Expedition Everest is one of the most popular Disney roller coasters of all time. Located at Disney's Animal Kingdom, this was one of the first major and elaborate expansions of the park, and it helped turn the park from what was widely considered to be a half-day experience into an essential part of a trip to Walt Disney World.
This roller coaster is currently unique in the entire world, but did you know that Disney has considered actually cloning this roller coaster to another Disney Park, and that they may be considering doing it again. Here is a look at the history of potentially cloning Expedition Everest.
First, a bit of history on Expedition Everest. This roller coaster when it was built it was the most expensive roller coaster in history, although it has since been surpassed by other rides. This ride was themed very specifically to its location, being designed to fit in an Asia-themed land and focus on the myth of the yeti. This would then make it very difficult for it to fit in with the theme of other parks.
Then how would Disney do this? How were they going to build a clone of this roller coaster that was really designed perfectly for Disney's Animal Kingdom in another Disney theme park?
The plan was to add a clone of this roller coaster to Shanghai Disneyland. It is not known if this would have been a clone in every sense, keeping the theming the same as well as the roller coaster layout, or if this would have utilized the same roller coaster layout with a different theme. If built it would have been located in Shanghai Disneyland's Fantasyland.
Eventually, this would be scrapped from the plans and a Zootopia land would be built instead.
However, this is not the only time that Disney potentially considered building a clone of Expedition Everest.
In 2021, Disney announced the incredibly elaborate Disneyland Forward expansion plans for the Disneyland Resort. This plan involved massive expansions of both Disneyland and Disney California Adventure. It mostly focused on cloning rides that already existed at other Disney Parks (on top of including a Black Panther land just secretly put into the plans). Included in these plans was a clone of the Expedition Everest roller coaster.
In the concept art there is a mountain-like structure near Pixar Pier, and if you look at the provided overview layout that accompanied the plans an exact copy of the roller coaster layout of Expedition Everest is visible, with the various track elements coming out of the mountain.
It is unclear if Disney ever actually intends on building any of the plans in Disneyland Forward. This plan is largely hypothetical, and an attempt to try and get the city of Anaheim to change regulations regarding Disneyland and what they can build where on their own land. It is still worth mentioning that they included Expedition Everest in these plans for an expansion of Disney California Adventure.
It is unclear if a clone of Expedition Everest will ever be built, but it is something that Disney has considered at multiple different times.
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