Wizarding World - Diagon Alley Discussion (Opens 2014)

[Hatetofly]

Wait a mintue, HE track installed behind Mummy? They are moving pretty fast on this. Any word on first tech runthrough dates?

The tech is being tested in a soundstage as we type, but as far as full scale test runs I've heard late September to early October.

Wow...that entrance/street is NARROW. Feel claustrophobic just thinking about it. can you imagine what HHN will be like?

Let me prepare myself to get a lashing One thing is yeah the narrow path will be a nightmare but the one thing I'm hoping helps out is how much larger the area is here. Not to mention people will want to experience the entire land through both parks so maybe that might help and Universal has two new attractions and a new area to pull crowds elsewhere.

Second of all and this is where I think I'll hear it is, I don't think either section of Potter will be accessible for HHN's for the foreseeable future. I think this year we will see the dual park layout return as they try to use this year to work out any kinks using this new layout.

 

[TheLastAshen]

ooooooooo good stuff, Hatetofly! Who wants to start placing bets on when they will start puting up the presumably prefab London facades to block our view....?

 

[USO92]

I say within the next 3 months

 

[JungleSkip]

I say within the next 3 months

I'd love for it to be before I go in May, but I'm not holding my breath.

 

[ReelJustice]

So from the looks of it its definitely going to be based on the real Kings Cross not St Panc. Kings Cross is double arched though and there only seems to be room for this one so do you think it will be one half of the front of Kings Cross.

Another thing trains run down the length of these arches in reality however HExpress is not parallel to the station in these pictures. Presumably you'll walk through tickets and maybe past a mock track and idle train before queuing through platform 9 3/4 and boarding HE.

You won't see the arches from London, they'll be blocked by the St. Pancras facade. You can already see steel in front of the arches :wave:

 

[Frogki]

All I can say is wow at this progress. I'm loving all this steel going up. Especially the train station - that curved roof is going to be beautiful!

 

[andy85]

You won't see the arches from London, they'll be blocked by the St. Pancras facade. You can already see steeling front of the arches :wave:

Ah i see, thanks for clearing that up. Can't wait to go back to Orlando when this is done, wen't to the WB Studio Tour last week and wandering around Diagon and seeing all the carts from Gringotts got me really psyched up!

 

[the last chronicler]

Knockturn will (I believe) be in the location where the left tower crane sits (in your picture). It is the alley in the line drawing that closes to a very narrow triangle. I am not sure where you are hearing that it will be covered and I don't believe this to be the case.

There is clearly a covered route right inside the largest building mass. I marked it of and checked the clip from the 6th film. You enter Knockturn Alley via a long arched tunnel that opens to a very compressed group of buildings. This is consistent with what I marked off. (Although I didn't realize the tunnels in the films are mainly an entrance).

Plus this would be consistent with TPIs 1/3-of-the-park statement as to the scale.

 

[andy85]

If they're basing it on the set, then the entrance to knockturn alley is on your right when you stand outside the front door of Gringotts at the tour.

 

[Teebin]

There is clearly a covered route right inside the largest building mass.

I do not see any clearly covered routes in the photo that you posted. Right now, it is merely a bunch of unfinished steel work. Anyone else see these "clearly marked" tunnels?

 

[andy85]

I do not see any clearly covered routes in the photo that you posted. Right now, it is merely a bunch of unfinished steel work. Anyone else see these "clearly marked" tunnels?

Not really, there is definitely a track where he's marked out the tunnel but that may just be for vehicle access?

 

[usfgeek]

I'm amazed at how fast that steel has gone up! I know it's pretty hard to make out what's what in that tangled mess of steel so from now on i'll be creating the expansion in 3D as the weeks go on to help everyone, including me, get a more cohesive look at we're looking at.

I'll try and get all the details at perfect as i can as they appear. So for now this is what I've made..

If any one wants to chime in and tell me if there's anything wrong with the layout, please do and i'll post updated versions.

 

[Hockeyman55]

I'm amazed at how fast that steel has gone up! I know it's pretty hard to make out what's what in that tangled mess of steel so from now on i'll be creating the expansion in 3D as the weeks go on to help everyone, including me, get a more cohesive look at we're looking at.

I'll try and get all the details at perfect as i can as they appear. So for now this is what I've made..

If any one wants to chime in and tell me if there's anything wrong with the layout, please do and i'll post updated versions.

Pretty cool. Thanks USFgeek :thumbs:

 

[ReelJustice]

I do not see any clearly covered routes in the photo that you posted. Right now, it is merely a bunch of unfinished steel work. Anyone else see these "clearly marked" tunnels?

I see what they're talking about. I noticed it in earlier aerials where there were sections divided by orange fencing and there seemed to be a path, but I assumed that was for construction purposes (or for backstage walkways for TMs.)

ETA: love the model USFgeek. I would cover the entrance to the arches with St. Pancras (tall tower on the left corner and flat front to arch tunnel.)

 

[Mr.Auror]

I see the covered path. I could see them using that as a way to get to KA. Actually, that would allow a separate path from the initial "go down the main drag and turn at Gringotts" entrance to KA. That way it would free up some space from the main DA pathway. But then again, we won't know for sure for at least a while. Whhaaah this is all coming together so quickly! I mean, the fact that we have a main DA strip and can start REALLY speculating shop locations and layouts is all very exciting, don't you think?

 

[Teebin]

That large area with the hole on the back of the building will probably become the service entrance for the Leaky Cauldron. Like the Magic Neep, it will probably have themed doors with a sign like, "Thestral Carriage & Stable". I would guess that as much as 30% of this new building will be for food service. Think of the massive kitchen and refrigeration area for Broomsticks.

 

[Manx27]

And yet another thing. A google map link with pushpin. Anyone have a guess what this is? It is somewhat important...

http://goo.gl/maps/209VR

I drove by this location and got a few pics. I didn't want to linger 'cause there were Nassal guys eyeballin me.
There were hundreds of these frameworks all lined up and they were working on more too.

 

[JungleSkip]

Looks like rock work.

Gringotts interior?

 

[usfgeek]

Looks like rock work.

Gringotts interior?

Definitely.

 

[illumination]

In the above photo showing an overview of the construction, what is the area I circled? Is it a guest area in DA, or is it behind-the-scenes or used for the Gringott's queue? Didn't know if this would be part of the main pathways of DA or not.