No Expansion for Hong Kong Disneyland
Hong Kong Disneyland has been in trouble since opening day. To small, not enough to do, no repeat visitors and the financial trouble started soon after that as the visitor numbers stayed down. Although some new rides made it into the park since opening a big expansion was also already planned for the future. But now Disney and the Hong Kong government failed to agree on a cash infusion, putting any plans to expand away. With the plans to expand gone, Disney has now planned to cut some jobs related to the expansion.
Disney said it would fire about 30 Hong Kong-based employees dubbed “Imagineers” that had helped conceptualize and plan the expansion. Some jobs might also go at Disney’s home-turf of Burbank, California, as a result of the work stoppage, a source familiar with the situation told Reuters. The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that Disney had already been funding creative efforts — designing and envisioning the look of rides — but decided to pull financing when it became clear that a deal with the government on expanding Disneyland was not imminent. (Reuters)
Not everything is lost as the doors are still open to strike a new deal between the Disney Company and the Hong Kong government. In that case an expansion could still take place, one that is expected to cost approximately $387 million.
One wonders how this would influence the park planned to be build in Shanghai. While there is a big market out there Disney can’t get this one wrong. With Disneyland Resort Paris financial trouble since the beginning and the Hong Kong park doing as bad Disney needs a success story. Personally I am not sure if another park would bring that success and if it wouldn’t be better to try and cure those park already out there. Would it not be better to get the Hong Kong park to expand and evolve to a resort, attracting people from Shanghai to visit it? How many potential guests for Hong Kong will be lost if another park would open “only” 764 miles (1229 km) away from it?
Expanding Hong Kong Disneyland is important for its success. Let’s hope an agreement will be made soon so Disney can start working on this success. To be continued for sure…
