Lightning McQueen and Co. are coming to Magic Kingdom! A huge chunk of Frontierland is getting a makeover, with Piston Peak National Park replacing the old Rivers of America and Tom Sawyer Island. In this post, we’re going to cover everything you need to know about the new “Piston Peak” Cars area coming to Disney World!
Related Posts
It’s a busy time for construction at Disney World! We’ve got some related posts you might want to read:
A Cars-Themed Area is Coming to Magic Kingdom (you are here)
Latest News & Project Milestones
April 30, 2026 - Frontierland Kiosks close, set for demolition
April 3, 2026 - Retaining walls continue to form
Tom Sawyer Island and Liberty Square Riverboat closed permanently on July 7, 2025 to make way for this new area.
Basics About Magic Kingdom’s Piston Peak
We’ll start with some basics, including how big the area will be, where it will be, and how it will differ from the famed Cars Land in Disney California Adventure.
Is it Going to Look like California’s Cars Land?
No, the setting of this new area is not Radiator Springs, which is the basis for Cars Land in Disney California Adventure. That is a full land with three rides alongside several stores and dining establishments.
The Cars area in Frontierland will be called “Piston Peak” and themed to a National Park design. What’s been confirmed is that we’ll get two new Cars rides. Moreover, the new area will have other features including “visitor lodge, Ranger HQ, trails” and more. The scope of the shopping and dining remains to be seen, but presumably there will be some of that, too. Piston Peak will technically be a part of Frontierland (the specific location is discussed below), not its own land.
Radiator Springs at Disney California Adventure
Whatever is produced at Magic Kingdom will surely be impressive, but it will not be quite the same as the full land at California Adventure. This is decidedly not a Galaxy’s Edge situation, where the two lands on both coasts are nearly identical.
Where Will Piston Peak Be Built?
The new Cars land will be located at Magic Kingdom in Disney World. It will replace the area formerly occupied by Rivers of America and Tom Sawyer Island. This is the area of the park between Haunted Mansion, Splash Mountain, and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. The above annotated concept art from Disney should have given some idea of where it was, but here’s a map:
Notably, since Piston Peak is replacing the Rivers of America and Tom Sawyer Island, both of which closed summer 2025, this new area involves the literal creation of land where there currently is none.
The permitting around removing Rivers of America caused a small headache at the outset, and we can only assume that the combination of having to clear and fill those existing areas is going to be an exhausting project in itself. (That small permitting headache wasn’t itself a “delay”, but the point is that more complicated projects will inevitably have more small problems.)
Bye Bye, Riverboat
When Will Piston Peak Open?
Disney has announced basically nothing about a potential opening timeframe for this project, so everything here is speculation. The bottom line is that you cannot plan a trip to see this land yet—you need to at least wait for Disney to give some indication of what year it’ll debut.
Based on what we’ve seen and heard, it’ll be a while before the new Cars area at Magic Kingdom actually opens. We’re looking at a couple of years, at least.
For some context, the Tropical Americas update to Animal Kingdom is slated for a 2027 opening. That land features two brand new attractions—but one is a carousel—plus a hefty conversion of DINOSAUR into an Indiana Jones ride. Construction started January 2025. That means that project is slated for between 2 and 3 years. Galaxy’s Edge took between 3 and 4 years to build, including two brand new rides.
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The creation of Piston Peak at Magic Kingdom is a larger project than Tropical Americas, starting with the fact that all the land has to get built. Then, it requires the creation of two brand new attractions, which is arguably the same amount of ride work, maybe more, as the new Topical Americas land.
When you bring this all together, a 2028 debut is something of a “fantasy” at this point. It would require the ground to be in a workable state by early 2025 (it wasn’t) and the project to move at a timeline comfortably between the speeds of Tropical Americas and Galaxy’s Edge.
I’m updating this in mid-2026 and we’re still in the “build the construction site phase.” Realistically, this is much more of a “tomorrow” thing (I’m trying too hard, sorry)—I’m looking for a 2029 debut.
Bolstering this expectation is some larger context. Tropical Americas is scheduled for 2027, and Monstropolis (Hollywood Studios) could reasonably open in 2028—its timeline is essentially driven by how long it’ll take to build the roller coaster. From both crowd-management and capital-expenditures perspectives, rushing Piston Peak to get it done before 2029 wouldn’t make much sense.
What rides will Magic Kingdom’s Cars Land Have?
Okay, let’s dig into some specifics. Well, the only real specifics we have right now. There are two new attractions coming to Magic Kingdom’s Cars Land, but not much is known about them.
E-Ticket Attraction (“Cars Road Rally”?)
Here’s how Disney first described the main attraction:
“One attraction will invite you on a thrilling rally race through the mountains. Take on wild terrain as you race across the landscape climbing mountain trails, dodging geysers and — Mater’s favorite — splashing through mudholes.”
