Since Disney is getting a bit crazy about guests taking photos or video of Pandora: The World of AVATAR construction at Animal Kingdom (we’ll talk more about that later this week), we decided to once again take to the skies to see the work on the new land from above. Still slated to open in 2017, the land based on the hit 2009 film has made some progress since we last checked in from the skies:
An overall look at the construction site, which looks to have come quite a ways since we last checked in.
In the back, we see that the dining facility in an “abandoned hangar” is coming along nicely.
The floating mountains are mostly completed above the show building level, no more scaffolding to be found.
The entrance to the Na’vi River Journey still has some progress to make.
Some smaller rock-work is starting to be painted at ground level.
A lot of foliage has been planted over the last few weeks.
If you prefer a video look, we have a quick fly-by for you to view as well:
So, so cool to watch Avatar land grow and develop. Thanks WDWNT for bring us the developments and especially the pics and videos.
Yeah, it’s cool to watch a new attraction develop especially when it happens in a timely fashion. However, that coolness fades rather quickly when it drags on for, in this case, years with no end in sight.
Pandora will be comprised of a 12 acre parcel and boast 2 rides, only one of which (Flight of Passage) seems like a significant attraction and/or undertaking. So far they’re 2.5 years into the construction and although Disney had predicted a mid 2017 opening no one believes that will happen.
Conversely, Universal opened their initial Wizarding World of Harry Potter attraction (Hogsmeade in the Islands of Adventure park) 2.5 years after construction started which included the demolition of the previous attraction (The Lost Continent). It covers 20 themed acres and has 3 rides (The Forbidden Journey, Dueling Dragons, and Flight of the Hippogriff). Universal opened the second Harry Potter attraction (Diagon Alley/Kings Cross in the Universal Park) in about a year after the former attraction (Jaws) was demolished. The newer HP attraction covers ~ 8 acres and has 2 rides, Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts and the Hogwarts Express (a train linking the 2 parks via one common attraction).
Maybe someone at Disney should talk to someone at Universal to get advice on how to build an attraction more efficiently.
Dueling dragons was already there. They actually didn’t build that ride. Not that I disagree with your point — that Universal moves pretty quickly — but they didn’t have to reinvent the wheel.
I don’t think you could’ve gotten these pictures from a worse angle. Every single picture is taken from behind the land, can’t see anything besides the show buildings and back of the rock work. Not interesting at all.
Seriously?