kadaten said:
I'm very new to all this, but I asked when the next one was coming when I took a tour 2 weeks ago, and the guide said they were hearing the next one was about 1.5-2 years away, if sales continued at the current pace. No idea how much credence to give that....just what I heard.
A lot depends on the sales status of SSR, which is a complete unknown. But I doubt they could have a new resort open in that short of time. SSR was announced in January '02...leveraged a lot of infrastructure from the old Disney Institute...and didn't open to guests until May '04. That's well over 2 years development time, and less than 50 rooms were open on Day One.
That said, I really don't have any idea when they will choose to ANNOUNCE a new resort. They certainly could sell two properties at once. But from the time of the announcement, it looks like it will be 2 - 2.5 years before that resort would begin to accept guests.
In the end, we'll all be waiting on that magical announcement before we can really start counting the days.
Regarding others' questions on Eagle Pines, it was more than just a concept that never got off the ground. The resort commonly known as Eagle Pines, which was never given a formal name, was actually
announced in September 2001. Ground clearing work began on the site near the EP golf course (thus the name), and it was to have been DVC's 7th resort instead of SSR.
You can read the original press release here:
http://www.wdwmagic.com/dvceaglepines.htm
Of course, the timing left something to be desired due to the 9/11 attacks and their impact on the entire tourism industry.
The sequence of events went something like this:
- Disney has both SSR and EP in the pipeline. Commits to EP.
- In the weeks following 9/11, Disney begins to assess the full impact of the attacks and looks for ways to cut costs.
- A decision is made to close the Disney Institute sooner rather than later to reduce costs.
- EP is halted. SSR gets the greenlight.
Basically SSR became a solution to two problems: 1) It gave them an excuse to close the DI immediately, and 2) it gave them a DVC property that could be developed moderately faster than EP due to some buildings being reused, utilities, roads, etc.
Some think EP could still be the 8th DVC resort. The property is still undeveloped. The plans have been drawn up. But, if they decide to go another direction, I suspect the EP development expenses won't exactly be the largest write-off Disney has ever taken.
