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The magic city

Image: Disney

For all intents and purposes, a Disney theme park is a functioning city. Yes, that’s especially true in Orlando, Florida, where the company has its own governmental powers, but that’s not what I mean here. Every Disney gate requires the same human needs mentioned above: power, sanitation, clean water, roads, and foods. In designing the utilidors, Disney execs invented a masterful solution to handle all of these needs out of the sight of guests.

The beauty of the utilidors is what they’re capable of doing. Within the confines of these drab walls, Disney runs their town. The pipes that handle the flow of water throughout the park are a constant sight in the utilidors. They’re also some of the largest pipes you’ll ever see.

Roughly 55,000 theme park tourists visit Magic Kingdom on the average day. The average American city includes about 20,000 residents. In building the park, WDI had to add infrastructure capable of supporting almost three times as many people. Also keep in mind that’s just average. Maximum capacity is (technically) 100,000. The utilidors are where the pipes run that support a city of up to 100,000 residents. Their gigantic size is a necessity.

Similarly, Disney has to power the entirety of park operations each day. The body of that was historically handled at least somewhat through the connecting tunnels of the utilidors. Today, Disney is gradually moving toward solar power and other renewable energy sources, but the cables, circuits, and wires still exist.

Image: Disney

Finally, they have to populate their storage space with all the supplies needed for daily operation. That’s all the foods that Disney chefs will serve. Almost all of them are delivered via truck to utilidors locations. Some of the meals you eat, especially the packaged ones, are cooked in the utilidor areas. Almost everything you enjoy at the park was housed in the utilidors at some point.

This brings us to a sad reality about the construction of Walt Disney World. The early blueprints for the resort area called for utilidors at every gate. Park planners loved this tidy concept of governance so much that they intended to adopt it everywhere. Alas, the financing of new gates is a recurring nightmare for Disney employees. They always wind up cutting corners when construction begins. In the case of utilidors, they never materialized at Animal Kingdom or Disney's Hollywood Studios. Their deployment at the former site would have been particularly interesting given the animals stomping around above the substructures.

Alas, the only two other places at Walt Disney World that wound up with any sort of utilidors are Epcot and what’s now Disney Springs. For similar reasons, the utilidors at Magic Kingdom didn’t expand in tandem with the park. Blind spots now exist, particularly in the New Fantasyland portion of the park that Disney updated in 2012.

Taken for granted

What happens behind those secretive doors at Magic Kingdom today? Only cast members know for sure since they’re the ones with authorization to look behind the curtain. They’d be quick to acknowledge that it’s not a big deal to them. The utilidors regions of the park are somewhat similar to unfinished basements in that the overall aesthetic is bare-bones. Walls need painting, gigantic pipes run everywhere, and the mood is decidedly less Disney than the floor above.

The explanations for this are ones of practicality. Disney spends its financial resources on the places that guests can see. They presume that the cast members can deal with a Spartan existence in their underground offices. It’s not the place where the magic happens.

Instead, the utilidors are where the sausage is made. Before you get too upset that Disney employees take the utilidors for granted, take a moment to think about your office or school. How exciting are the decorations there? The cast members-only areas of Magic Kingdom are basically the cubicles of Walt Disney World. If the company opened up these sections to regular guests, nobody would go since they’re so decidedly un-Disney. And boring.

 
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