6. Kali River Rapids… with animals?

Early on in Disney’s Animal Kingdom development, designers had a pretty straightforward goal: that each of the park’s “lands” would have its own “safari” – a ride-through opportunity to see real animals in naturalistic habitats and thematic contexts. Naturally, Africa’s would be the Kilimanjaro Safaris we know today. Asia’s would be the Tiger River Run. On board white water-ready rafts, guests would pass through the reclaimed hunting grounds of a Maharajah turned into a nature preserve, filled with gibbons, antelope, rhinos, elephants, and tigers. The end of the ride would see the rafts enter “white water rapids” for a thrilling conclusion.

The boat-based safari concept has a few drawbacks. For one, the rafts wouldn’t be able to slow down or stop near animal habitats, and there would be no on-ride guide to explain what guests were seeing. Second, they’d ride low in the water by necessity rather than giving guests the raised view of a safari truck. Opportunities to take photos would be unlikely given the ride’s thrilling (and wet) finale, and height and rider safety requirements would mean many guests simply couldn’t board, thereby missing many of Asia’s key animals.

Ultimately, the thrilling water ride and Asia’s animal experiences were split into two, yielding the Maharajah Jungle Trek and the animal-free Kali River Rapids. It makes sense that Disney would divide the concept, but it’s interesting to imagine Animal Kingdom having a “Jungle Cruise” style ride past real animals that becomes a surprise thrill at its finale.

7. Cars Land… without “Cars”?

If you can believe it, the idea of an automotive expansion at Disney California Adventure actually predates the idea to use the Cars film as its basis! Seriously! You have to remember that when Disney’s California Adventure opened in 2001, the park was a pretty big “miss,” failing to meet even a portion of its expected attendance. Negative word of mouth had signaled that the park just wasn’t very “Disney,” serving as a comic book style spoof of California rather than a “love letter” to the state’s history. 

The first five years of the park served as a period of “piecemeal” improvements – one-off additions and attractions meant to just add things that would draw people in. The idea of “Car Land” was no doubt one of them. Celebrating Route 66, “Car Land” would’ve continued the park’s “postcard” motif by inviting guests into a desert town plucked from the ‘50s, complete with diners, drive-ins, and tourist traps. The land’s main attraction was planned to be an Autopia-style ride through the desert, around Route 66 roadside landmarks, and into town (including a “car wash”). In other words, “Car Land” was still a spoofish, comical concept.

By 2006, California Adventure’s shifting identity and its urgent need for more anchoring attractions saw the land’s puttering family ride replaced with a high-speed Corvette race through the desert using the technology of the Lost Legend: TEST TRACK. When the Disney-Pixar film Cars debuted in 2006, Imagineers drew up plans for a mini-Autopia themed to the film to be located in “Car Land,” but that was it. After all, it’s not like you could build an entire land themed to a single intellectual property! … Right? 

After the 2007 announcement of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, Disney made one of their own: as part of an unprecedented, all-at-once, $1.2 billion, foundational reimagining of Disney California Adventure, the park would drop its “MTV attitude” and comic book styling and introduce its own “Living Land” – the Modern Marvel: CARS LAND. Obviously, the brick-for-brick recreation of the desert town of Radiator Springs does everything “Car Land” would’ve… and ironically, it looks a whole lot less cartoonish doing it!

8. Superstar Limo… the E-Ticket?

When the first guests stepped into Disney’s California Adventure, one particular attraction caught their attention… and not in a good way. The Declassified Disaster: Superstar Limo is often recalled as the worst Disney dark ride ever. On board cartoonish limos, guests would descend into a blacklight, comic book world recreating famous Los Angeles neighborhoods populated by caricatured robotic figures of C-List stars of the ‘90s. Superstar Limo was so bad, it closed less than a year after the park’s debut. Think about that: California Adventure was stronger with no dark ride at all than with Superstar Limo. 

Of course, it wasn’t supposed to be that way. As the story goes, the ride began developed as a fast-paced attraction (somewhere between Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride and a Wild Mouse coaster) wherein guests would race through Hollywood streets along banked turns, dodging and weaving through traffic to escape paparazzi. (For Gen Z readers: the early 2000s were a time when tabloids, gossip sites, reality stars, and paparazzi were what pop culture was all about. Hence why California Adventure’s “Hollywood Pictures Backlot” was decked out in modern references, zebra print awnings, and reality TV attitude.)

