Hello all, I am back and more motivated than ever to help bring the magic right to your home. With so much to cover, I thought I would change up my normal feed with diving deep into a section of the Magic Kingdom that isn’t really talked about more in-depth. So with that being said, today we are going to go into the past, present, and future of Tomorrowland.
This is an area of the park that I’ve always loved and have so many fond memories of. It is a land that is always alive and buzzing with energy by day or by night. A land that is always on the move and one that I was blessed enough to be able to spend part of my last CP creating magic at.
While there is so much to cover about this land and all that it inhabits, to make things simpler and to avoid confusion, I am just going to be sticking to Walt Disney World’s version when getting further into it, however, I will talk about Walt’s original idea and concept for the land in Disneyland to start things out. So with that being said, let’s dive right into the “The Future That Never Was and Always Will Be”.
The Past
History of Tomorrowland
-Walt Disney’s Dedication of Tomorrowland
Walt loved the future and was known by many for his futurist views, so when creating Disneyland he knew he wanted to dedicate a land to the visions of the future. True to his word, Tomorrowland was one of the five original lands to inhabit Disneyland when it opened in 1955. However, while it was there physically on opening day, it was not yet finished. It was subsequently the land that went through the most updates out of any other lands throughout the years as well because the future was always changing and we had to keep up with it. According to Walt,
“Tomorrow can be a wonderful age. Our scientists today are opening the doors of the Space Age to achievements that will benefit our children and generations to come. The Tomorrowland attractions have been designed to give you an opportunity to participate in adventures that are a living blueprint of our future.”
Some of the major changes that the land received over the years include:
- 1959: Grand Opening of the Disneyland Monorail, Matterhorn Bobsleds (the first E-ticket attraction at Disneyland) and the Submarine Voyage all opening on June 14th, 1959
- 1967: The land was completely rebuilt with new attractions and scenery included the addition of the Carousel of Progress, Adventure Thru Inner Space, Flight to the Moon, and the PeopleMover.
- 1975: Space Mountain entered the atmosphere
- 1986/1987: Captain EO & Star Tours joined the lineup of attractions
The Second Tomorrowland – Walt Disney World
When Walt Disney World opened it’s doors Oct 1st, 1971, the Magic Kingdom hosted a Tomorrowland quite similar to its’ sister park in California and just like that park, it opened unfinished. Similarly, the Tomorrowland we all know and love today has gone through a few remodels and reimaginations. The biggest remodel to this land was reimagined in 1994 into “New Tomorrowland” and this is the land that we all know and love today.
With the 1994 reimagination of Tomorrowland, the land was laid out to tell a story that would unify the attractions into serving as different parts of a spaceport city. The Imagineers decided to borrow idea’s from Disneyland Paris’s Disoveryland and theme this Tomorrowland to a “future that never was”, buying the Imagineers time so they wouldn’t have to redo the land every couple years. This setting allowed Tomorrowland to be a whimsical fantasy of what everyone thought the future was going to be more so than a prediction, “The Future That Never Was and Always Will Be”. To create this, the Imagineers borrowed ideas from Jules Verne, HG Wells, and Buck Rodgers to create this Spaceport city.
“Spaceport City”
In this new storyline for the land, Tomorrowland was set up as the headquarters for the League of Planets, with elements of the city composing of the following landmarks:
- Public Transportation: TTA Peoplemover
- Space Port: Space Mountain
- Police Force: Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin
- History Museum: Carousel of Progress
- Night Club: Cosmic Ray’s Starlight Cafe
- Energy Center: Monsters Inc Laugh Floor
The Present
Overview of WDW Tomorrowland
Current Attractions:
- Astro Orbiter
- Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin
- Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor
- Space Mountain
Stitch’s Great Escape!- Stitch’s Alien Encounter Character Greeting! (during the above attraction’s non-operating periods)
- Tomorrowland Speedway*
- Tomorrowland Transit Authority PeopleMover
- Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress
*The only opening day attraction still left in Tomorrowland
The Future
What’s Coming to Tomorrowland
Tron Lightcycle Run is a semi-enclosed launched steel motorbike roller coaster attraction based on the science fiction franchise TRON. First built for Shanghai Disneyland, this attraction is currently being built for Walt Disney World’s Tomorrowland and is planned to be opened in 2021, in time for Walt Disney World’s 50th anniversary. The video below showcases a ride-through of the current version located in Shanghai Disneyland which this new coaster is based on.
So there you have the world of tomorrow, TODAY! Let me know what you thought of my coverage of this land and if it’s something that you are interested in me exploring again with a different land or even park!
EDITORS NOTED ** Hey all, I hope everyone is well and is staying inside at a time like this. With all the uncertainty I am focusing my energy on what I do know that to be true and that is still my love and passion for Disney. I hope that during this time I can help you all escape what is going on in the world even for a little bit and reenter the (Disney) World we all know and love.
Until then, Keep Moving Forward
-Kacey
Marketing the Magic 