Chroniq

Couldn't have said it better myself. If all those stories about JK rowling being incredibly controlling are true then it's much easier/quicker/cheaper to copy what she has already approved. I think the the addition of stores is a no brainer as well, considering how crowded harry potter village is. I'm sure USO feels like they are leaving a lot of money on the table by not building out additional stores and restaurants. The only thing I'd guess is that they may add an additional attraction with a small foot print (probably off the shelf and themed) just to eat people. I'm going with Avatar, because it was the first announcement from Disney in years that didn't leak before hand. For everyone that thinks they shouldn't do a carbon copy of the two harry potter lands. I suspect they'll make just enough changes, at the least cost possible, to compel the true HP fanboys to visit both parks. They'll bitch about how they are so similiar, but still go to see the new things.

^I definitely agree with that as many people visiting the parks in California are just day tripping. So the situation is more, "Do we go to Disneyland or Universal today?".

While there has to be a percentage of visitors that choose WDW over UNI because of Harry Potter, Disney still managed to have great attendance and revenue gains this year (in a much more macro way than Universal because the attendance is that much higher). I'm thinking the number of people that would have gone to WDW but instead decided to go to UNi over the past 2 years is somewhere around 5 percent. I also think a good percentage of the people that flew down to Orlando to visit Harry Potter this year decided to add a few days at WDW to their stay.. “We welcome Harry Potter to Central Florida,” said Michael Griffin, a Disney vice president. “Because experience has shown us that any new offering in this market helps draw additional visitors to our resort.”

Oranges underneath a van? Because they didn't want them to get too hot inside the car, but were too lazy to carry them back to their hotel room (and also cool with the fact that they were laying on a parking lot, wtf).. Strange..Anyone have another theory?

I thought i had read the entire, recent, part of this thread. Thanks for pointing that out! There is this term- "uncanny valley", it refers to the fact that people are put off or freaked out by robots or 3d images that are close to real life but not close enough to believe. I think we might reach that point with a theme park ride if they did the screens thing on the potter train. In the images above the screens are small and the locations are unfamiliar, which is why it works in my opinion. Look forward to Tuesday

Any park that requires a fundraiser just to complete their master plan will never actually implement their master plan ( or get built)

Pro Tip: I'll sell you magic beans which have a much greater potential return on investment. If anyone has a bunch of trucks, I think we can make this happen.

^LOL

Cool checking this out....So if for some reason this whole thing ends up being Harry Potter 2 (rise of the wands), I'm going on record stating that they will use an underground station as a transition element and the train itself will be nothing more than hd screens as windows and interactive elements. This would be the only way they could transport guests from Potter to Jaws and it not break the bank. But the argument against this whole thing is if Hogwarts Express only goes from the real world to the Wizard World, than I'd expect Potternuts to be up in arms that train ride goes against everything in their books. Thoughts?

Kings cross station is the "regular world" right? and they way you board the hogwarts express is from a secret wall in a subway (underground) station?

Hey Potter fans.. I'm just wondering if anyone can tell me what locations the Hogwarts Express travels to in the books/film/cannon?

Wednesday morning. Take a nap.

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I'll just leave this here.

Exclusive, unreleased photo of where they actually plan to build it. Chris "yes that is "to scale" " Connolly

Reasons Harry Potter World isn't expanding to the Jaws spot -This would require an elimination of the universal single park ticket and price point. Eliminating their cheapest theme park ticket option. -Assuming the transportation system was VIA train, this would require about 1.2 miles of themed tunnel. I'm completely speculating at this point, but a project of that nature would cost over a 100 million dollars. - I don't know much about Harry Potter, but doesn't the Hogwarts Express only travel between the real world and Hogwarts/wizard world? - Expanding into the rest of lost continent is much easier, cheaper, (occams razor) and continues to make IOA a destination, rather than a park the general public isn't familiar with because of the bad marketing in the early 2000's. Reasons Why Harry Potter World is expanding into the Jaws spot- -This would require an elimination of the universal single park ticket and price point. Eliminating their cheapest theme park ticket option. -I'm sure there is a whole sect of the potterverse community that would sell a kidney to ride the hogwarts express. - By pushing the expansion this far out, they have the luxury of space. Something they didn't have at IOA. -Harry Potter has been the best thing has happened (attendance wise) to Universal Orlando Resort since.. well.anything. I'm still not convinced. I'm thinking new franchise and a new draw. The expansion spot is located at the back of the park. It has a huge amount of land available and I think Universal (now with more hot comcast money, extremely higher attendance, and per capita guest spending) would love to trump DIsney's Avatar announcement. You are all going to hate me when they announce TWILIGHT LAND. Chris "should have written this like Jim Hill and pretended I have inside sources" Connolly

Just some random thoughts to share- In order, the highest grossing films of all time (not adjusted for inflation) that don't have a theme park attraction or aren't currently slated to build one are- Titanic (water) Lord of the R i n g s (never saw a film or read a book but I bet this would be a huge hit) Inception (great film, but maybe too adult or specific for a theme park) Independence Day (that ship has sailed) 2012 (that film was really a hit? ) Davinci Code (not a theme park ride) Matrix (awesome but too dated) Twilight (phuck) So just off the top of my head, if not a harry potter expansion, they are building a *Twilight* or Lord of the Ri ngs Ride.

Not at all, the rumor is that they'll run whatever the hell the special magical train is called between the two lands. Is that ACTUALLY a rumor? Doesn't sound legit at all to me. "Take a ride from Hogwarts through a magical land of defunct soundstages and current venues for pro wrestling"

and that was a great episode...

Hey Elissa.. Are you a Harry Potter fan??

Real Art is a company the just get's "it". Looking forward to more hours wasted away trying to win something. Thanks Patrick for the exclusive pic.

I'm by NO MEANS saying Leviathan is going to change the world and I'm definitely not a B&M fanboy, but higher drop+ larger parabolic curves means a lot of air time... B&M is always the company that plays it safe and with the advancement of CAD design they seem to play it even SAFER, but this ride will be chock full of floater airtime. That's, just science....... How about this.. Only two coasters exist in the world- Verbolten and Leviathan. Which one are you riding? Chris "just playing devils advocate as always " Connolly Chris "prefers ejector air anyways" Connolly

Leviathan appears to be a coaster that everyone has a strong opinion about. With that being said, in your opinion, which existing B&M does Leviathan's layout most resemble?

^I can't believe they passed on a "Meet the Fockers" kuka arm enabled, dark ride

fixed