New permit suggests major expansion at Disney's Animal Kingdom is a go

Mar 18, 2024 in "Disney's Animal Kingdom"

Gallery / 6 Photos
Tropical Americas Encanto land concept art at Disney's Animal Kingdom

Posted: Monday March 18, 2024 6:15pm ET by WDWMAGIC Staff

A new permit filed by Walt Disney Imagineering suggests that the previously announced "Blue Sky" Indiana Jones and Encanto expansion project at Disney's Animal Kingdom is now green-lit and ready to begin.

Disney's Animal Kingdom WDI Trailer Compound Permit

The permit outlines plans to install a Walt Disney Imagineering project trailer compound behind Kali River Rapids and a parking lot for more than 300 vehicles. The area has a backstage roadway and walkway leading to DinoLand U.S.A. These types of facilities are common for large construction projects that we have seen in the past, including the Fantasyland redevelopment at Magic Kingdom and Pandora at Disney's Animal Kingdom.

Disney's Animal Kingdom WDI Trailer Compound Permit

While the permit does not detail any specifics on what project the trailers are for, this is likely the first stage of beginning the previously announced "Blue Sky" Indiana Jones and Encanto redevelopment of DinoLand U.S.A.

Disney has two big dates in the coming months that could be used to announce the Animal Kingdom expansion: the Annual Shareholders meeting on April 3 and the 2024 D23 Fan Event in August.

Disney announced in September 2023 that new experiences inspired by "Encanto" – the Academy Award winning Walt Disney Animation Studios film – and the fan-favorite adventurer Indiana Jones were being considered for the reimagined DinoLand U.S.A. at Disney's Animal Kingdom.

New experiences inspired by “Encanto” and the fan-favorite adventurer Indiana Jones are being considered for the reimagined land at Disney’s Animal Kingdom

The new land themed to the tropical Americas would replace the entire Dino-Land U.S.A. area, with Indiana Jones replacing the existing Dinosaur ride, and Encanto replacing Dino-Rama.

Dinosaur is replaced in this concept art with Indiana Jones

Dino-Rama is replaced with Encanto

Imagineering Boss Bruce Vaughn said, "Imagine a land filled with authentic experiences from this part of the world. With all of the placemaking and storytelling you'd expect. Look, it's a beautiful region to explore and has been the inspiration for so many magical stories over the years. We're looking forward to bringing all of that to life"

Tropical Americas Encanto land concept art at Disney's Animal Kingdom

Vaughn contninued, "Imagineering has been talking about stories from this part of the world; Encanto with Indiana Jones just rose to the top. They give us so much to play with. We have a long way to go now and a lot more to discover. But our team here in Florida is all over it."

In addition to Encanto and Indiana Jones, Disney has also previously confirmed that a new show based on "Zootopia" is being created for the Tree of Life theater at Disney's Animal Kingdom.

Zootopia show concept art

The current concept for the new "Zootopia" experience has guests visiting the different biomes you only glimpse in the film, traveling with Judy Hopps, Nick Wilde, and other characters.

Disney says that Imagineers are currently finalizing the concept, and more details will be coming in the future.

The new show will replace "It's Tough to Be a Bug," although no closures dates have yet been announced.

'It's Tough to be a Bug' theater

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JD801 day ago

That carousel is going to look gorgeous at night (assuming the park is open past sunset).

James Alucobond1 day ago

They removed it a while ago when they released the new wave of art. The outlining bushes remaining in the art are fun to take note of, though. https://www.wdwmagic.com/attractions/animal-kingdom/gallery/11aug2024-tropical-americas-pueblo-esperanza-concept-art.htm#&gid=1&pid=1

Gremlin Gus1 day ago

They removed it when they showed off the concept art at last year's D23, and funnily enough, you can kind of see where the river used to be with the plants around the river still there in the concept art. Kind of sucks that they removed as it does look cool, but eh, I can live without it.

Timothy_Q1 day ago

Worth pointing out they removed the pink river in front of Casita in the concept art

EagleScout6101 day ago

https://mickeyblog.com/2025/03/28/photos-new-tropical-americas-signage-makes-its-way-to-disneys-animal-kingdom/

Disney Analyst2 days ago

I was mostly curious if anyone knows whether it's the ride system, or other errors causing downtime (i.e. peoples items falling onto track, etc.). We may have had times where we had lightning lanes switched to Multiple Experience passes due to downtime, but I honestly didn't keep track well enough to remember which ride gave us that pass, how long it was down, etc. All I know is ride downtime never impacted us in any real way. Apart from Rise going down a lot our first day.

Timothy_Q2 days ago

Also retheming Dinosaur to Indy doesn't mean the ride will suddenly get the same downtime DL Indy usually has There's no correlation between the 2 things

UNCgolf2 days ago

They may update some of the computer systems/controls, but they aren't going to replace the ride system with something else.

MisterPenguin2 days ago

The vehicles are on a track. They'll build the new 'story' around where those tracks go. They won't change the current placement of the tracks. The movement of the vehicles then get programmed as to stop and go and sideways spine breakers.

rle4lunch2 days ago

You got very lucky with your visit. When we were living in San Diego, we'd visit every few months and the ride is regularly down at least once daily (for hours at a time). I'd say in the last 10 years of riding it, we've had it break while riding at least 3 times and were given complementary fast passes for a different ride at least 10 times for it.

Disney Analyst2 days ago

How much of the downtime at Disneyland is due to the ride system, and not other circumstances? I can say on our trip last year, we never had an issue riding Indy.

Giss Neric2 days ago

I would expect they would at least upgrade the ride system knowing how much downtime the Indy ride at Disneyland has on a regular basis. Indy for sure will have more complex show scenes than Dinosaur.