{"id":1383247,"date":"2022-03-16T05:10:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-16T09:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1383247"},"modified":"2022-03-16T07:52:12","modified_gmt":"2022-03-16T11:52:12","slug":"would-you-want-to-live-in-californias-next-disney-themed-subdivision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/would-you-want-to-live-in-californias-next-disney-themed-subdivision\/","title":{"rendered":"Would You Want To Live In California\u2019s Next Disney-Themed Subdivision?"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fwould-you-want-to-live-in-californias-next-disney-themed-subdivision%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1383247&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/disney-e1646959825822.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p>In the age of Disney-themed weddings and weekend Disney hotel stays that <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/02\/24\/disney-rewrites-han-and-leias-love-story-in-shameless-star-wars-hotel-marketing-ploy\/\">can run<\/a> $6,000, the House of Mouse has hit on another strategy to shake down their devoted fans. They\u2019ve licensed the Disney name to Arizona\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/dmbdevelopment.com\/portfolio\/cotino\/\">DMB Development<\/a>, who will build and sell 1,700 homes in a Disney-branded planned community in southern California.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>A 618-acre development in Rancho Mirage near Palm Springs, Cotino will feature a large lake as its central focus with a waterfront clubhouse and community association reportedly to be run by Disney-trained staff. It\u2019s the first of several communities being branded \u201cStoryliving By Disney,\u201d although Disney will not develop, build, or sell the homes.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The exact involvement of Disney talent in this first of several residential communities remains unclear. To the fans, Disney <a href=\"https:\/\/boardwalktimes.net\/storyliving-by-disney-disneys-new-business-to-develop-residential-communities-933b7dfa8180\">has stressed<\/a> their \u201cimagineers\u201d have design input. However, local reports <a href=\"https:\/\/www.phoenixnewtimes.com\/news\/scottsdales-dmb-development-to-build-disneys-california-storyliving-fantasy-homes-13107884\">note<\/a> that DMB had already planned a development for that California desert city. Mentions of Disney entertainment and experiences (like \u201ccooking classes\u201d) are essentially boilerplate marketing at this stage.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But who are they targeting? DeWayne Hamby, an entertainment writer based in the Orlando area, mentions Golden Oak \u2014 an upscale, secluded Disney-owned subdivision only a few hundred yards from the Magic Kingdom and its signature castle \u2014 as a potential model for this project. Homes in Golden Oak <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tampabay.com\/florida\/2019\/04\/24\/8-facts-about-walt-disney-worlds-luxury-golden-oak-neighborhood\/\">are priced<\/a> $2 million to $10 million.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s for the elite,\u201d said Hamby in a phone interview. \u201cIf you\u2019re going to the parks all the time, and then you return home where you live in a Disney neighborhood with a house full of Disney memorabilia, I would say that\u2019s a pretty extreme Disney fanatic.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>With the Cotino development in southern California only recently breaking ground, the developer may be three or four years from announcing specific prices. What they can do is hype it using Disney\u2019s celebrated heritage. For instance, their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.storylivingbydisney.com\/cotino.html\">promotional site<\/a> mentions Walt and Lillian Disney often visited their vacation home in the Palm Springs area.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Selling goods and experiences using idealized past memories has become American culture\u2019s default spin cycle, and no company has <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2019\/07\/19\/amid-a-sea-of-remakes-these-10-disney-nostalgia-trips-are-worth-the-ride\/\">perfected it better<\/a> than Disney. Hamby, raising three daughters in the Orlando area, admits that \u201cnostalgia mixed with fun\u201d are partly why he and his wife enjoying visiting Walt Disney World. \u201cReally, it\u2019s to be able to experience it through the eyes of our kids.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When Disney targets childless adults for its cradle-to-grave lifestyle, it raises questions.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"dreams-of-disney-living-became-nightmares\">Dreams of Disney Living Became Nightmares<\/h2>\n<p>Several steps up from usual real-estate brochures, Cotino concept art features amenities the project is zoned for but not in immediate plans. Communal spaces look welcoming, framed by mountain vistas. Restaurants and even a grand hotel reveal creative design flourishes.<\/p>\n<p>However, the development\u2019s central 24-acre blue lagoon \u2014 with beachfront areas and a water park in the works \u2014 has brought criticism from some locals.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t know if Palm Springs, the desert, is the right place for Disney,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.realtor.com\/news\/trends\/disneys-new-real-estate-development-storyliving-may-not-have-fairy-tale-ending\/\">said<\/a> Alan Long, managing director of a Los Angeles\u2013based real estate brokerage. \u201cWe\u2019re in a drought right now. Disney is going to have some real challenges on its hands.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Similarly, local resident Lucinda Crosby <a href=\"https:\/\/www.desertsun.com\/story\/opinion\/readers\/2022\/02\/19\/rancho-mirage-dont-get-taken-ride-disney\/6805736001\/\">called<\/a> the Disney development\u2019s planned lagoon a \u201cwater playground in a historic drought.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Disney hasn\u2019t yet swooped in with their PR magic to fix the bad press. Perhaps they\u2019ve learned from past residential living endeavors to take an arm\u2019s-length approach.<\/p>\n<p>The city of Celebration, Florida near Orlando began as a master-planned community that carved up some of that <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2019\/01\/21\/mary-poppins-forever-changed-family-world\/\">valuable Walt Disney World real estate<\/a>, with renowned neoclassical architects designing Main Street landmarks like a movie theater and city hall. It opened in 1996, following a <a href=\"https:\/\/celebrationfoundation.org\/what-we-do\/new-urbanism\/celebration-timeline\/\">much-hyped lottery of Disney fans<\/a> eager to get in.