Friday, October 23, 2015

All You Need to Know About Disneyland Paris Upcoming Renovations


Here is some important piece of infos for those of you planning a trip next year to Disneyland Paris. DLP  released an updated schedule of upcoming refurbishments with all closure dates up to 2017. As we know the whole park is under renovation and, land by land, one attraction after another are under refurb and in some cases will have an update. Have a closer look at the picture below to make sure your favorite attraction will not be closed during your next visit.


As you can see Big Thunder mountain as well as Thunder Mesa Riverboat Landing - i.e the river boats - will be closed starting this November 2015 and until ... January 2017! It looks a long time, and it is, but it's because they will do the biggest renovation in Frontierland since 24 years. Not only they will empty the lake, repaint Big Thunder and the stone arch, add in BTM the new finale with the mapping projection effect of the dynamite explosion and apparently enhanced the queue, but they will also renovate the geysers so these should finally work again during your next cruise on the Rivers of the Far-West. And the price to pay for all this is to have them closed during fifteen months.

It's a Small World is currently closed for refurb but a reopening on December 19 was announced yesterday and there should new surprises in it, others than the usual Christmas version. Main Street Station is also closed currently and will reopen in March 2016.

Peter Pan's Flight will close starting next January until July 2016 and strangely they apparently don't plan to introduce the new projection effects like they did at Disneyland, neither the new interactive queue like the one which opened at WDW. Instead this long closure will be for many technical renovations and may be a change of the track itself. Swiss Robinson Family Treehouse and Adventure Isle will also be closed from January until September 2016. And Pirates of Caribbean from January 2017 until Summer 2017. When the ride will reopen the Jack Sparrow Audio-Animatronics and other special effects should be installed.

Star Tours will closed for not only a refurb but also to install Star Tours 2 : The Adventure Continues from March 2016 until March 2017, so a whole year. And Space Mountain will go through another refurb from January 2017 until March 2017, and with a bit of luck may be this time they will install the new trains or the new harness system...

At DLP WDS the Rock'n Roller Coaster will be closed from late February until July 2016 which will make with Big Thunder Mountain two major DLP coasters closed during this period. Studio Tram Tour will also be closed from late August 2016 until April 2017 and there should be plenty of major changes on this one, including a new Star Wars scene where is currently the Dinotopia scene.

As for DLP hotels, after the long renovation of the Newport Bay it will be the turn of the Hotel Cheyenne to be renovated starting February 2016 and apparently at least until September 2017.

Yes, all this seems a lot of closures, specially considering that a lot of favorite rides are included in the list but this also happen only each 25 years and for DLP 25th anniversary you'll have a park which will look brand new - and that's a real good news!

Picture: copyright DLP Welcome, Disneyland Paris

8 comments:

Alex said...

Thank you Alain! Any news of the refurbishment regarding hotel New York?

Tom said...

Thanks for the updates list!

It's unbelievable how many things are closed at the same time, and how things change. So Peter Pan will not be updated (only technical), I'm not surprised... ;)

What about Animagique, has this update been cancelled too?

Do you know anything about RNRC? Will it also only be technical, as 5 months seems too short for a theme-change?!

Xavier said...

New york renovation will start after the Cheyenne's one is over.

Dutchduck said...

So the earliest time to visit will be summer 2017 for all the major attractions to be open again?
That is more than one and a half years from now. And I haven't visited DLP in seven years because there was nothing new the last time I visited.
In summer of 2017 there won't be anything new either, but at least everything should have gotten a paint job and be functioning again, which is what you might expect from a Disney park and considering the prices charged.

However, I still doubt I will visit in summer 2017 when nothing new has been added by then.

Alain Littaye said...

Not really Dutchduck, there will be the new Star Tours 2, probably a new parade and new castle night show at DLP and at the WDS at least the new scenes in the Tram Tour and probably the new show at Animagique.

Unknown said...

Might take my mom in mid-July. Hopefully the July openings are for the beginning of July!

Unknown said...

@Alain: you're right, and on top of that, come 2017, Disneyland Paris Park will be adding a new popcorn flavour!

I am kidding of course and these additions are nice. But come on, changing a film in a projector is not a new attraction, especially if this movie is already being shown for a couple of years in other parks. Although, I am looking forward to Animagique,these additions do not convince me to pay for a flight, a stay and entrance fee to the Disneyland Paris parks. I can watch a movie at any cinema theater here in Vienna.

I'd rather spend a little more and fly to Florida or California where they are building new attractions and not just cleaning up the mess they left unattended for almost 20 years now.

Do you have an explanation why Disney claimed wanting to be spending almost 1 billion dollars on DLP (I am not sure if it is true, but I thought I read it somewhere) and we still don't see anything substantially new and big coming to the parks in the near future?

Is it still in the pipeline or do they really need all that money to restore the place?

I understand that for the American parks, Disney doesn't have a real need to build big. Star Wars land should have gotten its own new park instead of destroying Rivers of America in Disneyland Anaheim. But it is cheaper and easier for Disney. And people will come anyway and on top of that, they can increase prices for the annual passholders as much as they want.

In Florida Pandora is of course very interesting especially with the extremely successful and immersing Harry Potter Areas around the corner at Universal. I'm not holding my breath yet since the models Disney presented where really underwhelming in my opinion.

What is your opinion on the designing qualities of Disney versus Universal? Of course, if you look at the past, Disney obviously is better in every way. But in the present time, I think Disney has gotten so big, it is hardly impossible for Imagineers to really leave a mark and push forward a well thought trough concept. I claim to see this with the designs for Shanghai Disneyland. It totally lacks the finesse and extremely detailed design of early Disneyland Paris. Just compare it to all these wonderful drawings on your amazing book. The current designs hardly ever come close to what has been done in the late 1980's and early 1990 for Euro Disneyland.

Would be interested in your take on these design qualities and maybe there is an article in it as well :-)

Keep up the good work, I like to visit your blog every day!

Alain Littaye said...

La Rs, i think the one billion from the WDC for DLP is a number that has been fabricated, i'm not sure the WDC ever said that. And in any case a big part of this billion, if there is one, will go in renovation, and not only rides. Although between now and 2017 they will update or enhance ten attractions which are: Space Mountain: Mission 2, Videopolis, “it’s a small world”, Big Thunder Mountain, La Cabane des Robinson, Peter Pan’s Flight, Pirates of the Caribbean, Animagique, Studio Tram Tour: Behind the Magic and Star Tours.

Now, about the debate Universal / Disney, i think Universal is doing most of the time a real good job with their new rides and theming, and they build them at the speed of light. They have the knowledge, the money, they're smart, and they even have Imagineers (!) as some previous WDI Imagineers are working now for Universal. All this to say that Universal rides are in good hands.

As for Shanghaî they obviously want to do a different kind of Magic Kingdom. There is things that i like, others that i wait to see it in person, i suggest that we wait for the park opening before having a final judgment!