If you’re heading out to Disneyland or Walt Disney World this fall, make sure you mosey on down to the Rivers of America and catch “Tiana’s Showboat Jubilee.” Princess Tiana, Prince Naveen, Louis, and the evil Dr. Facilier are all featured with their own songs from the movie and it’s sure to get you excited about seeing The Princess and the Frog in the theaters.

I’ve put together a few clips from the show to give you an idea on what to expect.

The show is currently scheduled to run through January 3rd, 2010 as a tie-in to the movie’s launch on December 11th.

It’s difficult for me to think of a theme park company that goes farther than the Walt Disney Company to accommodate guests with disabilities. That said, there is always room for improvement. Disneyland has now added ‘Audio Description’ to many of its attractions, a service Walt Disney World has been offering for a bit more than a year now.

Disneyland Resort Guests with visual disabilities can now be more fully immersed into Disney attractions and storytelling through a new Audio Description service created by Disney engineers. The service, which launched Nov. 1, is enabled through wireless technology via a handheld device available to Guests visiting the Resort.

“The Disneyland Resort welcomes millions of diverse visitors each year, and we are committed to making the Disney tradition of rich storytelling available to everyone,” said Betty Appleton, who oversees the Resort’s Guests with Disabilities program. “Audio Description supports our longstanding commitment to providing outstanding services to all Guests as it enables our visitors who are blind or have low vision to more fully enjoy our attractions.”

Audio Description provides narrated audio for Guests with visual disabilities by describing visual attraction elements such as actions, settings and scene changes. It works seamlessly with existing show audio, enhancing each attraction with rich detail and immediately involving Guests into the experience. This service is available at nearly 20 attractions at Disneyland and Disney’s California Adventure, including favorites such as Pirates of the Caribbean, It’s Tough to be a Bug and Haunted Mansion.

A Guest experiencing Haunted Mansion would hear the following after boarding a ride vehicle: “Our doom buggy rotates and we face backward. To our left, a knight’s armor guards an endless hallway. On our right, wilted flower arrangements surround a coffin. An eerie light escapes as bony hands push up the lid.”

CastABLE and Diversity Resource Groups

As part of the testing process, Audio Description service was evaluated by members of CastABLE, a Diversity Resource Group (DRG) composed of Resort Cast Members with disabilities.

“Experiencing the Audio Description service almost brought me to tears,” said Brenda Woodrum, a reservation sales agent at the Walt Disney Travel Company in Anaheim and CastABLE member who has been visually impaired since 1996. “For me it was an emotional experience, especially when I got onto Pirates of the Caribbean. It brought back memories of all the rich detail that I could see when I was younger. There was so much magic that I was missing, but this new technology it brings it all to you.”

As part of its ongoing commitment to fostering an inclusive work environment, the Disneyland Resort supports six DRGs, which have combined memberships of approximately 1,500 Cast Members. The DRGs exist to make Cast feel welcomed, appreciated and valued while providing enrichment, awareness and education. DRGs also serve as thought partners, providing valuable feedback and insight to business leaders on products and services currently in development.

Services For Guests with Hearing Disabilities

Audio Description joins two existing services available on Disney’s Handheld Device, a palm-sized wireless device originally developed in 2002 by Disney engineers. In addition to Audio Description, the device offers services to Guests with hearing disabilities, including Assistive Listening, which was added in August and provides amplified audio at several attractions, and Handheld Captioning, which displays text in specific attractions and areas.

Disney’s Handheld Device is available at no cost for daily Guest use by visiting Guest Relations at Disneyland or Disney’s California Adventure on a first-come, first-served basis. A fully refundable deposit is required.

Available Attractions

The following attractions offer Audio Description: Enchanted Tiki Room, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, Alice in Wonderland, ‘it’s a small world’, Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, Peter Pan’s Flight, Pinocchio’s Daring Journey, Snow White’s Scary Adventures, Storybook Land Canal Boats, Disneyland Railroad, Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage, Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters, “Honey, I Shrunk the Audience”, It’s Tough to be a Bug!, Turtle Talk with Crush, Monsters, Inc. Mike & Sulley to the Rescue! and Muppet*Vision 3D.

Sure, the Food & Wine festival isn’t even over yet, but with winter setting in around the country you may want to dream a little about spring on those cold nights. This year spring starts the earliest ever at EPCOT with a March 3rd launch of the The 17th annual Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival.

The event will continue for 75 days through May 16, 2010, and bring bold strokes of seasonal color and brand-new topiary whimsy. Donald Duck and his topiary pals will set up camp in full floral color to celebrate the Great Outdoors at the Epcot front entrance. The elaborate topiary with a North American theme, live waterfall and pond features Goofy in a fly-fishing misadventure, Daisy Duck roasting marshmallows over a campfire and Pluto in his “pup tent.” It will be a a must-stop photo op for guests as soon as they pass through the park turnstiles.

“The advantage of starting earlier is that we’ll be able to feature more brilliant color than ever, with richly hued petunias, violas, snapdragons and other hardy flowers,” says festival horticulture manager Eric Darden. “By starting earlier and going through mid-May, it allows more guests than ever to experience the festival and to plan ahead for their spring and summer gardening.”

Follow below the jump to find out what will be new this year as well as other highlights:

[Read more →]

Have a couple big posts I’m working on for later, so here’s another roundup of Disney news for today.

• The 180 day window for Dining reservations at Walt Disney World returns today. That means there are 80 free days of reservations to fill. Might be a good time to book that restaurant you’ve always wanted to try.
• Those last two years of playing at EPCOT must have really affected Los Lobos. Well, that and their SoCal roots. They’ve now come out with a Disney themed CD. Listen to a sample at The Oregonian.
• It’s not so easy to bring an Animated Feature to the stage on Broadway. Disney has had its failures (Tarzan and Little Mermaid), and now Dreamworks joins them as Shrek will be closing soon.
• Intellectual property Law students at the College of William and Mary examine Disney’s treatment of copyright when it comes to the Pirates of the Caribbean’s next movie.

