This is flat embarrassing that this is the best that Disney can do. Especially since the old fiber optic walkway lights were such a well known and loved Epcot thing. Hard to believe they don’t realize that and just don’t get it. Garbage.

“We’d been, at a minimum, leaving revenue opportunities on the table to avoid stirring the hornet’s nest". The "hornet's nest" was Disney fans who were being completely screwed over by him needing 18 percent compound annual profit growth!! Illustrates what he thought of us.

This is really excellent. We 100% need more Disney leadership to walk in the shoes of the guests and see it from the guest perspective. I’m the first to hammer Disney for its failings but this is one thing that they got absolutely right. Good job. mickeyvisit.com/disneyland-n…

I’d like to know how much this cost Disney? I’m sure they are hoping it drives a renewed interest in this attraction but to me there are such greater needs to put money elsewhere to than this. It’s puzzling - who is making these decisions?

Disneyland: refurbishes its shooting gallery. Magic Kingdom: tears it out for a DVC lounge. One company, two opposite answers to the same question. Anaheim got this one right.

All I can say is this is a disgrace that Disney can’t even get the lights replaced but decided to fill it in with concrete. The legacy of great engineering feats Disney used to do and now can’t literally fix a light. What an embarrassment. Still charging top dollar to get in.

This is a good start. Disney should keep going, rip the rest of that awful planter out and put back the fountain.

Well, here we go. I can only imagine what they will tell us, what they are leaving out this time (that they don't want to say they are destroying), and what we will only learn after the applause dies down. Interested to see how this goes.

I know a lot of Disney fans are going to take this the wrong way because they already love what they’re seeing. This isn’t an attack on anyone who likes it. It’s simply my reaction. And my first reaction is: this is about what I expected. Unfortunately, that’s the problem. I hoped Imagineering would find some genuinely clever way to solve the enormous sightline and thematic problems created by dropping Piston Peak into this part of Magic Kingdom. Looking at the model, I don’t see that. I see a massive new environment inserted into the middle of the park, with berms and trees doing their best to conceal the collision. The Haunted Mansion relationship already looks awkward—and I suspect there’s a reason we aren’t seeing that angle highlighted very much. The old riverboat landing sitting beside this enormous mountain formation looks even stranger. And Frontierland? What exactly is Frontierland now? The Rivers of America has been reduced from the organizing heart of the land to what looks like a narrow water feature winding around the new development. The scale, openness, and visual breathing room that defined this part of Magic Kingdom are simply gone. Maybe the model is misleading. Maybe the finished landscaping will soften it. Maybe standing inside it will feel considerably better than looking at it from above. I sincerely hope so. But I’m already hearing the inevitable declarations that this is “great Imagineering,” and I just don’t see the evidence for that yet. What I see is a concept that still feels fundamentally imposed on this location rather than organically belonging there. And that makes the opportunity cost even harder to swallow. Imagine what this Cars project could have been if Disney had built it beyond Big Thunder, where it could have expanded the park instead of consuming the Rivers of America. Give Piston Peak the room to become a true Cars Land-scale environment without forcing it to negotiate with Haunted Mansion, Liberty Square, and the remnants of Frontierland. That could have been extraordinary. Instead, we sacrificed one of the most distinctive environments in Magic Kingdom to make this fit. I think part of the overwhelming enthusiasm right now comes from something completely understandable: Disney fans desperately want Imagineering to be back. After years of projects that have too often felt compromised, underbuilt, or merely adequate, people want to look at something and say, “There it is. They’ve still got it.” I want that too. But wanting Imagineering back doesn’t mean we should lower the bar for what “great Imagineering” actually is. Maybe the finished land proves me completely wrong. I hope it does. Because if you’re going to destroy the heart of this park to build something new, “pretty good” isn’t remotely good enough.

Does modern Imagineering increasingly promote creative executives for mastery of IP, visual storytelling, and environmental design rather than attraction development itself? Looking through Caroline May’s public résumé, I can’t identify a major E-ticket she personally carried from development through opening. What I do find is extensive experience in Environmental Graphic Design, the Marvel IP portfolio, Storyliving by Disney, and Assistant Art Direction for Shanghai Tomorrowland. That is a substantial résumé in environmental storytelling and placemaking. But designing a compelling environment and designing a great attraction are not the same discipline. That’s what concerns me about the apparent depth of Imagineering’s bench of proven attraction-development talent. I've mentioned this before. Historically, many of Imagineering’s senior creatives earned the authority to lead through years of increasingly complex attraction work. The question isn’t whether she can design a beautiful land; it’s whether her public record shows the same depth of experience integrating story with ride systems, pacing, capacity, show action and operations, with enough experience to lead. And now Disney has made her one of the senior creative leaders on what may be the most consequential new land Magic Kingdom has attempted in decades. To me, that feels like an enormous gamble.

Jeff Vahle sums up the rot in modern Disney leadership: “We know more than you, so your criticism doesn’t matter.” That’s not listening to your audience; it's dismissive. Pure contempt for your guests, passed off as "expertise." Customer contempt is a reliable path to failure.

This is it 1000%. The mentality is you can just slap anything anywhere, and the guests are too stupid to notice and will still pay the admission price. They hate their guests because they think the average guest is too dumb to notice. Until that mentality changes, expect more.

Just think how much worse this will be when you have thousands of extra people that DVC will bring there walking around. The isolated wilderness feel is gone. They’ve ruined something really special, with a Marriott hotel. So much for the theme.

47 years and Tom Fitzgerald leaves behind a legacy that fans will remember; Journey into YOUR Imagination, helping turn EPCOT from a park of original ideas into a delivery system for Disney IP, and the years of rumors that he helped push Tony Baxter, and Baxter’s philosophy of Imagineering, to the sidelines. Some retirement tributes write themselves. Farewell.

Jeff says he will carry Walt Disney World’s memories with him. That is fitting, because under his leadership, guests increasingly had to rely on their memories of how good the resort used to be before he got his hands on it. His legacy will be one of destroying Splash Mountain; the Frontierland Shootin’ Arcade; the Rivers of America; Tom Sawyer Island; the Liberty Square Riverboat; Muppet*Vision 3D; It’s Tough to Be a Bug; TriceraTop Spin; The Boneyard; DINOSAUR; and ultimately all of DinoLand. Long after the corporate farewell is forgotten, his name will be remembered as the person who presided over the destruction of the parks. I think we should dedicate the rusted metal "trees" in Epcot as a fitting monument to all he accomplished.