Master Plan

WALT DISNEY'S ORIGINAL MASTER PLAN

The first known master plan was drawned by Walt Disney himself in 1965 and 1966. It was then adapted several times by his imagineers and Walt himself but all versions kept the overall design and location of each elements. The master plan was applied to aerial maps and drawing of the property and various versions of it could be seen in the Florida Project "war room" and on the E.P.C.O.T film as well. 

FIRST SKETCHES BY WALT DISNEY

E.P.C.O.T was the last great project of Walt Disney and he was involved in every aspect, every details of it. In those rarely seen personal sketches, every key elements of E.P.C.O.T are already included:

• the radial design of the city.

• the inter-connecting multimodal transportation systems: monorails, peoplemovers, roads for trucks, road for personal cars.

• clear separation between business and residential areas.

• a central transportation station.

If we compare those 4 sketches with the concept arts and the animation featured in the film, there are little to no differences.

OFFICIAL 1967 MASTER PLAN

The last master plan approved by Walt Disney was mounted on board featuring the early planning stages of Walt Disney World and E.P.C.O.T. At the WED offices in Glendale, California, a "Florida War Room" was erected. Here, master planning took place for what became known as "The Florida Project" and later "Disney World". Imagineers such as Marvin Davis, John Hench, Joe Potter, Marty Sklar and Walt himself tirelessly used this room to translate one man’s fanciful notion into a sprawling reality. This WED board room was lined with huge drawings and high altitude photographs to offer the designers a proper perspective on their project. Walt’s final on-screen pitch, "The E.P.C.O.T Film" was shot in a recreation of this planning office using actual maps and drawings from the room itself. Walt intriguingly motioned to the towering maps and photographs around him to explain his far-reaching plans. This photo mosaic below is from that war room as planning progressed before and after Disney’s death and features master planning drawings laid over high altitude photographs of the whole Disney World property. At this stage, E.P.C.O.T was still very much an actual city of tomorrow, complete with residential green belts and a high-volume airport of the future. The Magic Kingdom "theme park" is present and takes up a tiny portion of the North-West corner of the property. A very rare artifact from the offices of WED Enterprises in Glendale, California. 

OFFICIAL 1967 MASTER PLAN vs CURRENT LAND USAGE

In its phase 1 (Magic Kingdom) and phase 2 (Epcot Center), the development of the Walt Disney World property stayed very close to Walt Disney's own master plan. The Magic Kingdom and Epcot themeparks are located around where it was planned earlier. We can also say that about the very first official hotels on property: the Contemporary and Polynesian resorts.