What expansion are we likely to see at Disneyland Paris?

D23 announcement

D23 came and went last weekend which left many Disneyland Paris (DLRP) fans disappointed. This was due to its only announcements being the Marvel retheme of Hotel New York and the loss of its exclusivity of its newest ride Ratatouille. While the fact the Walt Disney Company (TWDC) recently bought the remaining shares of DLRP and removed it from the stockmarket it reason to get excited this in itself wasn’t going to suddenly cause instant park expansion. It also doesn’t mean there weren’t things to announce. DLRP is also left with two of the 3 Disney Parks without any expansion announced. The other is Animal Kingdom which opened Pandora the world of Avatar in May at a cost of $500 million.

What we know

Though announcements regarding DLRP are fairly rare and late in the day, leaks and shareholder meetings and documents have proved useful and accurate. The share buyout also released some small but key information.

10 year plans

DLRP was required to submit a 10 year business plan as part of the buyout. The shareholder document mentions a few a small but key bits of information about the current business plan. Firstly there will be $2.1 billion invested in the next 10 years which will cover renovations to Hotel New York and the Disneyland Hotel, continued ride refurbishment and Marvel attractions and entertainment in the Studios park (WDS). It also mentions the average yearly spend will be inline with the last couple of years. That covered the park renovations, New Port Bay and Cheyenne hotel renovations, ride updates and 25th Anniversary additions including new shows known as Project Sparkle. Some caution is required as the plan does say that they will go over their current $350m lending fund from TWDC in 2023 by $300m with no way to pay the initial $350m due in 2024 or the $1billion lent due in 2025. On the plus side TWDC now owns DLRP and mentions in the buyout proposal it will keep to the current business plan. 10 years is a long time and things can change.

But there is another…

There is another 10 year plan. This one doesn’t come from official documents but from trusted blogs with “reliable” sources. Why even look at this? This plan started around 2012 and 2013 and leads up to the 30th anniversary, it has also been very accurate. Considering we’re 5 years in to it, that gives it some weight. This plan reported that Ratatouille would be the last new ride for some time (most likely 2022), the focus would be on bringing the whole park back up to scratch. There would be replacement scenes for Disney Dreams which did happen. This plan wasn’t a Paris plan but a Disney Parks plan. With the recent announcements, Disney Parks has a fairly full roster of new attractions around the world until 2021 with the Walt Disney World 50th anniversary. Hong Kong’s expansion could run until 2023 but it requires government approval for funding. Paris would fit quite nicely into a fairly vacant 2022/2023 window. This 10 year plan also mentions a Marvel land in 2023 for the studios park. This lines up with the confirmed  business plan and the rumours of a Marvel stunt show moving into the recent closed Cinemagique building. The plan also includes a smaller Star Wars land expansion with a D ticket attraction addition. A D ticket is something along the lines of a Little Mermaid ride (from WDW new fantasyland) in popularity rather than a Ratatouille which is seen a a top level E ticket attraction.

What does this actually mean

At a recent shareholder event it was mentioned  by current DLRP president, that what was included in ride expansion hadn’t been decided. So while there will be expansion they may be waiting on how popular other new rides are to guarantee some success. It’s also cheaper to copy an existing ride.

Though some see $210 million a year spend as low this will be the average spend. If this is the average spend for the last two years it has bought this for $420 million:

Pirates of the Caribbean update and refurbishment

Peter Pans flight refurbishment

Big Thunder Mountain refurbishment and update with Geysers fixed

Star Tours refurbishment and update

Star traders update with addition of a Vader meet and greet

Space Mountain refurbishment, replacement trains and harness design with Hyperspace Mountain overlay

Robinson Tree House refurbishment

It’s a small world refurbishment

Star Wars a Galactic Spectacular night show

A new Parade

Five new shows, Frozen sing a long, Forest of Enchantment, Mickey and the Magician, Happy Birthday Disneyland Paris, Princess Waltz

Disney Illuminations adaptation front Shanghai to replace Disney Dreams

Cheyenne hotel refurbishment

New Port Bay refurbishment

That’s a fair amount and also doesn’t include the general refurbishment around the parks like replacing bridges, new lighting throughout the park as well as other things.

Confirmed spending

We know commitments are already in place for some of the expenditure. Hotel refurbishments are meant to finish in 2021 with Hotel New York next on the list. We can expect the retheme Marvel hotel to be open by the end of 2019 at the latest. New Port Bay is the largest hotel in France and possibly Europe so this work shouldn’t even wipe out two years spend.

The other major known spend is the Nala building. This is quite important for the long term plans. This will be the new Cast Member building and will open in September 2018. It will house parades, costuming and rehearsal areas. Currently costuming has been in a temporary tent building (similar to the one housing Pizza Planet) behind the entrance to the Tram Tour. The previous building was knocked down to build Ratatouille. It sits on the main expansion area for the WDS park. The Tram Tour itself was due for an update as part of Project Sparkle for the 25th Anniversary and should have received three new scenes. It wasn’t clear if this was a retheme of the current scenes or three additional ones. This appears to have been put on indefinite hiatus. That could suggest the Tram Tours future is in jeopardy or at least needs changes. Rumours of the entrance being moved have been around for years and would be essential for major expansion.

