WB Kids refresh ideas

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Continuing conversation from this reply i've put down my current thoughts on a WB Kids refresh.

 

What WB Kids needs is to be gutted and refreshed. 

• My ideal first plan would reclaim the other half of the old LTRR soundstage from maintenance - maintenance might need to relocate entirely if they've outgrown their own space. Put in a new kids area into the soundstage building with multiple attractions similar to Mermaid lagoon at disneysea, or USJ's Sesame Street Fun World. It doesn't need to be immersive, just an indoor area out of the sun with some rides and activities for the little kids to blow off some energy. The reason this is the first plan is it provides the opportunity to refresh the rest of the land without dropping the kids offering in the park. Once this is open, move to refreshing the rest of the land:
• Remove speedy taxis. It serves no purpose with the introduction of JDS
• Find a new home for the parents room that doesn't occupy prime attraction space and demolish Taz' Rest Stop along with the original Marvin facade to make space for new attractions. You could potentially provide parent's room facilities as part of the new indoor stage space if you planned for it.
• Consider the longevity of both Sam Train and Tweety Cages and perhaps remove them in place of new attractions
• If this whole corner of the kids area can be cleared, then also consider (controversial I know) removing the giant tree. It's a gorgeous old tree and it's been there for a long time, but it occupies prime park real estate and is a major blocker to expansion
• If the tree comes out, tweety, sam train, taz and the old marvin area are removed, you're left with a huge plot of land you can close all at once, which allows greenfield planning for a new install, with the added benefit you can actually run power to the character stage and bury the cables rather than flying them through the trees suspended on wooden poles.
• Update JDS to bring it current to today's park lineup (remove arkham, add WOZ, for example - and does it have DCR?)
• Turn the JDS arcade (is that still there with the new kids arcade?) into a JDS themed gift shop to bring more opportunity for merchandising into the land instead of the laneway entrance most people walk straight past.
• Reopen the restaurant with a new offering and re-establish a covered (umbrellas) seating area for parents to chill while the kids run their energy out.

 

Probably a bit much especially for BGH's current attitude toward the park, but that's what i'd love to see. WB Kids currently offers a disjointed experience. There are 'rides for babies' plus road runner. So the slightly older kids that have outgrown the 'baby rides' but haven't graduated to hypercoasters don't have a lot of middle ground, so there's an opportunity with this level of expansion to provide some 'middle of the road' attractions - a lot like what Sea World offers in their nickelodeon area.

[Ash]

Mermaid Lagoon idea is awesome such an immersive experience for the kids to enjoy, I think all points mentioned are very valid 

[LoZza]

Could try contract the same people that did Bluey's World a little while back 🤔

[Levithian]

The reality is it would likely be an open a Zamperla, Preston and Barbieri or possibly Fabbri catalogue and pick 3 or 4 replacements kind of deal. 

Edited Thursday at 03:57 AM by Levithian

[Noll_57]

7 hours ago, LoZza said:

Could try contract the same people that did Bluey's World a little while back 🤔

You mean Pico Play? 

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

17 hours ago, Levithian said:

The reality is it would likely be an open a Zamperla, Preston and Barbieri or possibly Fabbri catalogue and pick 3 or 4 replacements kind of deal. 

Honestly for a children's area, there's nothing wrong with that, as long as there is some thought put into the models and how they would be themed. There's a real opportunity to spruce up WB Kids. The land itself has remained virtually untouched for around 20 years. Sure Marvin got plonked on an old seating area, and JDS rejigged the traffic a little from how it was with LTRR, but overall the bones of the land haven't been messed with in a long time - in that time Sea World has been through at least two generations of their kids land, and Dreamworld has been through FOUR.

[themagician]

35 minutes ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:

in that time Sea World has been through at least two generations of their kids land

Cartoon Network Cartoon Beach, Sesame Street Beach, Beach Break Bay and now Nickelodeon Land. It’s crazy it’s gone through that many in the same time that Kids WB has existed and hasn’t really changed. They did add the carousel and pounce n bounce (which didn’t last long).

But I 100% agree that this land needs some love. The lineup of attraction isn’t bad (a part from having double driving attractions), but the whole area just feels tired and could certainly benefit from a full refurb and addition of new rides.

Just take a look at Warner Bros. World in Abu Dhabi and their Cartoon Junction land. You could certainly take inspiration from this and transform the entire show building to be to this level. Also look at their ride lineup and the way they are themed for inspiration.

https://www.wbworldabudhabi.com/en/explore-the-lands/cartoon-junction

[LoZza]

Never really been a fan of that driving school, they should at least rebrand it to something Looney Tunes related

[Baconjack]

The problem with wb kids as others have pointed out is that 1) the land as a whole has barely been touched up in 25 years and 2) apart from road runner there’s not much to do for guests who find the kiddie rides boring and the likes of superman and rivals too scary

1. Remove the taxis and JDS

2. Move the maintenance area on the other half of the JDS building to another facility within the park (or build a new shed like at sea world) to free up space for a JDS replacement

3. Replace JDS with a family dark ride. Make it like a looney tunes take on the great movie ride. 

4. Re evaluate all the existing rides except Marvin the Martian and road runner, remove the ones at the end of their service lives and replace with similar models.

5. Install a nebulaz as an extra ride to occupy the middle ground between the kiddy rides and everything else. Provides good kinetics at every park that has one.

6. Repaint and touch up all existing buildings, signage, and fixtures. 

This way you have 3 rides in the land that both kids and parents can enjoy as opposed to just one, with all 3 having a low height requirement. This should be the bare minimum because some families aren’t going to go to Oz or west or scooby. People with young kids spend a lot of time in that land on its own. 

Edited yesterday at 02:38 AM by Baconjack

[franky]

1 hour ago, Baconjack said:

apart from road runner there’s not much to do for guests who find the kiddie rides boring and the likes of superman and rivals too scary

This is the 2nd similar comment regarding the gap in coverage - isn't this the premise of what WoO was meant to fill?

[wikiverse]

1 hour ago, franky said:

This is the 2nd similar comment regarding the gap in coverage - isn't this the premise of what WoO was meant to fill?

If WoO had more than just rollercoasters, then yes.  Kids that age need to fill a whole day too.  Right now, their options are all coasters (including Scooby) and maybe WWF if it's operating.

Rides with small footprints like a Nebluaz, Condor, or ABC Interactive tower, would all have been solid additions to WoO and could easily have been themed to suit.  It will be hard to add them later because so much space is wasted on the emerald city queue lines.

[Levithian]

Absolute ridiculous to remove JDS. People who even contemplate this demonstrate they have no kids between 3 and about 8, or have paid zero attention to how busy this is during the holiday season. 

The reason for having JDS and speedy taxis was because speedy taxis never used to have a minimum height restriction. If your kid could co-ordinate feet standing on a button and being able to turn a steering wheel, they could go on the attraction. 

If they had real money to spend, you really need to shut the area for maybe 18 months and give serious consideration for enclosing the whole area. Either, actually indoors or another canopy setup in similar guise to main street. In a country with some of the harshest sun/uv on the planet, the place is a concrete canyon. 

Edited 6 minutes ago by Levithian