Disney's California Adventure Project Tracker II

[mycroft16]

Originally Posted by bfdf55

Well, if we don't know where it went or why, how do we know that it wasn't just a budget cut?

Because the budgets are approved and signed off on. As far as accounting and the banks are concerned, that money is spent and gone. It is completely given over the the DCA project at this point. WDI can re-purpose budgets and pass money between them, but it is out the door at this point and won't be cut.

Originally Posted by ICe101

I am just saying, lets not get ahead of our selves and wait until things are finished before we truely start criticising the park for there lack of whatever.

Amen to that one!

[k_peek_2000]

Originally Posted by ICe101

Why does everyone in this thread seem to jump to conclusions? No one knows what the final outcome of the Fun Wheel's line will be like, o one knows budget details for the park, and no one is truely obligated to have a complete opinion without hearing the whole story. That is like calling Star Wars a stupid movie cause you didn't like the first scene. I am just saying, lets not get ahead of our selves and wait until things are finished before we truely start criticising the park for there lack of whatever.

I am already underwhelmed by the repainting of the handrail. It still looks like that cheap mesh from IKEA. It doesn't matter what color it is. It is still cheap mesh. Red, Green, Yellow, Blue, Still is cheap mesh from DCA 1.0

However, I think that the reason they are only repainting it, is because they don't want to do anything major that will just eventually be changed. So they are keeping it small for an eventual much larger makeover of the queue. That is me being optimistic.

[Imagineerfan]

Given the fact that in construction painting is generally the last task to be done, I suspect that since they are already paining the railings in the queue, that is pretty much it. If they were going to be doing more extensive construction such as resurfacing the concrete with something else (I wish they would have at least covered it with beadboard and moldings or something) they probably wouldn't be paining the railings already. Unfortunate.

[ICe101]

Originally Posted by k_peek_2000

I am already underwhelmed by the repainting of the handrail. It still looks like that cheap mesh from IKEA. It doesn't matter what color it is. It is still cheap mesh. Red, Green, Yellow, Blue, Still is cheap mesh from DCA 1.0

I don't believe you read my earlier post. You honestly don't know if it will look cheap when the surrounding areas! Its like placing Space Mountain in Fantasyland. Does it make sense, slightly yes, but overall nope. I understand that you think the railings will be cheap no matter what color but we don't know what its surrounding environment will be like and that will definitely affect the way we look at it.

Originally Posted by Imagineerfan

Given the fact that in construction painting is generally the last task to be done, I suspect that since they are already paining the railings in the queue, that is pretty much it. If they were going to be doing more extensive construction such as resurfacing the concrete with something else (I wish they would have at least covered it with beadboard and moldings or something) they probably wouldn't be paining the railings already. Unfortunate.

Nothing was garunteed in that post. Thank you for telling me that because I had never put it like that. But this just needs to be pointed out for everyone else that there is no garuntees! So lets not having rants about how "There isn't gonna be any more detail to the que! Blah...blah...blah". No one knows!

[Uncle Bob]

The reason they are painting the rails now could have nothing to do with what they are going to do to for the rest of the queue and you cannot conclude that they will not be doing anything more elaborate from this. They had to do things in a little different order because of the nature of the project, it is not a new structure and you have to do things in order that work for the particular project.

In order to paint the wheel they needed the scafolding, which is preventing them from doing much to the queue right now. Since they are doing painting right now, it makes more sense to have the painting crew take care of the railings now also so they don't have to come back at a different time. Each time you have a crew leave the site and come back you have to pay mobilization costs that add a lot to the budget. Also painting now could have impacts on overall schedule as well.

We really won't have a good clue as to what if anything is happening around the queue until the scaffolding comes down. It sounds like it's pretty sure the boardwalk is gone, but I'm still hoping we'll at least get a new entry tower of some sort and some type of covering over the mirrors. A roof over the queue would be nice too, but that also seems less likely now.

[RocknGuitar]

^That sounds like a good reason. I am taking an optimistic stance on this, and I am not saying any of this is what I think will happen, but with all the budget movements and last-minute adjustments, this is starting to be DCA 1.0 all over again. Look at concepts for DCA before the budget started being moved around and changed, and look at what we got. I'm really hoping we're not getting a repeat of the past. I have faith in this, but with the budget situations with the Pier, I'm starting to have second thoughts. If this happens with Carsland or the entrance... who knows what will turn out happening...

