Updated July 14, 8PM Central
This again? Yes. This. Again. The Disneyland (California) reopening has been delayed indefinitely, so we’re back to discuss a question on a lot of people’s minds—When Will Disneyland Reopen? The Disneyland parks closed on March 14, and while every other Disney resort is either reopened or scheduled to reopen, we’re still waiting on Disneyland.
Related Posts
If you’re looking for information on Walt Disney World, check out our Walt Disney World Reopening Masterpost. We also have weekly updates about all the Disney reopenings—the latest is the July 14 reopening update. Finally, this post existed in a previous version that’s now been archived here.
Disclaimers and Our Biases
When it comes to these posts, it never hurts to remind you we aren’t epidemiologists. We aren’t policy makers or advocates in California or Florida. We’re just Disney parks fans who have spent the better part of the last few years reporting on the happenings at the parks.
And, for that matter, this isn’t the most important question in the world right now. But theme parks never are the most important question in the world, and we cover them anyways because they matter to lots of people, or they at least provide an escape for people.
When this issue was “hot” in April, a few people reached out expressing that we must really want the parks to reopen because we’re seeing less web traffic and ad revenue while they’re closed. While that’s partly true (we’re making about 15% of what we were pre-pandemic), our overall feelings are more complicated.
Even setting aside very real human concerns we have for guests, Cast Members, and the people of California, we’ll only see web traffic and ad revenue rebound when the parks can reopen safely and with consumer confidence. A reopening that gets derailed because of actual or perceived safety concerns benefits no one.
To that end, we’re mostly neutral on these issues. People who are in the states, on the ground—like public officials, health experts, customers, and Cast Member unions—are much more informed and important voices as to whether the parks should reopen.
As for us, you’ll ultimately see when we decide it’s safe enough for us to personally visit. Safety and risk are, to a large degree, personal matters. We’ll consider both the risk of us contracting and us unknowingly transmitting the virus when considering whether to go, and we’ll make a decision from there.
The Latest from Official Sources
Disney last updated its plans on June 24, when it announced the parks and hotels would remain closed indefinitely.
Disneyland is only taking reservations beginning August 1. As we repeatedly wrote the past few months, this date means very little. They very well could open the parks before any reservation date, and they can cancel reservations if they get to August 1 and aren’t ready to open.
Tracking the position of the California government has gotten complicated. For starters, the official response website—last updated June 28—says they’re in Stage 2. But most counties, including Disneyland’s Orange County, were already allowed to move onto Stage 3.
Stage 3 is the stage in which theme parks would first be able to open. But the state still wishes to develop guidelines for theme parks to reopen, and it was delays in issuing these that Disney claims are the reason Disneyland cannot yet reopen.
Things took a step sideways on July 1 when the Governor announced new restrictions on indoor operations in many counties, including Orange County. Since “Family Entertainment Centers” and “Restaurants” cannot operate indoor dining, it’s hard to see how the Disneyland parks, which have lots of indoor ride and queue buildings, could reopen as long as that order applies.
I’ve seen it said this order will be in force for at least three weeks. That seems reasonable, but I haven’t found official confirmation of it. If that’s the case, it would seem to prohibit the parks from reopening before July 22, absent special permission from the Governor.
How Long Have The Disney Parks Been Closed?
Shanghai Disneyland Closed January 25, Reopened May 11, (107 Day Closure)
Hong Kong Disneyland Closed January 26, Reopened June 18, (144 Day Closure)
Tokyo Disney Resort Closed February 29, Reopened July 01, (123 Day Closure)
Disneyland Paris Closed March 14, Reopening Scheduled July 15, (123 Day Closure)
Disneyland Closed March 14, No Reopening Date Set
Disney World Closed March 16, Reopening Scheduled July 11, (117 Day Closure)
Separate timeframes may apply for resort hotels and Downtown Disney. Downtown Disney is currently scheduled to reopen July 9.
In this post, we’re most focused on the heart of the operations—the parks. For more light hearted reading, check out our ranking of all the worldwide Disney parks.
When Is Disneyland Scheduled To Reopen?
As of this update, no reopening date has been set for the reopening of the Disneyland parks. Downtown Disney reopened July 9.
Previously, the Disneyland parks were set to reopen July 17. This date faced resistance from Cast Member unions, who didn’t feel assured of the safety of reopening at that date.