Disney has provided a cute little video of Mickey and Goofy helping to refill the California Adventure Lagoon:

While we all wait for official news of Blackstone’s purchase of Busch Entertainment’s parks, including Sea World and Busch Gardens, here’s a fascinating bit of insight into how big theme parks do their ticketing from someone who has helped Disney manage its strategy.

If an attraction has not placed a significant focus on the internet ticketing revolution, they will soon find themselves way behind their competition. Online, print-at-home ticketing is far more strategic than just an added guest convenience and a means of speeding up the front gate lines. Getting guests into the park more quickly means they can squeeze in an extra ride or maybe have time for another soda purchase. Research clearly shows the more attractions a guest experiences in a day, the higher they score their value for the money and the higher they rate their intent to recommend the park to friends.

When they buy print-at-home admission and parking online, it goes on a credit card. With those expenses behind them, it leaves more cash in their pocket for the day of spending in the park. At accesso, we have clients approaching 50% of their tickets being sold online. In just a few years, ticket booths will no longer be the first thing you see when arriving at an attraction. Nearly all guests will show up with tickets in hand and head straight to the park entrance.

More of this interview with Steven Brown over at Blooloop.

I really hoped that Cypress Gardens could make it. But even in the best economic climate it wouldn’t have been easy. So it was not a shock to learn today that the historic attraction has closed its doors. After a turbulent last few years, Cypress Gardens, which this year re-opened without the amusement rides, and its Splash Island water park are now possibly closed for good.

When Cypress Gardens evolved into a world renown tourist destination back in the 30s and 40s, the world was a different place. The star power of Esther Williams waned long ago and water skiing shows no longer pull in the crowds. The public is no longer so easily satisfied.

“The world is not the same today as it was 30 or 40 years ago,” Dantzler said. “Coming up with a model that works in today’s marketplace is a challenge.”

I actually think Cypress Gardens had a model that would work. But when Hurricane insurance didn’t pay out and the economy started to slow, it was just too difficult to keep the property afloat. They might have been able to overcome one of those, but both was too much.

Had central Florida taken another turn, perhaps with a successful Hollywood East industry, or with Lakeland or Winter Haven attracting a corporate world headquarters or two, Cypress Gardens could have used those as a platform to success. But those are what ifs and could’ve beens.

Those who track the Amusement Park Industry know Cypress Gardens is not alone in its troubles. Many regional parks are closed or having difficulty operating. Will they come back when the economy comes back? Those in the theme park industry remain hopeful that there will always be a demand for families to head out together for some quality time together at the park. How about you?

Reports are growing that The Blackstone Group has put the final touches on its acquisition of Busch Entertainment Company (BEC), the division of AB-Bev that owns SeaWorld and Busch Gardens theme parks. The Blackstone Group already owns about half of the Universal Orlando resort and theme parks. And the joining of the two would create a destination that could compete much stronger against their chief competition for tourist dollars in Central Florida – Walt Disney World.

Of course, not all BEC properties are in Orlando where easy synergy can be found. Plus The Blackstone Group owns parts of Six Flags, Legoland, and Madame Tussauds. Which makes some some interesting tie-in possibilities to central Florida. Remember that Legoland rumor that went around last year? And wouldn’t a Madame Tussauds fit in wonderfully at Citywalk?

The complete list of BEC properties is:

Busch Gardens Tampa Bay (Tampa, Florida)
Busch Gardens Williamsburg (Williamsburg, Virginia)
SeaWorld Orlando (Orlando, Florida)
SeaWorld San Antonio (San Antonio, Texas)
SeaWorld San Diego (San Diego, California)
Discovery Cove (Orlando, Florida)
Aquatica (Orlando, Florida)
Adventure Island (Tampa, Florida)
Water Country USA (Williamsburg, Virginia)
Sesame Place (Langhorne, Pennsylvania)

And there is a project in Dubai to build three more parks, but it is currently on hold due to the economic crisis.

In California Legoland and SeaWorld can now work closer together to attract visitors and save on supply orders and management costs. That seems like a potential plus too.

Apparently high ranking officials from Blackstone have been seen walking around SeaWorld and rumors really started flying after word went out earlier to BEC employees to expect an announcement later today. I certainly wish my friends at Seaworld and Busch Gardens well and hope that everyone lands on their feet.

So with Harry Potter, Shamu, and Shrek all soon to share one corporate master, what do you see happening first?

So totally unrelated to the previous post we hear that Walt Disney World is restructuring their Transportation management. This actually harkens back to the corporate restructuring Disney implemented early in the year, the one that resulted in all the management layoffs. Since then, Disney has been shuffling their executives as part of a cost saving exercise. Whether it’s a good time to do that to the Transportation Department given the year’s events, remains to be seen.

When Kevin Lansberry was appointed vice president of Disney’s Animal Kingdom it was also noted with some confusion among fans that he was also put in charge of the WDW resort’s transportation. Seemed like a fairly odd pairing for someone whose previous job was executive over Disney’s shopping and entertainment district. Now Kevin can concentrate on giving DAK the attention it deserves.

Disney announced they have appointed Jim Vendur, who had been in charge of transportation maintenance, to oversee both operations and maintenance of WDW’s whole transportation system. Said system includes the monorail, ferryboats, and about 300 buses. Disney will also add more supervision of the Transportation fleets, but that position remains to be filled.

More at The Orlando Sentinel.