The park will not be opening any time soon, according to Disneyland’s President Ken Potrock.
Unlike Disney’s parks around the world, Disneyland park in Anaheim, California has been unable to open due to the strict state rules stemming from the ongoing rise in COVID-19 case numbers. The park initially planned to open mid-July but is yet to do so. Earlier this week, California health officials released protocols to provide theme parks with a path to reopening based on the rate of spread in individual counties. However, for Disneyland in Orange County, any hopes of meeting those requirements have been dashed since a new statement was released.
— Disney Parks News (@DisneyParksNews) October 20, 2020
“We have proven that we can responsibly reopen, with science-based health and safety protocols strictly enforced at our theme park properties around the world. Nevertheless, the State of California continues to ignore this fact, instead mandating arbitrary guidelines that it knows are unworkable and that hold us to a standard vastly different from other reopened businesses and state-operated facilities,” president Ken Potrock said in a statement on Twitter. “We want to get people back to work, but these State guidelines will keep us shuttered for the foreseeable future, forcing thousands more people out of work,” he continued.
In August 2020, California’s Governor Gavin Newsom unveiled the Blueprint for a Safer Economy which consists of four tiers. Each tier indicates a risk level ranging from “widespread” (the purple tier) to “minimal” (the yellow tier). Counties are assigned to tiers according to their coronavirus case rates per 100,000 residents, in addition to their overall test positivity rate. As counties move into the lower risk tiers more reopening will be allowed to happen. It wasn’t until the release of Tuesday’s guidelines, that theme parks were really given any indication of how they fitted into that.
In line with the new park reopening roadmap, Disneyland is defined as a large park, with a capacity of more than 15,000 visitors. And in order to open, Orange County must reduce COVID-19 transmission cases enough to meet the “minimal” risk tier. If that happens, the park will be able to reopen at a 25% capacity limit. But based to projections by Orange County officials, Disneyland may not open until summer 2021.
Meanwhile, Disney World and other resorts are continuing with a phased reopening with reservations which you can read more about here.
[Featured Image: Disney]