In 1997 – smack dab in the middle of the park’s development – the internationally beloved Princess Diana of Wales was killed in a car crash in the Pont de l’Alma tunnel outside Paris. At the time, it was believed that the paparazzi’s mad pursuit of the tabloid-exploited Princess had contributed to the accident, and suddenly, Disney’s high-speed race to escape camera flashes didn’t seem so funny anymore. 

Allegedly, Imagineers were sent back to the drawing board, proposing copies of the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror, The Great Movie Ride, or Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster (Starring No Doubt) take up the ride’s real estate, but all were far too expensive for the budget-minded park. Frankly, even if Superstar Limo had been built as described, it probably wouldn’t have survived the park’s 2007 - 2012 five year plan. Today, a ride based on reality television and gossip magazines and escaping the paparazzi wouldn’t feel very relevant. 

9. Star Wars land… with Darth Vader?

After Disney’s $4 billion purchase of Lucasfilm in 2012, there was no question that Disney would make Star Wars a major component of its theme parks… Instead, the questions were how, where, and when? Before there was Batuu, Imagineers had begun development on a very different kind of Star Wars land… As the story goes, both Disneyland and Walt Disney World had plans to transform areas of their parks around the existing STAR TOURS installations into formal Star Wars lands, bringing Luke, Leia, Darth Vader, and Yoda to the parks.

So in Disneyland, Tomorrowland would inevitably be re-wrapped. Allegedly, the “Season of the Force” limited-time promo was a dry run: Space Mountain switched to the projection-filled Hyperspace Mountain; STAR TOURS was upgraded; Innoventions became Star Wars Launch Bay; the 3D theater housed the Star Wars: Path of the Jedi clip show, and the Tomorrowland Terrace restaurant turned into the Galactic Grill. Swap out Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters and place the Millennium Falcon on the old Rocket Jets platform and you’ve got a Star Wars land!

At Walt Disney World, the supposed plan was that the Echo Lake area of Disney’s Hollywood Studios would be redressed as the planet of Tatooine, repurposing STAR TOURS as the planet’s starport and adding a dueling Speeder Bike coaster through the vast Tatooine desert and marketplace. We dug into the “What If” attractions that almost populated this version of Star Wars land (and the cancelled concepts from the final version) in a recent Theme Park Tourist feature.

Rather than lightly wrapping existing areas in Star Wars aesthetic and attractions themed to the original trilogy, Disney and Lucasfilm executives made a bold decision: first, that the property offered Disney’s equivalent to Universal’s Harry Potter – the perfect formula for a truly immersive “Living Land” – and that squandering Star Wars on a redecoration of Tomorrowland would be a major regret. Second, that the future of Star Wars was a richer opportunity than the past. The Batuu we know today is rigidly set in the timeline of Disney’s sequel trilogy, meaning neither Han Solo nor Darth Vader can appear. But it’s interesting to imagine what an immersive land themed to A New Hope could look like… 

Possibilities Abound

It’s often said that “good ideas never die at Walt Disney Imagineering,” and there’s no doubt that some of these “almost-attractions” have been or will be used somewhere, someday. What’s most fascinating about these “unbuilt” versions of the rides we know and love is the reminder that one change – one “yes” instead of a “no” or vice versa – can literally reshape the parks we love. Would a Pirates wax museum still be around? Would a murder mystery Tower of Terror be one of the most beloved attractions on Earth? Would a Star Wars land set in the original trilogy’s timeline be better or worse than the land we know?

If those are the kinds of questions you ask yourself, we’ve got just the place for you: make the jump to our Possibilityland series, filled with full walkthroughs of the “alternate reality” versions of theme parks, lands, and rides. What if the Muppets opened their own production facility at Disney’s Hollywood Studios? What if Fire Mountain rose over Adventureland? What if EPCOT’s Mission: SPACE had used the Soarin’ ride system? Join us in Possibilityland to find out...