[ICe101]

Originally Posted by RocknGuitar

^That sounds like a good reason. I am taking an optimistic stance on this, and I am not saying any of this is what I think will happen, but with all the budget movements and last-minute adjustments, this is starting to be DCA 1.0 all over again. Look at concepts for DCA before the budget started being moved around and changed, and look at what we got. I'm really hoping we're not getting a repeat of the past. I have faith in this, but with the budget situations with the Pier, I'm starting to have second thoughts. If this happens with Carsland or the entrance... who knows what will turn out happening...

I don't understand what there is to complain about!? There has been 1 major cut back that we know is for sure; dropping the elaborate queue and walk around pier for Fun Wheel. That is it!? Nothing more is there to judge about. Again, here we go having people form opinions before we even have anything to base it off of!

[bfdf55]

Originally Posted by mycroft16

Because the budgets are approved and signed off on. As far as accounting and the banks are concerned, that money is spent and gone. It is completely given over the the DCA project at this point. WDI can re-purpose budgets and pass money between them, but it is out the door at this point and won't be cut.

When they cut budgets, what budgets are cut? On other projects that had their budgets cut, weren't THEIR budgets approved and signed off? That would be the whole meaning of "budget cut". Budgets are just the amount of money specified for a project, not the actual money in hand. In fact, the money used to pay for the actual production is often not even paid until months after the work has been done (IF the contractor is lucky!).

[RocknGuitar]

^^ Ice: As I said, that is not what I assume is going to happen. I'm simply forming very vague predictions. If the worst does end up happening (No elaborate queue) Then it's a loss, but there is so much more on the way that we can't complain about it, as you just said.

[HMF]

Now is WDI doing the painting or is that still the contractors?

[Uncle Bob]

The difference between this and DCA1.0 is that this is realocation of funds and not a budget cut. On the orginal DCA project they lowered the total budget, more than once I believe. On this project, they still have the same total amount, they have just realocated where that money will be spent. They have tons of ideas and a 1.2 billion dollar budget (actually probably more like 700 million for phase one) so they have to prioritize where to spend the money first.

This is completely normal. How else would you be able to design a massive project like this with an overall budget and be able to meet that budget? If you didn't edit yourself in the way WDI is doing you would exceed the budget for sure. That's the way these things work. For example, if they penciled in 100 million for Mermaid when they were establishing the budget and now they want to spend 110 million, they have to get that 10 million from somewhere. So they decided to cut some minor things in PP to get the money they needed for other projects. It's even possible they're adding cool new things that were never originally planned for. If this was DCA1.0, we would have lost the boardwalk, had the budget of everything else cut by a significant factor and probably lost some minor attractions from CL.

[k_peek_2000]

Originally Posted by ICe101

I don't believe you read my earlier post. You honestly don't know if it will look cheap when the surrounding areas! Its like placing Space Mountain in Fantasyland. Does it make sense, slightly yes, but overall nope. I understand that you think the railings will be cheap no matter what color but we don't know what its surrounding environment will be like and that will definitely affect the way we look at it.

Well it looks cheap right now. I know it looks cheap right now, so I am going to say it looks cheap. Will it look cheap when the whole thing is finished. I don't know. Who knows.

[Uncle Bob]

Originally Posted by HMF

Now is WDI doing the painting or is that still the contractors?

I'm pretty sure it's contractors, but maybe someone else can confirm.

[k_peek_2000]

Originally Posted by Uncle Bob

I'm pretty sure it's contractors, but maybe someone else can confirm.

Contractors

[ICe101]

Originally Posted by k_peek_2000

Well it looks cheap right now. I know it looks cheap right now, so I am going to say it looks cheap. Will it look cheap when the whole thing is finished. I don't know. Who knows.

Toy Story Mania looked cheap when it was just infrastructure. Again, don't judge anything until it is finished.

Originally Posted by Uncle Bob

The difference between this and DCA1.0 is that this is realocation of funds and not a budget cut. On the orginal DCA project they lowered the total budget, more than once I believe. On this project, they still have the same total amount, they have just realocated where that money will be spent. They have tons of ideas and a 1.2 billion dollar budget (actually probably more like 700 million for phase one) so they have to prioritize where to spend the money first.

The original DCA I believe had 3 signifigant budget cuts. If people seem to read the billion post pointing out the exact same key-points as you (epically mycroft) they would understand there are no budget cuts.