Disneyland California
Walt Disney World Orlando opened in 1971 after Walter Elias Disney saw the park’s potential. Disneyland California was the first Disney park to open its doors in 1955. Even though it was popular, surveys proved otherwise.
Surveys showed that only 5 percent of visitors came from the east side of the country. Considering that 75 percent of Americans live on the east side, the number of visitors was low.
Why Choosing Florida?
Walt Disney wanted all eastern residents to visit the happiest place on Earth and beat those surveys. After considering pros and cons, he decided to set Disney World in Florida’s Bay Lake.
Walt chose a spot near Kissimmee and Orlando. The first part of the plan was to decide what to do with mosquitoes. You can’t have these annoying insects at the happiest place on Earth, right?
The Florida Project
Now that the location was settled, it was time to start designing the park. The filmmaker gave the plan a code name: The Florida Project. Throughout the 60s, he carried out his plan secretly.
Walt wanted visitors to have the best experience of all times. He visioned a park full of varied attractions where people could have fun and at the same time feel special.
Epcot
Walt had a visionary plan for Epcot. The theme park that nowadays explores different cultures was meant to be otherwise. Epcot stands for Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow and was designed to be an urban community.
The Epcot area was meant to be a backdrop for future building developments. However, Walt’s plan saw an end when he passed away in December 1966. No one continued Walt’s experimental project, so Epcot became the theme park we know today.
Four Theme Parks
Walt wasn’t there to see the final results, which were epic. Magic Kingdom, the one with the Cinderella Castle at the end of Main Street, was the first park to open its doors in 1971. Epcot opened 11 years later.
The third park to open was Disney’s Hollywood Studios in 1989, which included the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror attraction. Nine years later, Animal Kingdom opened its doors.
Increasing Popularity
The four theme parks allowed Disney World to offer different options for all ages, making the area even more popular. Around 58 million people visit Disney World each year. Imagine having that flow of people and no mosquitoes around. It just makes the experience even better!
All four theme parks ranked in the top eight most visited parks worldwide. Magic Kingdom was at the top of the list, according to a 2014 survey.
Disney Hotels
The massive flow of people that attend Disney World was reason enough to create resorts around the area. There are around 34 Disney hotels and resorts, all of them designed to enhance the magical experience.
Visitors can find all sorts of hotels that best fit their budget, varying from deluxe villas to campgrounds. Visitors can pick any place according to their budget or rather stay at non-Disney hotels in the area.
Disney Transportation
Disney Transport is a free transportation system available to all guests. It includes over 400 buses that can take people from the villas and resorts to the parks. There’s also a monorail, a ferry boat, and a Skyliner.
One of the many advantages of staying in a Disney resort is that the shuttle is available every 20 minutes or less. Visitors avoid paying parking costs and enjoy a magical ride.
Employees Budget
Cast members, the term used for Disney’s employees, have a significant role in the Walt Disney World experience. The company hires 77,000 employees, making Disney the biggest employer in the country.
Disney spends over $1.2 billion in wages a year. In addition, to make cast members happy and translate that happiness into their work, Disney spends around $474 million on additional perks.
Preserved Area
Even though Disney owns 25,000 acres of land in Florida, only half of it is currently used. Walt’s vision was to preserve the park area, so he had a third of the total property protected for conversation.
The Disney area is as large as San Francisco and double the size of Manhattan. Considering these facts and that a third of it is preserved, still no mosquitoes are found. How cool is that?
Underground City
Rumors of an underground city below Magic Kingdom are true, its reason being merely architectural. Engineers couldn't hide a warren of tunnels located on ground level, so they built the park on top of it.
These tunnels are known as utilidors, where cast members dress up in costumes and take breaks. It was Walt’s idea to make things this way, so characters freely walk underground. Therefore guests don’t see the backside of the magic.
Magic Stays Intact
As Disney sells a magical experience, details must be preserved. For cleanliness purposes, trash bins are placed every 30 steps. Studies showed that people don’t keep their trash long enough and discard items on the floor, and Disney wanted to avoid that practice.
To make the experience even better, Disney World includes smellitizers in some park areas. For instance, the smellitizers placed in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride smell like fresh sea air.
Keeping Everything Intact
The maintenance of parks is an arduous task, as everything has to be as clean as possible. This is why Disney World prohibited selling certain items such as chewing gum. Guests can bring their gum, of course.
