It appears the Disney may have removed the radio house at the New Orleans Square train station in Disneyland Park after a fire damaged the exterior.
The building caught fire on December 28, 2022 after which construction walls, scrim, and scaffolding went up around the building before being briefly removed in January 2023, revealing some of the melted radio house roof.
The day after the fire Disneyland Resort told the Orange County Register, “The small fire near the New Orleans Square train station caused minimal disruption and no injuries.”
The green scrim was removed a year after the fire in December 2023, but the walls have remained along with minor fire damage to the roofline. Now, it seems that Disney has decided to forgo repairs and opted to remove the structure entirely.
The main train station structure can be seen here peaking out above the blue construction wall while the former radio house is no longer standing.
The radio house was formerly nestled between the main station and water pump, as seen on the right in the above photo.
Now, it is very hard to clearly see, but from the vantage point of the Haunted Mansion queue, it’s at least clear that the entire roof is gone. It’s impossible to confirm that the entire building is gone, but it certainly looks that way. Whether or not Disney will rebuild the structure remains to be seen.
The New Orleans Square train station is based on a set from the 1948 Disney film “So Dear To My Heart.” Walt wanted to use the original movie set, but animator Ward Kimball did not want to return it after Walt had given it to him, so a replica was built. When the park opened in 1955, it was known as Frontierland Station. The building famously appears in EPCOT’s The American Adventure attraction during the “Two Brothers” segment.
The Disneyland Railroad was also then known as the Santa Fe & Disneyland Railroad, named for the sponsor Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway. It was changed to the Disneyland Railroad when the sponsorship ended in 1974.
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