While visiting Disney’s Hollywood Studios on a cold and rainy morning, we noticed something interesting over in the Muppets Courtyard area of the park. To provide a little bit more context, let’s turn the clock back to 2015. The Summer of 2015 saw the announcement that a Star Wars Land would be coming to Disney’s Hollywood Studios (and Disneyland) and that the Streets of America would need to close to be replaced by the new Star Wars spaceport.
Streets of America Apartments Facade
Tucked away in the corner of the San Francisco section of the Streets of America was a rundown apartment building. That served as the backdrop for a Phineas and Ferb meet and greet in its closing years. Here’s a closer look.
The meet and greet location closed in early 2016, before the rest of the Streets of America, and then kind of sat dormant for a while. Here’s a look at the facade from April 2016, shortly after the construction walls were installed for the Streets of America demolition project.
Some 8 years after the construction walls were installed, we noticed movement on this particular facade. At the time, it seemed like it would be demolished. The theming was stripped off of the steel structure, and it was likely just a matter of time before the whole thing was removed. Over time, we saw the scrim that was covering the structure removed, as seen in the progress photos below.
With the structure now simply steel, the zoom lens was at the ready to take a photo of a clear sky following its demolition, showcasing where the new Monsters Inc. door roller coaster would sit. Well, something has happened that makes me think that this structure isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, and may, in fact, be repurposed in the new Monsters Inc. land scheduled to open sometime in the future.
First, here’s a look at concept art for the Monsters Inc.-themed takeover of Muppets Courtyard. For this article, we’re simply concerned with the large Monsters Inc. building at the top of the concept art.
Using this annotated version of the same concept art, we can see that the Monsters Inc. doors roller coaster will occupy a space that is currently utilized by a small portion of the expansive Cast Member parking lot at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Most important for our bearings is the location of the Mama Melrose restaurant, which will be rethemed in the new Monsters Inc. land. The entrance to the Monsters Inc. door coaster will be to the right of Mama Melrose, right where our still-standing Streets of America facade is located.
The recent development is not demolition, but rather, paint. The steel structure has been painted a light blue, which to me signals that it will stick around to be utilized in the Monsters Inc. land. Why does paint not signal demolition? Disney utilizes a variety of paint colors to help blend buildings into the visual background. The most popular is, perhaps, “Go Away Green”, which is a common color to paint the exterior of buildings that Disney wants to blend into the foliage.
However, there is another color that has gained popularity in recent years – a sky blue. Most famously, Disney utilized shades of green on the lower portion of the massive Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind building while going with two shades of blue to try and blend it into the skyline.
Here’s a look at the Streets of America structure, now painted a light blue, signaling that Disney is going to keep it around for a while and wants it to blend into the sky. Of course, a grey, gloomy, wet, cold day isn’t the best time to highlight its chameleon-like abilities, but here we are.
If my gut is right, and Disney wants to keep this structure for the new Monsters Inc. land, now you know its backstory!
As always, keep checking back with us here at BlogMickey.com as we continue to bring you the latest news, photos, and info from around the Disney Parks!