Plants are another significant aspect that always has to look good. The company plants more than three million flowers every year. In addition, gardeners take care of two million plants and 13,000 roses.
Mosquito-Free Area
Disney World made sure to keep parks clean and plants magical and created a mosquito-free area. Anyone living in hot and humid weather like Florida can explain what it’s like to be surrounded by these insects.
All efforts have been made to ensure guests enjoy a magical experience without having blood-sucking insects buzzing around the Disney area.
Meeting An Expert
Making mosquitoes disappear from one of the most humid areas of the country wasn’t an easy task. When Walt Disney first addressed the issue, he met with expert Major General William “Joe” Potter.
Potter was a former Governor of the Panama Canal Zone and an expert engineer. When the Panama Canal construction started, Potter helped control the spread of malaria, a disease transmitted by mosquitoes.
Getting The Job Done
Walt met with Potter to offer him the job of eliminating mosquitoes from Disney World. Potter accepted and placed all his knowledge in Walt’s secret plan – Disney’s Florida Project.
Thanks to Potter’s expertise, Disney World is now a mosquito-free area. However, the company still employs several strategies to scare away these bloodsuckers. It’s an everyday task.
Potter’s Work
When Potter started the construction, he designed a drainage system that transformed the swampland into an area ready to be built upon. These drainage gutters, known as Joe’s ditches, are still used today.
Christopher Lucas, a Disney fan, explained that “the water is constantly flowing. Whenever you walk by a body of water, there’s usually a fountain in the middle, or they’re doing something to keep it flowing.”
Still Water
The aim is to make the area an unpleasant home for mosquitoes or any insect that lays eggs. One way to keep mosquitoes away is to ensure that there is no still water where insects may leave their eggs.
Every park has a fountain where water is currently moving, so mosquitoes are not attracted to it and leave no larva. For this reason, there is no standing water at Disney World.
Everything Is Magically Calculated
Every plant in Disney World serves a purpose. In fact, most of them are placed in specific locations to fight the battle against mosquitoes. In addition, fountains are filled with fish that eat the mosquito larva.
Walt Disney’s aim was to create a natural environment without having to spray the place with smelly pesticides. Nowadays, the company uses garlic spray to scare away bloodsuckers. Humans can’t smell it, but mosquitoes do.
Rainwater
Every time Disney acquires new land close to the area, the company makes sure to correctly place the drainage ditches. In addition, every construction is designed to avoid rainwater accumulation.
Lucas added, “All buildings are built so that water flows right off them... With all the rainstorms, if water got caught on the buildings… it would form a pool, and then mosquitoes would hatch their eggs, and you’d have thousands of mosquitoes.”
Chickens Also Play A Part
As far as fauna is concerned, chickens have a significant role in this fight. The birds live near the resort and undergo blood checks to see if they have any pathogens related to mosquitoes.
Chickens can’t catch the diseases that mosquitoes spread – such as Zika – but they can help prevent them. When these birds are blood tested, evidence of any pathogens may pop up. This information helps staff know which area to place their attention to.
Potter’s Legacy
Potter helped in a lot of ways and will always be remembered. When Potter passed away in 1988, Dick Nunis –former Disney president– published a letter dedicated to the engineer. “Joe was a man [whom] Walt Disney was very fond of. Without Joe Potter, there would be no [Disney World] today,” he wrote.
To make a tribute to a Disney legend, the company named one of the Seven Seas Lagoon ferry General Joe Potter. After all, thanks to his work, guests can enjoy a day at Disney World without getting bit by a mosquito.
Disney Curiosities
The fight with mosquitoes is one of the secret things that guests don’t know about. There are other behind-the-scenes details that you might’ve never heard of, so let’s reveal them all!
One of the many curiosities of Disney is that mickey symbols are hidden all over the place. These mickey signs were purposely imprinted in several corners of the parks, from restaurants to rides. Guests spend hours spotting them.
Wild Cats Inside Disney
In the mid-50s, Walt Disney wanted to create a ride inside Sleeping Beauty’s Castle. The problem was that constructors found the place filled with wild cats, but we’re not talking about the East High Wildcats.
After all, the ride was never built, and the cats stayed. These cats helped keep the rodent population under control. Now two hundred wild cats live in the Disney area and eat the little non-Mickeys.
Underground Rubbish
The utilidors – underground tunnels below Magic Kingdom – serve more than one purpose. These paths allow cast members to move trash around the park thanks to the pipes that carry rubbish.