I’ve seen a few sources refer to this as “Cars Road Rally”, so Disney presumably used this name in some communications, but I’m not finding official public usage of that name. Subsequent to the initial announcement, though, Disney did share some really cool video of testing for the attraction design. Here’s the concept art:
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Unlike the cars at Radiator Springs Racers, the vehicles seat four people and have more intense safety belt systems. While the initial rumors and art suggested this might be a trackless ride, subsequent updates confirmed it will indeed have a track.
A Second Ride for Smaller Racers
Here’s how Disney described the second attraction:
“But what about smaller racers? The second attraction will be geared towards them and will be fun for the whole family.”
That doesn’t tell us much. There was a piece of concept art shown during the first round of announcements:
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This looks to be something closer to a go-kart style ride. Here’s that land-wide concept art from earlier…zoomed in, you can see the family friendly ride…I think…:
Copyright Disney/Pixar, Fair Use Claimed
(Honestly, I’m not positive which parts of the concept art are which rides—it looks like they both use dirt tracks and the distinction isn’t totally clear.)
Update: New Ride Tech Revealed, Second Attraction Axed?
March 2026: A second new patent reveals ambitious technology designed to allow for “off road” guest-directed vehicles. This seems to comport with what we expected from the main attraction, though exact expectations for that one have varied a bit.
Feb 2026: A new patent application from Disney could be related to technology to be used in one of the two new rides.
In June 2025, Disney provided some new information about the land, and references to the second attraction were conspicuously absent. According to noted Disney etc. reporter Scott Gustin, there is still a family attraction planned for the space, but based on the most recent concept art cute map(?) it doesn’t look like it’ll be a smaller race ride.
Commentary
There’s a lot to cover here. Let’s start with the awkwardness of this whole “new mini-land, er, area inside ‘Frontierland’” situation.
“Frontier”land — A Land By Any Other Name…
At this point, I think we sort of have to keep an open mind as to what the future of this part of the park looks like. Frontierland is a core Disney castle park land, but it’ll soon have Tiana’s Bayou Adventure and two Cars rides—it’s sort of losing its identity.
Disney sort of acknowledged this in a parks blog post:
Since the early days of Magic Kingdom, adventurous guests have traveled across space and time as they pass from Liberty Square to Frontierland. Starting with architectural influences from upstate New York and colonial America in Liberty Square, before traveling to a bear-y fun concert in the North Woods, a stop by New Orleans at Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, and ending in the Arizona bluffs at Big Thunder Mountain Railroad.
At the heart of all these stories are heroic characters with a belief in themselves that helped forge a path to their dreams. To continue this journey in great American storytelling, Piston Peak National Park will be part of the largest expansion in the history of Magic Kingdom.
That description starts well, establishing “Liberty Square” and “Frontierland.” But then we’ve got Liberty Square, North Woods (a term which seems relatively rare in Disney content), New Orleans, and Arizona mentioned in succession. In other words, it would maybe make just as much sense to make Liberty Square a part of Frontierland, but maybe there’s no good reason to do that (especially because Haunted Mansion).
How Do The New Attractions Impact The Park?
Now, as for the original ride announcements. It just rubs me the wrong way to have the two rides in a land be “really cool intense racing ride” and “less cool less intense racing ride.” I think family friendly rides are a necessity, particularly at Magic Kingdom, but I wish the concept went in a different direction.
But the second issue I have is maybe actually a “pro” in the long run. You see, Magic Kingdom already has Tomorrowland Speedway. Adding another “kids drive around a track” ride makes little sense. Why would you need two such rides in a park? You wouldn’t. No, you wouldn’t need two.
So, is this positioning for the end of Tomorrowland Speedway? My 100% speculation is that it could be. Tomorrowland Speedway is an absolute blight on the design of Tomorrowland, occupying valuable real estate that connects TRON to the rest of the park. In the long run, maybe moving go karting to Frontierland won’t be such a bad thing.
As noted earlier, though, Disney has left the second attraction in a bit of limbo. It’s hard to unpack what’s going on here. Honestly, my hope is that they cut the smaller ride in favor of a more exhaustive playground-style non-ride attraction. Something like Shanghai Disneyland’s Challenge Trails (maybe not legally attractive in the U.S.) or even Disney California Adventure’s Redwood Creek Challenge Trail could be great and add balance to the park.
Such a space would sort of undercut the reasoning for rebuilding over the entire area in the first place, though, since Tom Sawyer Island was basically a big, but underdeveloped and underutilized, playground. Maybe Disney had other structural reasons to eliminate Rivers of America, and even getting the land to host one ride would make it worth it.
On that note, I’ll close by reminding you that Cars land is only one of the two major projects in the works at Magic Kingdom. The new Villains-themed land—yes, a full land this time—should follow in relatively short order. While we’re still a ways away from this new, even-more-majestical Magic Kingdom, there’s obviously a ton to be excited about.
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