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Disney marketed Celebration as a throwback to 1950s middle America, albeit with pastel-colored homes and palm trees. But costs were prohibitive for most families, with reportedly high demands on homeowners to maintain a certain aesthetic. Businesses that moved to their town center dealt with many unmet promises over years.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<span class=\"4sGchuviqLmIWCFYeAHBDUrEzpJn69lMPxtQkVbOjfaS0Rwg7K528X31\"><\/p>\n[embedded content]\n<p><\/span>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Multiple issues reflected poor management. Several car accidents occurred around the idyllic town\u2019s retaining pond, with guardrails ultimately installed. A series of unrelated murders rocked the community. Less than a decade after founding the city, Disney divested of its management of the town in 2004, although it still owns most Celebration landmarks and several office buildings where white-collar Disney staff in finance and other departments work.<\/p>\n<p>With Golden Oak, also connected to their Orlando theme park, Disney dropped the charade that they were targeting middle-class families. Starting in 2011, the company began to sell those few dozen homes at exorbitant prices. Great views of nightly fireworks, if you can afford it.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Longtime Disney followers will also point out that EPCOT \u2014 an acronym for Experimental Prototype Community Of Tomorrow \u2014 <a href=\"https:\/\/fortheloveofthemouse.com\/2017\/10\/16\/epcot-walts-vision\/\">was envisioned<\/a> by Walt Disney as a futuristic residential community. Following Walt\u2019s death in 1966, the company spent a decade wrestling with various sketches and concepts to make his big idea work. They ultimately opened it as a theme park.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Cotino and other Storyliving by Disney residential communities will likely have more in common with walled-garden Golden Oak than the open-layout, imitation small-town Celebration.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"when-disney-obsession-becomes-unhealthy\">When Disney Obsession Becomes Unhealthy<\/h2>\n<p>For newly installed Disney Chief Executive Officer Bob Chapek, this Storyliving venture stands among his biggest moves. He started in their home video division during the \u201990s, when Disney churned out direct-to-video <a href=\"https:\/\/www.polygon.com\/features\/2019\/3\/28\/18261900\/best-disney-sequels-movies-animation\">cheapquels<\/a> like \u201cThe Fox and the Hound 2.\u201d So Chapek\u2019s moves so far \u2014 to <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2022\/02\/07\/outraged-disney-shareholders-want-ceo-bob-chapek-voted-out\/\">raise<\/a> theme park ticket prices, <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/02\/24\/disney-rewrites-han-and-leias-love-story-in-shameless-star-wars-hotel-marketing-ploy\/\">open<\/a> an overpriced Star Wars hotel, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thewrap.com\/walt-disney-imagineering-leadership-change-bob-weis-barbara-bouza\/\">move<\/a> the Imagineering creative team (long based near Disneyland in Anaheim) to Florida for cost reasons \u2014 perhaps aren\u2019t surprising. <\/p>\n<p>Hamby, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/reelfaith\/\">Orlando-area writer<\/a> who is also a pastor, says he doesn\u2019t \u201cpre-judge\u201d when his family sees an all-adults group decked out in Mickey ears at Walt Disney World. \u201cI don\u2019t know what they\u2019re going through,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s very possible that they\u2019ve had a loss in their family and are using Disney as an escape, to return to their childhood and help them cope.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But he does suggest two indicators of an \u201cunhealthy obsession\u201d with Disney and its alluring nostalgic brands. When theme park tickets, collectibles \u2014 and maybe a Disney-brand house \u2014 begin to \u201cwreck your personal finances\u201d and make it rough to pay bills, the fixation has gone off the monorail, said Hamby.<\/p>\n<p>Then there\u2019s another attitude he says he observes \u201call the time in a couple theme-park Facebook groups\u201d in which he participates. \u201cThey say, \u2018Couldn\u2019t we have a day where kids don\u2019t get to go to Disney and it\u2019s all adults? Then we don\u2019t have to trip over them.\u2019 Really? You want to exclude the ones this experience was intended for?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hamby adds: \u201cThere\u2019s probably a very much deeper conversation to have about adults not letting go of things really meant for children. They\u2019re kind of missing the whole point of it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Will those anti-child attitudes be present in Storyliving by Disney communities? Regardless, observers like real estate expert Sonia Hirt of the University of Georgia see Disney, that once-great American brand, being collapsed into one attribute: escapism.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you just create a community that is aesthetically pleasing, (will) other things go away?\u201d she <a href=\"https:\/\/www.realtor.com\/news\/trends\/disneys-new-real-estate-development-storyliving-may-not-have-fairy-tale-ending\/\">asked<\/a>. \u201cThere\u2019s always this desire to make a utopian tomorrow today, but so many times, tomorrow doesn\u2019t quite come.\u201d<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<p>\n  Josh Shepherd covers culture, faith, and public policy for several media outlets including The Stream. His articles have appeared in Christianity Today, Religion &#038; Politics, Faithfully Magazine, Religion News Service, and Providence Magazine. A graduate of the University of Colorado, he previously worked on staff at The Heritage Foundation and Focus on the Family. Josh and his wife live in the Washington, D.C. area with their two children.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the age of Disney-themed weddings and weekend Disney hotel stays that can run $6,000, the House of Mouse has hit on another strategy to shake down their devoted fans.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1383247","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1383247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383247\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1383247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1383247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1383247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}