Goofy 325!! Or The Problem With “Normal” Disney Roller Coasters

If Disney wanted the greatest collection of "normal" Roller coasters, I think they could easily put that together. What makes me think this is looking at the estimated price tags of Disney roller coasters vs roller coasters at your more average theme park. Guardians of the Galaxy opened just last year, ensuring each park would have at least one roller coaster, and with an estimated price tag of $500 Million. The coaster takes place entirely in the biggest show building on Walt Disney World property. It must need all of that space as it ties for the 10th longest steel roller coaster in the world at 5,577.4 feet. The 3rd longest steel roller coaster in the world, Fury 325 at Carowinds, is 6,602 fet in length and cost an estimated $30 Million when it opened in 2015 ($38.6 million in 2023 dollars). Fury 325 has been on the short list of best roller coasters in the world since it opened.

So why doesn't Disney just slap 12.9 Fury 325s on their property and call it a day? Probably because being 325 feet tall, that would instantly make those roller coasters the tallest structures on property. Walt Disney World famously has no buildings taller than 200 feet, including Cinderella Castle, Mt. Everest, The Hollywood Tower, and Spaceship Earth. Disney employs a lot of tricks with forced perspective and creative architecture to make buildings and landmarks look bigger or smaller as they please. Disney also carefully crafts their site lines to maximize guest immersion. How exactly am I supposed to feel like I'm on a jungle expedition if I can clearly see a future mountain over yonder. A gigantic steel wave on the skyline would probably throw both of those into chaos, but also consider what you would see from the tallest structure on property. What do you mean we're not actually flying through a pristine alien landscape?!?

Well, Walt Disney World is huge and mostly undeveloped. Let's just make a new park to put all of our Fury 325s in. How much would that be? If Lost Island in Waterloo Iowa was any indication, they could do that for about $100 Million. That takes into account Lost Island opening with 3 roller coasters, about 20 rides total. In reality though, a new Walt Disney World park would probably set the mouse back $1 - $2 Billion. That estimate is in line with what Animal Kingdom and Universal's currently under construction Epic Universe estimated costs of construction. So what gives? For a simple explanation you could scale up visitor expectations. This article says the owners of Lost Island were hoping for 2,500 - 3,000 daily attendance to keep afloat. A new Disney park would probably be trying to pull nine to ten times that figure.

OK, so we have to drop a Billion for a new park, but then we can pump it full of Fury 325's with all of our sweet sweet mouse money right? It might seem so, but Disney would still choose not to. An average roller coaster conflicts with three core values of Disney parks.

The first of these is that Disney is doing it's best to make experiences for the entire family. This includes small children. The highest high requirement for any ride at Walt Disney World is actually already a roller coaster. Rock'n'Rollercoaster at Disney's Hollywood Studios is currently the only ride at the park with a height requirement of 48''. The next lowest is a 3 way tie. Expedition Everest, Flight of Passage, and Space Mountain all require riders to stand at least 44'' tall. Then the requirements decrease from there. Fury 325 has a height requirement of 54'' which would begin to significantly exclude smaller children. High intensity rides may also exclude the elderly or those with certain medical conditions. The most intense rides at Disney may already do this, but only the few most intense rides do. The slower dark rides Disney are known for are much more accommodating.

The second core value is that Disney wants all of their rides to tell a story, and big lurking scream machines are not well adapted for doing so. Roller coasters do tell a story. That story is "you're going really fast, up and down and round and round." and for a lot of people that is enough, but Disney is not particularly interested in only saying that. Now there are some big roller coasters that do say more than just being intense thrill machines. The roller coasters that come to mind immediately are Superman The Ride at Six Flags New England ($21.2 million) . Medusa at Six Flags Great America ($27.5 million), Montu at Busch Gardens Tampa ($38.9 Million), Alpengeist at Busch Gardens Williamsburg ($38 million), and Nemesis (25.4 Million British Sterling) at Alton Towers. Note That's only big hulking outdoor Roller coasters. Non-Disney parks do make highly themed roller coasters such as Laff Track ($18 million) at Hershey Park, and Mystery Mine ($25.7 million) as well, but those rides are in line with the smaller-scale roller coasters already offered at Disney. Funnily enough, Disney did build one roller coaster of which the theme was 'this is a roller coaster'. That was California Screamin' ($86.1 Million) at Disney's California Adventure. It opened with the park, which was a critical and commercial failure the first few years it operated (The park, not just the roller coaster, but it was in the park). Although there were many problems when Disney’s California Adventure when the park opened, one of them seemed to be that it was filled with rides that were themed to be rides. Disney would say the stories of those rides are that they’re rides, a normal person would say they just weren’t themed. California Screamin' was rebranded into Incredicoaster in 2018, and is the 6th longest steel roller coaster in the world.

By the way, the sum of those roller coasters listed is $194.7 Million not including California Screamin’ or $280.8 Million including it.

The last core value I can think of as to why Disney avoids large scale roller coasters is that Disney sticks to unique experiences. Unique experiences and quality experiences go hand-in-hand, that is to say, quality experiences are unique experiences. Disney strives to be the leader in quality experiences, so they must also offer unique experiences. While a lot of enthusiasts would love for Disney to plop down 10 roller coasters and call it a day, that already exists. It's called Cedar Point (or Energylandia for European enthusiasts). Local theme parks that invest in large scale roller coasters can think of themselves as serving an area. The top non-Disney parks such as Six Flags Magic Mountain, Cedar Point, and Dollywood, could think of themselves as serving the nation. Disney is serving the entire world.

So while it would seem enticing for Disney to make it's own roller coaster destination, not doing so also makes a lot of sense for their business.

Also Vekoma won't let them.

(While I was writing this I found this really interesting video from DSNY Newscast on the more realistic concerns of Walt Disney World adding a 5th park, because I know there's a lot more that goes into building a theme park than hypothetical money calculations.)