Florida’s oldest tourist attraction is about to become its newest. Merlin Entertainment will be building a new Legoland theme park at Cypress Gardens in Winter Haven, FL. Winter Haven is about a 45 minute drive from the Orlando attractions area, assuming light traffic. But that… Read More »Legoland Official, Memo Leaks Out
Merchants and business owners along Highway 192 in Osceola County have finally decided to get their act together. Prior to the latest economic meltdown, I wrote about signs of life in Central Florida’s most neglected tourist region. As you might guess, those improvements have been given back and the trend points even more down hill these days.
However the newly formed 192 Business Alliance has a plan to turn that around. The region will adopt a theme of…
“Orange Central” by painting the curbs or sidewalks orange. The theme would continue with a new public-transportation option consisting of two orange-colored shuttle buses. A new Web site would promote the area, and businesses would support the initiative with things like orange mints in their lobbies.
The 192 Business Alliance, the newly formed nonprofit group that drew up the plan, said something must be done, and quickly, to revive the sagging tourist strip west of Kissimmee. “We could have shuttle service here by spring break,” Brisson said. “We need something easy. We need something fast.”
It’s a good start, perhaps mints in the lobby is all that can be afforded in these times, but there are a few cracks in the plan.
Included in the strategy is a plan to build a sports complex focused on drawing amateur competition to the area. I’m a little skeptical of this idea. Have they not heard of ESPN’s Wide World of Sports? Disney is bound to take the lion share of the amateur sports business. That is ESPN WWOS’ whole focus and they can offer the ESPN brand and Disney magic, something Kissimmee can never match.
Perhaps the 192 Business Alliance is thinking that they would attract sports teams who would travel to central Florida and not compete on Disney property, but still package a vacation with their tournament by offering them a cheaper price for the same quality facilities, just without the ESPN experience. That could work, but I don’t see it as being a big driver, if it was, existing regional amateur sports facilities would be full already. Maybe they have a study that says differently.
Moving in on sports instead of convention business is an interesting angle, however think they need to be more ambitious. The name “Orange Central” is neither catchy, nor descriptive. Nobody is going to say, “let’s go down to Orange Central and see what’s going on.” But they’re on the right track, 192 does need better branding.
Follow me below the jump for a few more suggestions for the 192 Business Alliance and the Osceola County government to get moving on.
Merlin Entertainment Group, a division of Blackstone Group (owner of SeaWorld and co-owner of Universal Orlando), was just uncovered by Screamscape as the purchases of Cypress Gardens. Merlin Entertainment owns the Legoland theme park brand and it has been rumored to be considering the Winter Haven historical park for some time, even before it closed last year.
I really hope that this works out. The park’s location has a lot of problems. But Legoland has made stand alone theme parks work before and Cypress Gardens does have a lot going for it that makes it a good prospect for a Legoland.
Read more about the deal at the Orlando Sentinel and the Motley Fool.
Below the jump I’ve placed a few ideas on what sort of change I think the property needs to work going forward, no matter what is built there.
Read More »Merlin buys Cypress Gardens. Can Legoland be far behind?
Today TouringPlans.com, the fine folks behind the Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World, are launching a preview version of Lines, a mobile website for iPhone users that displays estimates of wait times for every attraction at Walt Disney World, in real time. For the past… Read More »Unofficial Guide launches WDW Wait Times iPhone mobile website
When the Walt Disney Company set out to build a theme park in Hong Kong there were a lot of questions. Would the Chinese take to the American style theme park? Would the Disney characters resonate with a population that had previously had little exposure… Read More »What Can Disney Learn from Hong Kong before building in Shanghai?
This week yet another sexual assault incident at a Water Park, this time Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon, was covered by the local press. It may seem like there have been dozens of reports this year, but it’s really just a handful. That’s not to downplay the… Read More »Travel Safety Issues in Orlando
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… Read More »SeaWorld and Universal Studios to be owned by Same Company?
Someone at Disney has leaked what appears to be very real blueprints laying out all the new ‘attractions’ planned for an expanded Fantasyland at Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom. This plan matches what I’ve heard from other sources. My gut tells me it’s not something… Read More »Magic Kingdom Fantasyland Expansion Plans Leaked