While visiting Magic Kingdom recently, we tried to get a sneak peek at the work taking place in the former Rivers of America basin for a new Cars-themed area called Piston Peak National Park. We rode Tiana’s Bayou Adventure for an elevated view of the work, and then got a sneak peek showing how much the project has expanded. Here’s a look around!
First Look at Piston Peak National Park Stream Replacing Rivers of America
To set the scene, here’s a look at two brown structures that we believe are for two attractions coming to Piston Peak National Park. It’s worth noting here that the structures are likely representative of what the buildings will look like (under the rockwork that will hide them), but not exact measurements. There is wiggle room allowed within the permit, and there is likely some amount of error on my part when creating the overlay. The point of the overlay was to give us a good idea of what to expect.
The next thing I want to draw your attention to is the Piston Peak National Park “fun map” seen below. In the fun map, we can see a water feature starting up near Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and wrapping along the southern border of the land. This water feature appears to run alongside the existing Frontierland boardwalk.
One final piece of background info that we need to take a look at is an aerial photo from Bioreconstruct. In the aerial photo below, we can see the start of what we believe is the stream that will replace the Rivers of America. This photo was taken back in mid-January, and it showed the early work of creating the wooden outline for concrete pours. As we’ll soon see, the area shown below is the northwest side of the stream, with an updated look at the current work that takes the concrete forms along the Frontierland boardwalk on the south side of the construction site.
We’ll start from two vantage points on Tiana’s Bayou Adventure. The first is just past the outdoor garden, before you drop into the interior portion of the ride. From here, we have a nice elevated view of the “back” of Piston Peak National Park, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, and toward Villains Land. For this article, we’re actually more concerned with construction taking place in the “front” of Piston Peak National Park, but more on that in a bit.
The photos below show the Tiana-level view of the area of work captured by Bioreconstruct from some 3,200 feet above Magic Kingdom, a few weeks ago. Here, we can see that rebar has been added to the bed of the concrete forms.
Our next vantage point is from the main drop on Tiana’s Bayou Adventure. This required a quick burst of photos before tucking the camera away so it didn’t get soaked. This will actually become quite the popular vantage point for guests looking to track the construction over the coming months. As you can see from the photos below, we have a wonderful view down the length of the boardwalk, and we can just see some concrete forms and rebar over one of the construction walls.
We’ll get a better look in a minute, but to me, this signals that the concrete forms that we saw a minute ago actually snake along the border with Frontierland, creating the bed of the upcoming Piston Peak National Park water feature (stream).
Our final vantage point comes from the guest walkway near the finale drop on Tiana’s Bayou Adventure. We can just see over the construction wall, and our suspicions are confirmed. To me, this looks like the snaking stream that will run from Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (to the northwest), down along the existing Frontierland boardwalk (to the south), and along toward the Riverboat Landing building (to the east).
One of the things that makes me think that this is the snaking stream and not the attraction show building is the fact that this is being built well below the intended final grade for Piston Peak National Park. Well, that, and the fact that it is far too skinny to be an attraction foundation. Its very close proximity to the existing boardwalk (to the right) would also suggest that this is the start of the bed for the stream that will replace the Rivers of America.
For everything we know about the Cars-themed expansion to Magic Kingdom’s Frontierland, check out our dedicated project page below!
As always, keep checking back with us here at BlogMickey.com as we continue to bring you the latest news, photos, and info from around the Disney Parks!
Walt built Disneyland in a year and this will take 3to 5 years to complete
You nailed it!!!!!