Epcot's transformation continues as Walt Disney World has renamed the sections of the theme park's parking lot to Disney characters.
Gone are the old parking section names Journey, Discover, Amaze, Create, Explore, Imagine, and Wonder. Those sections, respectively, now are called Hei Hei, Crush, Moana, and Dory on the "Earth" side, and Rocket, Wall-E, and Gamora on the "Space" side.
Frankly, given that the whole point of naming sections of a parking lot is to help people remember where their car is, using Disney character names rather than generic buzzwords probably will help more Disney guests actually do that. The visual/verbal use of character images along with their names on the signage also should help promote recognition among Disney's many non-English-speaking guests.
In addition to today's changes, Walt Disney World will be introducing a new marquee for Epcot's toll plaza later this month.
For our latest reader rankings of the park's attractions, please visit our newly-updated-for-2023 Epcot page. And for more theme park news, please sign up for Theme Park Insider's weekly newsletter.
Universal builds a new park
Disney renames parking lot.
Sounds about right.
This will definitely help.
And great reference, Russell. Fortunately, Disney is using more than just 2 characters.
I see the construction of Magic Kingdom 3 is progressing.
Dammit, Russell beat me to my joke!
Probably 2 years in the making - record time. What’s next an empty star wars hotel ??
^ haha !!!
Guess that just leaves Animal Kingdom as the lone holdout for using character-named parking lots.
Real talk though, Robert hit the nail on the head regarding the buzzwords. Parking in Epcot was always a PITA when you have interchangeable words like Wonder & Amaze, Create & Imagine, and Explore & Discover. By far, the biggest offender in Florida is SeaWorld, which uses similar buzzwords, but the entire layout is just one big surface lot with indistinguishable boundaries. Makes it darn near impossible to find your car in a timely manner unless you wrote the location down.
^ SeaWorld is the first one that popped into my head, too. I absolutely got lost looking for my rental car when I was there last March.
Sea World has always been the easiest for me because its just one big lot with each row going up one number, so as long as you took a picture or texted yourself the row number its extremely easy to find your car because it just goes 1, 2, 3, 4 etc.
DAK on the other hand, whoever designed that parking lot must have been smoking crack.
Love this!
It’s highly amusing to me that some people are mad about this.
@fatty: AH-MEN, brother ... When they rippped out that horrible 'Tower of Terror' billboard some people acted as if Disney had done something unforgivable -- like open a trashy Jimmy Fallon screen-based attraction.
That Tower of Terror billboard was AWESOME!
^^^ it sure was - now all I see when I travel to the parks is a big volcano, rocket roller coaster and harrypotter ??
(Chuckle)
There used to be a cool-ass oversized E.T. billboard as you entered downtown Orlando via I-4. It always got me hyped because I knew that Disney and Universal weren’t much farther from that point. I’ve always enjoyed the “plussed” billboards Disney and UO used to throw up, that often featured some sort of robotic accent prop coupled with dynamic nighttime lighting. On the same token, I’ve never lost sleep over their removal or them being changed. :)
This article has been archived and is no longer accepting comments.
I just want to park my car in the Itchy Lot.