Disney Land in Shanghai

2012 May-17

The Shanghai Disney World will be Disney's first on mainland China and its third in Asia - after Tokyo and Hong Kong. After nearly a decade of negotiations, the Chinese government has given Disney its stamp of approval to move ahead with the construction of Shanghai Disney land in the city’s Pudong area. The whole theme park complex is designed to be finished by 2015 with the first draft blueprint has been released by the Shanghai municipal government.

Construction
The construction has already begun and a major road has begun construction to get the materials for the rest of the park. So major construction work is planned to start as early as May 2011 and the whole complex is to be opened by 2015. The resort is planned to cover an area of 4 km2 with a total expense amount to around 25 billion RMB ($3.66 billion USD). The project will be financed by several large Chinese state-owned enterprises in Shanghai forming a joint venture with Walt Disney Company. The Oriental Land Company has not confirmed any connection to venture this with Disney on the Shanghai Disneyland project. "The first-phase of the project will be in the South of Huanglou Area, an area in Chuansha Town, the southeast suburbs of Shanghai's Pudong area; and the second phase will be extended further southwest," an urban developer from Shanghai stated

Relative Comments
Upon completion of the final agreement, the project’s initial phase would include a Magic Kingdom-style theme park tailored to the Shanghai region, along with other areas that fit the global Disney mold, presumably Main Street USA, Adventure land, and Space Mountain (features that Disney also extended to their Hong Kong theme park).
----- Xinhua News

in a feature on this story, perceptively noted that Shanghai Disney — rather than just being another tourist trap in mainland China’s most international city — has the potential to bring some sorely needed culture to Shanghai’s notoriously all-business-all-the-time Pudong district.
----- The London Time

“From our point of view the Hong Kong and Shanghai parks are not competitors, they’re complementary. We really believe that the greater China market is big enough to support multiple parks.”
----- A spokesman from Disney