New things are coming to Universal Studios Florida! Earlier this year, Woody Woodpecker’s KidZone closed permanently to make way for a new land. Universal officially announced the new DreamWorks Land would be opening in 2024, but we haven’t had any additional announcements since.
Taking a look at the concept art, we can make out what appears to be a new Shrek meet and greet and a Trolls retheme of the Woody Woodpecker’s Nuthouse Coaster. Beyond what we can see in the concept art and over the construction walls, we can only speculate what other new things may be added to the new DreamWorks Land. For now, let’s take a closer look at what we can see over the walls.
As you look in the direction of the new land, the brightly painted coaster track stands out the most. The track for Woody Woodpecker’s Nuthouse Coaster was left standing after the closure and has been receiving a fresh coat of new paint. The colors are very different than the previous blue and red color scheme of the Nuthouse Coaster. Since our last update, the track is now fully painted over.
The outermost support beams at the highest part of the track were still a simple white basecoat in our last update, but now they’ve been painted bright green to match the other supports.
The track looks good from here! Since the coaster is getting a retheme, the ride vehicles will also be getting an updated look. The ride vehicle should remain basically the same, but with a new look. Woody Woodpecker’s Nuthouse Coaster ride vehicles looked like your typical coaster vehicle, with a Woody Woodpecker figure at the front of the train. It will be interesting to the see the new ride vehicles once they start testing on the track.
The poles that used to hold the sign from Woody Woodpecker’s Nuthouse Coaster are still standing on top of the building. If you look closely at the poles, you can see the paint on the top portion of the poles is a much brighter blue.
Near the entrance to the E.T. Adventure, a small building is visible over the construction walls. This structure isn’t very large, so we’re not entirely sure what it will be used for at this point in time.
Also visible over the construction walls are some wooden beams that look like a fence or ramp used for safety. The construction site has been very active lately and we can hear equipment moving around during the day.
Shrek’s Swamp hasn’t changed too much since our last update, but there is a lot of scaffolding going up around the exterior of what we assume will be a tree trunk. This is a good sign that they will start adding concrete to the frame around the top of the structure. The metal frames for the structure look complete at this point so the next step will be adding concrete to create the tree stump. The scaffolding may be covered with scrims soon to protect workers and the materials during construction.
Woody Woodpecker’s KidZone, at the time of closing, was made up of Curious George Goes To Town, the DreamWorks Destination, Woody Woodpecker’s Nuthouse Coaster, Shrek’s Swamp Meet, and Fievel’s Playland. The Nuthouse Coaster is getting rethemed to Trolls and the new Shrek meet and greet location is now standing where a small stage used to be near the entrance to Fievel’s Playland. There’s a lot of space in this part of the park, so we’re eager to see what else will be added.
As we look forward to the opening of this new land, we’re awaiting more news on what else we can expect. The new DreamWorks Land is scheduled to open sometime in 2024, so stay tuned for more updates. What DreamWorks characters would you like to see included in this new land? Let us know in the comments!
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