Let's consult a map.
Here's Germany.
Morocco.
And Fantasyland.
But beyond Walt Disney World's borders
you find a larger boundary.
The Central Florida Tourism Oversight District
that's been at the center of a feud
between Disney and Governor Ron DeSantis.
“There's a new sheriff in town.”
But this district started way before the DeSantis-Disney war.
It explains something about the history of Florida...
and the lost city of EPCOT.
“It will be a community of tomorrow that will never be completed.”
And most importantly, why Disney World is here...
and isn't moving anytime soon.
This isn't Disney World, but Disneyland.
And the key thing is not the park
but the surroundings.
Downtown Anaheim.
A 40 minute drive from Los Angeles.
Disneyland opened in 1955.
In an internal publication, Disney showed its belief
that the site provided sufficient land for present and future growth.
Period photos show the area didn't start
as densely developed as it is today,.
But this 1965 map shows how quickly things changed.
Everything from schools to shopping centers
limited Disneyland's control over its future.
Walt Disney needed more...
and he wanted to get more
from a new park.
He wanted his new park to be on the East Coast.
He needed a lot of land, so dense urban areas were out.
He didn't want cold.
That narrowed things down to Florida.
He also didn't want to compete with the ocean
so he skipped coastal locations.
When flying over Orlando, he saw I-4, I-95, and the Sunshine State Parkway.
That clinched it.
Locals started to notice big land deals
being made by mystery companies.
Soon, Floridians began to suspect their mystery industry was Disney.
The size was immense.
Here's the size of Disneyland if it were in Florida.
And here is the land
they bought for Disney World as it is today.
Even after some land was sold off.
Shortly after the land story broke
Disney held a press conference with Governor Hayden Burns
and brother Roy Disney to discuss the plans.
“It will bring a new world of entertainment...
pleasure, and economic development to the state of Florida.”
“Walt Disney.”
Let's break down this next Walt Disney quote.
After you've done something you see
with the experience and all of that,
what you might do if you were starting from scratch.
Disney wanted to get right what he missed in Anaheim.
“Taking a look at the land this morning
I say we are starting from scratch.”
The land needed a lot of work, drainage work, development:
everything.
Just look at this 1962 map of the area.
There were some orange groves on the land
but this symbol means swamp.
The area is called the Reedy Creek Swamp.
“But we have many things in mind
that would make this unique and different from Disneyland.”
But Disney also had greater ambitions
for the land that he would only reveal later on.
“Here in Florida
we have something special we've never enjoyed at Disney.”
“There's enough land here to hold
all the ideas and plans we could possibly imagine.”
To persuade Florida's government to support the project...
Disney released concept art like this...
that showed way more than a theme park.
Like a giant industrial complex.
And a constantly evolving city
of 30,000 people.
EPCOT: An Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow.
“All these varied activities around the Disney World...
will be tied together by a high speed, rapid transit system
running almost the full length of the property.”
“It will never cease to be a living blueprint of the future...
where people actually live a life
they can't find anywhere else in the world.”
But Disney didn't want to wait for permits for every sewer drain and light post
in his city of tomorrow.
To have complete dominion over the land he'd bought...
he needed political control, not just a title.
He needed a kingdom.
Special districts are common.
Tens of thousands of them exist across the United States.
For example, the famous retirement community, The Villages
just north of Disney uses them.
These let residents vote on a board
which then establishes policies that can raise taxes,
build stuff, or fund public safety departments.
This can happen across municipal boundaries, county lines...
or other traditional boundaries.
Disney wanted a superpowered version of this...
with Disney staff as the sole voting "residents" inside it.
They would be able to vote themselves in
and make their own rules.
The Disney World land is split
between Orange and Osceola Counties.
It also includes what planning documents list
as jurisdictions of the city of Bay Lake
unincorporated areas and the city of Lake Buena Vista
all of which were created for
and are largely controlled by Disney.
They had multiple points of leverage to get this.
“I believe we can build a community
that more people will talk about and come to look at...
than any other area in the world.”
All these plans meant promise of economic development
for a relatively sleepy area.
“I predict that we'll experience at least a 50%...
and possibly a 100% increase in tourism in the state of Florida.”
Disney could also threaten to pursue alternate sites...
in northern California in Mineral King.
They had a parallel proposal to build a ski complex
that was closer to Anaheim and less swampy.
It ended up serving as a taunt to Florida.
The result was clear.
In the same issue of Disney's internal magazine
in which they announced
the biggest surprise of the decade
Florida's VIPs were already flying out...
to begin working on project problems.
Other places didn't grant big powers like Florida.
There was no ski resort in Mineral King
because the Sierra Club fought it
and the state never approved it.
All that is why Disney World is here.
In May 1967, the Reedy Creek Improvement District
was chartered as an entity that could regulate across counties..
like its own government.
It could control sewage, generation of power by nuclear fission
airport facilities, railroads, and construction.
And Disney used its powers.
The company created an underground tunnel system
for their utilities called utilidors.
Each tunnel had spots for ventilation, water and transportation.
They built the monorail and they created their own lake.
The Seven Seas Lagoon.
So the parking lot wouldn't sit too close to the castle.
They did it all because...
they could.
In 1966, Walt Disney died in Los Angeles.
The city part of his Disney World dream mostly died with him
despite some gestures toward building it.
EPCOT became a part of the theme park in 1982...
but it was not a city.
The district's comprehensive 10-year-plan shows
how far the Disney dream has drifted from EPCOT.
Undeveloped land is labeled green for conservation
not as the foundation for some future city.
Mass transportation consists of busses and the monorail line
rather than the intricate transit network
that Disney envisioned.
Disney has massive populations staying in its many hotels
but when you look at a map of permanent residential addresses in the district
you see 8 here and 9 here.
It's projected to be about 43 people by 2027.
Disney ensured that later residential developments didn't change things.
Development of Disney's "imagineered" small town Celebration, Florida...
began on the district in the 1990s
but it was de-annexed from Reedy Creek.
The same happened for the Disney-owned Plantation Park Condos
in Little Lake Bryan.
Being cut out of the district means no voting for the board.
All of this was just background...
until the feud.
“Welcome to the Walt Disney Company's annual meeting of shareholders.”
“I called Governor DeSantis this morning
to express our disappointment and concern.”
Disney's CEO called to protest Florida's "Don’t Say Gay" law
which restricts classroom instruction
about sexual orientation.
“We believe being joined at the hip with this one California-based company
was not something that was justifiable or sustainable”
And promised...
“The corporate kingdom finally comes to an end.”
But the taunting continued.
“Second Quarter 2023 Financial Results Conference Call.”
“So this is plainly a matter of retaliation
while the rest of the Florida special districts
continue operating basically as they were.”
“Someone even said, like, maybe you need another state prison.”
“Who knows?”
“I mean, I just think that the possibilities are endless.”
Still, the state would struggle
to actually dissolve the district.
The charter gives the district the power to finance the projects
and activities of the district through bonds.
If the district disappeared, hundreds of millions in bond debt
would probably flow to taxpayers in Orange and Osceola Counties.
And on the other side,
Disney has already made noise about a $17 billion Disney World expansion.
In the end, Disney's district has had a name change
and board composition and process may slightly change.
But Germany and Morocco aren't going anywhere.
The kingdom will probably stay a kingdom.