All the cuts that will happen to make way for new Disney projects

Disney announced several new projects at the D23 event. While we are very excited for what’s to come, these new projects also have a lot of consequences in the form of attraction cuts. See what’s on the chopping block as Disney expands and reimagines Epcot, Magic Kingdom, and Animal Kingdom.

D23 Announcements

This past Saturday, D23 held their annual event with a ton of news for Disney Parks! Some of the biggest announcements were made for Disney World.

For Magic Kingdom, Disney revealed date the Hatbox Ghost will materialize and plans for the largest ever expansion to a Disney Park. And Disney announced that the Country Bears will be getting a new show.

Then, at EPCOT, Disney revealed the opening of the Journey of Water attraction and new Moana meet and greet HERE. You can see details in this post on when World of Celebration open. and when you can meet Figment HERE. Also don’t miss the new nighttime spectacular coming!

While a lot of these projects are completely new, some of these projects mean that a current attraction will need to close. Let’s take a look at what will happen

Dinoland’s Reimagining

DinoLand U.S.A. originally started as a small highway town where an amateur fossil-hunter found dinosaur bones. They saved up their money to purchase this area to research everything they could about dinosaurs. The other half features dinosaur exploration.

At Saturday’s D23 event, Josh D’amaro shared something entirely new coming!! Dinoland U.S.A. is being reimagined to focus on the tropical Americas – the Northern Part of South American and Central America. He specifically mentioned Indiana Jones and Encanto. Read more about that in Susan’s post HERE.

Where does that leave DINOSAUR? The track layout is very similar (but not identical) to that of Indiana Jones Adventure at Disneyland Park. Tokyo DisneySeat all has an Indiana Jones attraction called Temple of the Crystal Skull, which is is set in Central America. It’s likely we will see one of these or a combination where DINOSAUR currently is.

It also means all the other DinoLand attractions like TriceraTop Spin, the Boneyard, Fossil Fun Games, and all the dining will close and be rethemed to fit in with Encanto and Indiana Jones. In addition, the fun character meets like Chip ‘n’ Dale, Daisy, and Donald in their cute outfits will not be around anymore.

But, hopefully this means we will see Indiana Jones and Mirabel meet and greets!

It’s Tough to be a Bug and Zootopia

At last year’s D23 event, Disney shared a “blue sky” project involving Zootopia and DinoLand. Well, of course we now know Zootopia won’t be heading to DinoLand, but will go to the center of the park instead.

The current concept for the new “Zootopia” experience has guests visiting the different biomes you only glimpse in the film, traveling along with Judy Hopps, Nick Wilde and other characters.

The Zootopia show will REPLACE It’s Tough to be a Big in the Tree of Life Theater. This project will completely erase It’s Tough to be a Bug from Disney World theme parks. Hopefully we will still see some of the characters out at races and other special events.

So far, we have no idea when It’s Tough to be a Bug will close or when work will begin for the new Zootopia show.

Test Track Reimagining

Test Track, as we know it now, is done for. Instead, Disney is going back to the past – to the attraction that Test Track replaced. World of Motion was a whimsical look at the history and achievements in transportation.

It seems as if Disney will be trying to get back to that concept of transportation achievements in this next iteration of Test Track. Currently, the attraction tests how your designed vehicle performs in categories of speed, efficiency, and more.

We are curious to see if Guests will still have the option to design a car and if the attraction will now focus on technological achievements in transportation. Disney has not shared any additional information about what the attraction will look like or when work will begin.

Pirates of the Caribbean Lounge and Tortuga Tavern?

In the near future, fans will be able to enjoy an extension of the storytelling you love in Pirates of the Caribbean. Imagineer Chris Beatty announced that an all-new Pirates of the Caribbean lounge is coming to the Magic Kingdom. Read the original story from Kate HERE.

But, where will it go? Will they extend out past the gift shop plaza to create a new space, or will they repurpose a space already in use? While not confirmed, it seems likely they will close Tortuga Tavern and retheme it for the Pirates of the Caribbean Lounge.

Tortuga Tavern is only open for lunch and dinner, and it is probably the least popular dining option in all of Magic Kingdom. This dining spot only offers a handful of entrees from 11 am to 5 pm daily. I could absolutely see this as the new spot for the Pirates lounge, especially since it will save Disney a lot of money if they don’t have to build a completely new space.

What do you think of all these cuts? Are there any you are happy about? Sad to see go? Let us know in the comments below, and be sure to share this post with a friend.