>>97990513I dunno, company towns are hardly a new idea, and honestly it's not like Disney cannot properly run things as diverse as theme parks, hotels, cruise liners, and shopping districts. Replace 'hotel guest' with 'apartment renter' and it's not that complicated.
I don't think Epcot would have met expectations as a 'city of the future', but it would probably have become the hub for Disneyworld going forward. At the very least it would be the perfect place for all of the park's staff to live and commute from, and would be a perfect place for hotels as well.
I've actually experienced a similar concept before in Washington DC, when I went to CPAC at the Gaylord Hotel (yes, conservatives come from all around the country to meet at a hotel called 'the Gaylord'). You had the hotel, with its big convention center, then around it you had various smaller hotels, shops and restaurants, and apartments above them. The thing about the Gaylord and it's complex is that it's the only thing in the area. If you want to go anywhere else, or do anything else, you have to take a shuttle or bus. That's the system. Bring people to a location for X, and keep them there so they spend money on Y and Z. That's what Epcot was going to be, and it would have worked well.
