Disney Steam?

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Word travels fast in the steam community as we all know, but I was contacted today by a very close friend (whose word is good) and he knows some of the higher powers at Disney World here in Florida. He stated that since the retirement of the gentleman in the engine shop in April of this year, that they are highly considering closing the steam program and going to diesels locomotives. His comments were not very pleasing to me in one respect because he stated that this is governed by the “higher ups”, that only view the train as an expense and a ride, and that the biggest reason is the issues of steam and liability as we are well aware. Another comment that stuck out was that they would rather scrap the engines to not have the liability of them being sold, due to the fact that they made so many changes on the engines themselves over the years, rather than to place them out where they could be exposed to the public in one manner or another at some future date. I have heard that comment myself also from some acquaintances that were in some of their other programs, but I was glad to see that they did donate the Fort Wilderness engines to other organizations in the past such as the Railroad Museum of PA.

I have passes there and my only reason for going to their “theme park” and not another “amusement park” is that I like to ride the steamboat and the trains. My boys feel the same way, and we ride the trains over and over again. If they were to yank the trains, I would find Bush Gardens more attractive since they would have some of the last operating daily steam attractions in Florida, and would most likely purchase their passes.

I am not disrespecting the credibility of my close friend, but can anyone that might know some of the “higher ups” confirm this to be true? I sure would not like to see the steam engines go, especially if this is the case.

Thank you,

Don't know about the main topic but the Fort wilderness engines were not donated but purchased by three individuals in California. Disney put some very tight restrictions on the engines and the negotiations took a couple of years to complete.

Ray Montgomery

This rumor resurfaces every few years. I will do some checking, but I doubt very much that WDW would scrap the steam engines at the Park. They spent too much money on the recent refurbishments to just shut them down. Besides, John Lasseter is a big steam fan -- he is "taking care of" Ollie Johnston's Porter for him -- and I'm confident that he would not allow the steam program at the Magic Kingdom to vanish.

By the way, I am one of those "three gentlemen" who acquired the Fort Wilderness trains. I have number 4, and you can read more about it at http://www.fortwildernessrr.com

To paraphrase Mark Twain, "The rumors of the death of steam at Walt Disney World are greatly exaggerated."

I spoke with the head of all transportation at WDW and he assured me that there is no ongoing discussion of a diesel conversion. He heard the same rumor about the time of George Britton's retirement, something along the lines of "Well, now that George is gone I guess we'll have to switch over to diesel." It wasn't true then, and it isn't true now.

His exact words were, "we've would not have put so much effort into finding a replacement for George if we were going to shut down the steam operation."

So -- for the foreseeable future -- water will continue to boil at the Magic Kingdom.