The pipes transport the litter with a pressurized air system, making rubbish flow at 60mph. Having trash bins every 30 steps was necessary, but this underground pipe system is genius!
Do Your Laundry
Disney World employs so many people and has outfits that you can’t count that their laundry is extensive. To match one laundry day of Disney, a person would have to wash and dry cycle every day for 52 years.
Each day, Disney World washes 285,000 pounds of laundry and dries clean another 30,000. Numbers are scary. However, laundry is fundamental, as Disney employs around 70,000 employees only in Florida.
Cast Members Have Secret Codes
If a ride has broken down and a cast member says so aloud, it will probably make every guest freak out. As Disney World doesn’t want to cause any situation to be uncontrollable, cast members have secret codes for these situations.
Code 101 means the ride has broken down, while Code 102 means it is well-functioning again. One of the funniest codes is White Powder Alert, which means a guest is trying to scatter Space Mountain ashes. How weird is that?
Cast Member Name Tag
Every cast member has a tag with their name and where they come from. When a cast member forgets to bring their name tag to work, a substitute name tag is given to them: Chris from Orlando.
The chances of coming across a Chris from Orlando are relatively high, as it is the only name tag available for forgetful cast members. At least those whose name is Chris don’t have to worry about forgetting their name tags.
Lost And Found Items
Working at lost and found must be fun, but being the guest who finds the lost object is probably more fun. Imagine yourself walking around Disney World and coming across a prosthetic leg and a glass eye.
It sounds crazy, but it’s true. Fortunately, the owners of those objects claimed them later. Disney World’s Lost and Found collect around two hundred sunglasses every day.
Main Street Windows
Main Street is one of the most magical streets of Disney. Most windows have signs with the names of people who positively contributed to making Disney what it is today.
One of the windows reads Elias Disney. Most names refer to people directly related to the creation of the parks, which means only top employees got their names on the window.
Have A Magical Day!
One of Disney World’s top rules is that cast members must be charming, smiling, and sweet to guests. It doesn’t matter how rude or offensive a person might be – cast members must always stay calm.
There’s a secret code that cast members use in these situations as a way to vent. While the phrase “have a magical Disney day!” sounds delicate, it actually means “f* you.”
Cinderella Castle
As you enter Magic Kingdom park and walk down Main Street, you’d find yourself standing in front of Cinderella Castle. It’s an impressive structure that, surprisingly enough, looks real but contains no stones.
Just like any other construction in Disney World, the castle looks real. However, it’s actually made of fiberglass shell. Regardless of the material or how fake it is – the Cinderella Castle is still magical.
Not The Best Pay
Cast members dressed up in costumes protested outside the park in 2008. They were demanding better pay and working conditions. 32 of them were arrested that day. Guests were shocked to see Mickey, Donald and the rest being handcuffed.
After the pandemic, 2022 has brought great news for cast members. Days after Disney’s 50th anniversary, the company announced workers were given a pay rise. Fortunately, everything’s changed.
Cast Members’ Accusations
Disney characters play a fundamental role in the magical experience. However, a few situations got out of hand, according to some guests who filed suits against cast members who wore the costume.
In 2011, a woman claimed that Donal Duck groped her and then made gestures to say he did something wrong. The 27-year-old Pennsylvania woman settled out of court. Unfortunately, this isn’t the only case against a Disney character.
The Biggest Wardrobe
Disney owns the most extensive wardrobe around the globe, storing cast members’ costumes on eight miles of racks. Not even the Kardashian family can compete with Disney’s number of clothing items.
Mickey Mouse alone owns almost three hundred costumes. In total, Disney has two and a half million items. Before 2001, cast members even shared underwear. Hopefully, this practice has changed. Now they have their own undergarment and take them home to wash.
Strict Dress Code
The company created an extensive manual for all cast members, titled the Disney Look Book. Some of the most common prohibitions include visible tattoos and body piercings.
In addition, there are length limitations on fingernails and facial hair. Even prescription glasses have to follow Disney’s demands. All in all, working for the Mouse requires more than just being fun and happy at all times.
Green Water
Most waters in Disney World have a particular color that makes the water look as if it’s dirty, but it’s not. The watercolor is green, and it is dyed on purpose. As crazy as it may sound, the company had its reasons.
One of the reasons is that the color makes the boat ride more immersive, as it hides the tracks under the water. In addition, if there’s any litter swimming around, the green color makes it almost indistinguishable.