There also further ride updates. Phantom Manor closes in January for 9 months which 2 months longer than Pirates of Caribbean. Rumours have suggested a new scene being added, at the very least this seems more than a simple refurbishment. Cinemagique is also closed until at least September next year which the longest of all the temporary closures at well over a year. A Marvel stunt show is rumoured for here. The length of time is most likely due to a lack of rehearsal space for a show like this and and required changes needed for this type of show.

There are increased transport updates which are required to cope with the new hotels and increased attendence over the years. The Village Nature complex built with Centre Parcs will also obsorb cost as well as the new roads and changes to Davy Crockett Range to accommodate the new hotel resort.

What about the rides?

Of the $2.1 billion I’ve seen it suggested that $735 million is directly for attractions and entertainment but I’m yet to find confirmation of that. Let’s assume that is correct, what will it buy you? Find ride costs is tricky and inflation should be factored in but below are some figures I’ve found. Development and research costs would be included in the first iteration of a ride, for example Ratatouille had a brand ride system designed for it. Tower of Terror also cost far more in Paris due to different regulations due to its height causing issues.

Ratatouille – 2014 – $150m
Iron Man experience – 2017 – $100m
Grizzly mountain + mystic Manor – 2012/13 – $500m
Cars land (radiator springs racer) – 2012 – $206m
Toy Story playland – 2010 – €79
Tower of terror – 1994 – $140m (WDW)
– 2006 – $191m (Tokyo)
– 2004 – $100m (DCA)
– 2007 – $240m (Paris)
Mission Space – 2003 – $100m
Expedition Everest – 2006 – $100m
Pooh honey hunt – 2000 – $135m
Toy Story Mania – 2008 – $80m
Pandora – 2017 – $500m

The Iron Man experience and Pandora are two items rumoured for Paris in the future, without the development costs these combined would come in way below the suggested $735 million. Adjusted for inflation Toy Story Mania would cost $100 million but that cost covered both builds in Florida and California.

With the announced Superheros land at Disney California Adventure (DCA), Guardians of the Galaxy in Epcot and the Tony Stark Expo in Hong Kong there are already plans for future Marvel rides which could be copied in Paris for less. What doesn’t appear possible is a copy of anything from the Star Wars lands, Paris would most likely need a bespoke ride. Given the potential smaller scale of a Star Wars land in Paris that is probably a good thing.

Future for Walt Disney Studios

There has been a small list of Marvel rumours for the park for a number of years, they do still leave a lot of questions. Starting with the Marvel stunt show there is an expectation of the Iron Man experience replacing Armageddon and the Rock n Rollercoaster being rethemed for Spiderman. Additional rumours suggest a Marvel attraction being built over the Motor Action stunt show but I don’t believe the park is in the position to reduce the attraction count. Although it’s 10 rides is one more than Hollywood Studios will have after all it’s announced expansions open, it will still have less than half the show count.

With the successful rethemeing of Tower of Terror to Guardians of the Galaxy: Mission Breakout in DCA, this will most likely come to Paris. It took under 6 months to do and should be fairly cost effective for a new Superheros season to launch off. Though many would be unhappy about it, I’ve been impressed watching the on ride videos.

If the rumours are true

If all of this was done there would still some major themeing issues. In middle of this new Marvel area would Stitch Live, Playhouse Disney, Star Wars projection show during Season of the force and Restaurant des Stars. A restaurant retheme would be greatly welcomed but I can’t see them ditching the projection show which has required decent cost to build and set up and is vastly superior to the Florida version. There are also question marks over how well it would work if the Mission Breakout theme was added to Tower of Terror. This puts the retheme in doubt, it seems key to the Disney Parks plans that each park has a location to project on to. The current Tower is about as perfect as they’re likely to get. Licensing could be the deciding factor, Disney as whole is pulling away from paying licence fees out to non Disney entities. The Twilight Zone is CBS, not Disney. Even with it’s potential new film the twilight zone theme will most likely be dropped.

Replacing Armageddon

Armageddon is almost universally disliked and surely will be high on the list to replace. It also has a low rider per hour count I would expect they would want to increase. The Iron Man Experience is a Star Tours type ride which would need a significantly bigger building than Armageddon uses. The similarities to Star Tours and the heavy criticism of the over use of simulators at Universal would suggest this wouldn’t be used either.

One option is a retheme of an existing ride from elsewhere. Due to open in Hong Kong in 2018 is an Ant Man ride based on the Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters ride. The Buzz version is already in Discoveryland in Paris but with those types of ideas already being used, a rethemed Toy Story Mania would be a good option. It also has a small enough footprint to fit with the option of building extra tracks behind it on the future. Some form of Captain America or Avengers training facility could be an option, or even a Spiderman based version. Not all rethemeing works, Dumbo has proved popular in parks around the world, various clones based around Magic Carpets and space rockets (not just in Paris) have never come close.

Rock n Rollercoaster

This ride only survives in its current form if the Marvel land isn’t destined for left hand side of the park. That can’t be ruled out as it could be built from Tower of Terror and Armageddon backwards with the potential of reusing elements of the Reign of Fire Tram Tour section as a Marvel back drop. This would probably require a more ambitious initial expansion. More likely option is a combination of rethemeing, reusing and new builds. There hasn’t been any justification around why a Spiderman theme is most likely, it maybe an assumption as it sits so close to the Spiderman meet and greet.