Tomorrowland (Disneyland)
Tomorrowland is one of the five original lands of Disneyland Park at the Disneyland Resort in Anaheim, California, opened with the park on July 17, 1955. It stands east of the Central Plaza and presents the future — a subject that has forced it to be rebuilt more thoroughly and more often than any other land in the park. Disneyland's Tomorrowland is generally described as existing in three generations: the hastily finished original of 1955, the complete reconstruction of 1967, and the retro-futuristic version of 1998, modified since. Its best-known attractions are Space Mountain, Star Tours and the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage, and it is also served by the Disneyland Monorail, whose Tomorrowland station dates to the system's debut.
The first Tomorrowland, 1955–1966
Tomorrowland was the last land finished for opening day and the least complete; budget cuts left several plots empty, filled temporarily by corporate exhibits. Its emblem was the TWA Moonliner, a rocket ship standing taller than Sleeping Beauty Castle, beside the Rocket to the Moon attraction. The land's most durable opening attraction was Autopia, where guests drive small cars on guided tracks — the last opening-day Tomorrowland attraction still operating. In 1959 a celebrated trio of additions opened together: the Disneyland Monorail, the first daily-operating monorail in the Western Hemisphere; the Submarine Voyage, whose fleet was then among the largest peacetime submarine fleets in the world; and the Matterhorn Bobsleds, later counted with Fantasyland. The Monsanto House of the Future, a plastic house on a concrete pedestal, stood in the land from 1957 to 1967.
The 1967 rebuild
By the mid-1960s the land's picture of the future had dated badly, and it was demolished and rebuilt almost in its entirety, reopening on July 2, 1967 — seven months after Walt Disney's death, to plans he had approved. The new Tomorrowland introduced the PeopleMover, gliding on an elevated track above the land; the Carousel of Progress, brought from the 1964 New York World's Fair (it moved to Florida in 1975); Adventure Thru Inner Space, which simulated shrinking to atomic size; Circle-Vision 360°, a cinema in the round; and the Rocket Jets, spinning high above the land. Space Mountain was planned for this version but shelved after Walt's death; it finally opened on May 27, 1977, following the success of its Florida counterpart.
In the 1980s the land absorbed film properties for the first time: the 3-D film Captain EO, starring Michael Jackson, opened in 1986, and Star Tours, a Star Wars flight simulator and Disneyland's first major attraction based on an outside studio's films, replaced Adventure Thru Inner Space in January 1987.
The 1998 version and after
A further redesign, opened in 1998, recast the land in a retro-futuristic style of bronze and gold influenced by the Discoveryland at Disneyland Paris — a future as imagined by earlier generations, chosen partly because such a future cannot date as quickly. Its centrepiece ride, the Rocket Rods high-speed vehicle tour, was plagued by breakdowns and closed in 2000; the PeopleMover it had displaced did not return, and its elevated track still stands empty through the land. The Submarine Voyage closed in 1998.
Recovery came with the park's fiftieth anniversary period. Space Mountain, closed in 2003, reopened in 2005 with its track entirely replaced on the same layout and an on-board soundtrack. Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters, an interactive shooting ride, opened in 2005, and in 2007 the submarines returned as the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage, using projection and animation within the original lagoon. Star Tours was replaced in 2011 by Star Tours – The Adventures Continue, whose randomised sequences draw on the wider Star Wars saga, parts of which later moved out of the land entirely with the opening of Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge in 2019. Astro Orbitor spins at the land's entrance, on the site where the Rocket Jets once turned above the PeopleMover platform.
See also
- Space Mountain (Disneyland)
- Disneyland Park
- Fantasyland (Disneyland)
- Main Street, U.S.A. (Disneyland)