Disney S California Adventure

Disney unveiled plans today for the largest expansion in the history of the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World, provided updates on its $1-billion expansion of Disney's California Adventure and said it would modernize the popular Star Tours ride at its domestic parks. Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Chairman Jay Rasulo chose the D23 Expo in Anaheim, the first-ever gathering of Disney devotees, to announce the ambitious new project in Orlando, Fla., that will nearly double the size of Fantasyland.

What do you get when you combine a shoot-'em-up video game with an amusement park ride? Disney hopes you get a way to lure jaded gamers off the couch and to one of its theme parks. Walt Disney Imagineering melded the interactive elements of a video game with the kind of immersive 3-D experience of an amusement park to create Toy Story Midway Mania, a ride opening today at Disney's California Adventure park in Anaheim.

Disney's California Adventure is poised for a $1-billion makeover that's designed to give the troubled theme park the main thing it lacks -- an emotional connection to keep people coming back. The sweeping overhaul will transport visitors to the California of the 1920s, when Walt Disney first arrived in Hollywood. In the same way that Disneyland's Main Street evokes Disney's hometown of Marceline, Mo., a refocused California Adventure will follow the young animator's journey to Los Angeles.

California Adventure is getting a $1.1-billion makeover -- with Walt Disney Co. planning to spend more than it did to build the theme park just six years ago. The struggling park, which sits in Disneyland's shadow, was a disappointment from the start, failing to draw the crowds the company had anticipated. The idea behind the overhaul recently approved by the board of directors is to give it new attractions and a sharper identity -- and make it more like Disneyland.

Since California Adventure made its debut six years ago, billed as Disneyland's hipper, edgier younger sibling, the entertainment colossus founded by Walt Disney has wandered far from the Orange County city where he launched his first park in 1955.

A high-level executive reshuffling at the Walt Disney Co. on Thursday will give Chief Executive Robert A. Iger a deeper bench from which to choose a No. 2. The restructuring came in advance of the company's fourth-quarter earnings announcement. Disney reported an 18% bump in income, fueled by gains in the television group that helped offset a loss at the film studio and softness in the theme park business. As part of the management changes, Chief Financial Officer Tom Staggs will trade jobs at the end of the year with Parks and Resorts Chairman Jay Rasulo.

State officials were investigating Saturday whether mechanical or human error caused the first major ride accident at Disney's California Adventure, in which at least 15 park visitors suffered minor injuries the day before.

Ride operators at Disney's California Adventure told Anaheim authorities that the California Screamin' roller coaster was functioning normally before the July 29 collision that hospitalized 17 people with minor injuries. The statements were contained in police and fire reports released Tuesday. The ride remains closed as state investigators try to determine what caused one train to rear-end another that was stopped.

With a cool glass of chardonnay in hand, it's no longer a sizzling summer day at a crowded theme park. You're in Napa Valley, a vineyard of Riesling grapes around one corner and eager sommeliers nearby. Even the Mickey Mouse ears donned by seemingly every other child in sight don't ruin the illusion. This is the Golden Vine Winery at Disney's California Adventure, a respite for adults who suffer from Mickey burnout.