On June 24, Disney tweeted that the reopening of the parks would be delayed. Ostensibly, this was because California was not expected to release guidelines for theme parks reopening until July 4. Realistically, it was probably due to ongoing uncertainty in union negotiations and growing unease about virus trends in California.
When Do You Think Disneyland Will Reopen?
An earlier version of this post pointed to August 1 or September 1 as likely dates for Disneyland and Walt Disney World reopening, while noting there were lots of reasons the might not reopen at the same time.
Subsequently, Walt Disney World parks reopened on July 11. Disneyland parks were scheduled to reopen July 17, but those plans have been scrapped.
I’d look at the California situation from three lenses—Disney, the Governor, and Cast Member Unions. You’ll need all three of these groups to agree before anything moves forward.
The unions and the California Governor are wholly unpredictable at this time. As we noted above, a mix of union issues and governmental issues caused the July 17 date to be scrapped.
Once the July 17 date was scrapped, some union issues were resolved. That doesn’t imply, though, that the unions would be okay with a July 17 reopening.
Unions are likely to push back against Disney’s plans whenever they’re announced. This is simply because the announcement is likely to be forward looking and based on where Disney and California think cases are heading. The union would likely advise caution and hope cases get to safe levels by the time of the reopening.
As for the Governor, nothing indicates he was ever opposed to Disney’s original plan when they set it out. Things changed quickly, and he praised Disney’s decision to postpone the reopening, but it’s unlikely Disney would have announced a reopening date without believing the Governor would approve it. Recall that Disney Chairman Bob Iger sits on the state’s reopening task force.
So, the best place to look for guidance at the moment is Disney itself. Throughout this process, Disney has given almost no hints about when they’d reopen. We can’t track any breadcrumbs, since there are none…but we can take a closer look at their original announcement that Disneyland parks would reopen July 17.
There are two ways to think about Disney’s position. The first is that July 17 was a “false start.” That is, Disney felt pressure from a few corners and acted impulsively. If that’s the case, we’re back where we were in May, with no insight from Disney itself.
Alternatively, we can assume July 17 was a well-reasoned choice based on the information Disney had at the time. We’ll use the IHME model to see when we might get back to where Disney thought we were the first time around.
(Again, we’re not epidemiologists, so this is really the most naive sort of analysis we can do here. Also, I have to note here I’m not really comfortable talking about deaths or infected people as a metric for predicting a theme park reopening. I’m not so callous as to see those figures primarily as a metric for that purpose.)
Disney announced the July 17 reopening on June 10—37 days ahead of time.. If you look at the model, you see the assumption at the time was likely that cases were continuing a downward trend, when in fact they had started turning upward.
California now has a second hump to clear. More or less, it looks like September 1 is the best case scenario for when the state will be back to where it was (or where Disney thought it was) June 10, if the IHME model is correct.
If that’s the case, and if Disney applies the same timeline and standards it applied to the first reopening, we’d be looking at an early-October (approx. October 7) reopening.
Could it be sooner? Maybe, but that seems unlikely.
Since June 10, we know Disney and the union have made progress in their talks (discussed below). The government probably has made progress in developing standards for theme parks. And Disney has hopefully made some progress in preparing to reopen. So they might not need a full 37 days to prepare.
Shanghai, Tokyo, and Hong Kong all reopened on much shorter notice than the month-plus Walt Disney World saw. In terms of operations and customer-base, Disneyland is probably more similar to those local-heavy, small resorts than the large, very vacationer-heavy Walt Disney World.
But California is also trending toward more restrictions, not less. It’s hard to believe that in the next few weeks we’re going to get to a place where Disney feels comfortable announcing a reopening date. They might not need the full 37 days to prepare to reopen, but I don’t expect an announcement before mid-August.
One breadcrumb out of the region is Legoland San Diego. They previously were pushing for a July 1 reopening and now have said anything prior to August 1 is out of the question. August seems in play, but definitely on the quicker side.
But it also could be longer. That’s the lesson of the last few weeks. We don’t know how cases in California will trend. We don’t know how the politics of the situation will develop. When we first brought this post back about a few weeks ago, mid-August looked reasonable. Then it was early September. And already we’re looking at October.
With how quiet Disney has been throughout the process, I don’t think anyone thought they’d possibly pick a date and then pull it back. The idea was that their silence meant when they had something to say, it would be big and it would be real. That didn’t work out.
Given how things went the first time around, maybe they’ll be more cautious the second time around. Rather than trying to look forward a few weeks, maybe they’ll wait until cases are where they want them to be, then wait a week, then make an announcement.