, DisneyQuest, or Disney's Wide World of Sports), and the No Expiration Option (between $10 for a two-day ticket and $135 for a ten-day ticket, without which the ticket will expire 14 days after its first use).
As part of the "Magic Your Way" package, Disney also created a service entitled "Disney's Magical Express" whereby guests staying on the Disney property will be able to take Disney transportation directly from the Orlando airport to their hotels, while their luggage is picked up (with participating airlines) and delivered to their rooms for them.
Annual Passes
The Annual Passes at Walt Disney World allow guests to have unlimited access to the parks during the year time period of their pass. There are a few levels of passes including different prices for children.- Premium Annual Passport - This allows guests to have unlimited access to The Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Disney-MGM Studios, Disney's Animal Kingdom, Pleasure Island, Blizzard Beach, Typhoon Lagoon, DisneyQuest, and Disney's Wide World of Sports complex. Complimentary parking is included.
- Annual Passport - This allows guests to have unlimited access to The Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Disney-MGM Studios, and Disney's Animal Kingdom. Complimentary parking is included.
- Florida Resident Seasonal Pass - This allows guests to have limited access to The Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Disney-MGM Studios, and Disney's Animal Kingdom. The ticket has blackout dates that are around Christmas/New Years, Easter, most of June to August and Thanksgiving. Parking is not included. This is for Florida residents only and requires proof of residency.
- Florida Resident Epcot After 4 Annual Pass - This allows guests unlimited access to Epcot after 4pm. Parking is not included. This is for Florida residents only and requires proof of residency.
Business
The trade magazine Amusement Business reported these attendance figures for the four theme parks in 2005, as quoted by the Orlando Sentinel:
- Magic Kingdom, 16.2 million visitors, making it the most visited theme park in the world.
- Epcot, 9.9 million visitors
- Disney-MGM Studios, 8.6 million visitors
- Disney's Animal Kingdom, 8.2 million visitors
See also
- Magic Kingdom
- Epcot
- Disney-MGM Studios
- Disney's Animal Kingdom
- Typhoon Lagoon
- Blizzard Beach
- Downtown Disney
- Disney's Wide World of Sports
- Bay Lake, Florida
- Lake Buena Vista, Florida
- Reedy Creek Improvement District
- Walt Disney Travel Company, Incorporated
- Walt Disney World Company
- Walt Disney World Hospitality and Recreation Corporation
- Walt Disney World College Program
- Walt Disney World International Program
- Disneyland
- Walt Disney
- Carolwood Pacific Railroad
- Walt Disney World Explorer
External links
Amusement parks in the United States | Theme parks in the United States | Attractions in Florida | Disney parks and attractions | Walt Disney Company subsidiaries | Walt Disney World Resort
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