Over the past few years, Disney has started or announced a lot of projects and then backtracked on them.

Just to name a few, we have the Mary Poppins attraction in EPCOT‘s UK Pavilion, a refurbishment to Spaceship Earth, the PLAY! Pavilion reimagining (formerly known as the Wonders of Life Pavilion), as well as an ENTIRE hotel, Reflections — A Disney Lakeside Lodge. We haven’t heard any official news on this hotel in a long time, but here’s why some fans of the idea may think it could still happen.

Reflections — A Disney Lakeside Lodge was first announced in 2018. In March of that year, Disney filed permits for a new mystery development labeled “Project 89” to be built in an area right near Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground, where the remnants of River Country — Walt Disney World’s original revolutionary water park —  had mostly been rotting since its abrupt closure in 2001. 

On October 18th, 2018, Disney officially announced that the “Project 89” was going to be a new deluxe hotel and 16th vacation club property on the site. Further information was released the following month at the Destination D event where then-Disney Parks, Experiences and Products chairman Bob Chapek announced the resort’s name as Reflections – A Disney Lakeside Lodge. 

During this event, it was also confirmed that the resort would house approximately 900 rooms and DVC villas, and be themed around characters from nature-based Disney films including including Bambi, Brother Bear, The Fox and the Hound, and Pocahontas. Reflections was initially scheduled to open in 2022. 

At the time of the announcement, Terri Schultz — then Senior Vice President and General Manager of Disney Vacation Club — said the resort would be a “celebration of Walt Disney’s lifelong love and respect for nature, with some fun and even surprising accommodation types that families will find irresistible. It will give our members and guests yet another opportunity to stay in close proximity to all the newest attractions and experiences in our theme parks, and with the flexibility, value and world-class service families expect from Disney.”

Construction work was on-going on the site throughout 2019, including the draining and demolition of all the River Country slide structures and pools, which was completed by that April. In addition, further announcements about the hotel — including that it would house a “lakeside restaurant” featuring characters from The Princess and the Frog — were announced at the 2019 D23 Expo. Like much in the world, all this progress came to an abrupt end in 2020.

When Walt Disney World closed due to the COVID pandemic in March of 2020, work on Reflections shut down with everything else. However, it did not resume even after the rest of the resort had reopened that July. By the time Imagineering filed a permit to “remove office trailers from property” in April of 2021, many assumed that was the final death knell for Reflections. The site remained clear, but with little activity through 2023. 

Aerial photo of site of Reflections: A Disney Lakeside Lodge. pic.twitter.com/JUwjj9tGUA

— bioreconstruct (@bioreconstruct) September 23, 2023

The general consensus was that Disney had silently scrapped the project…until we noticed Disney extended their permits.

Back in October 2023, Disney renewed the permits they filed for Reflections. The permit extension was originally submitted in June 2023, which basically just extended the possibility of this land being used for something within the next 5 years. 

So why renew this permit then? It could be because Disney may choose to continue with plans for this hotel in the next 5 years. However, it’s more likely that it was so the massive Fort Wilderness cabin refurbishment could be completed. And that’s close to being done — those cabins will be available starting in July. The permit is for work on a specific spot that could ultimately be a staging area for construction on Disney’s Fort Wilderness cabins.

Now, there’s no way to confirm or deny this, as Disney hasn’t specifically announced that Reflections is entirely scrapped, or that the new Fort Wilderness cabins are taking up the entirety of this space.

On one hand, it would likely make sense for Disney to revisit the project, as hotel rooms in the Magic Kingdom resort area are pretty much always in demand, which might only spike higher if the rumored and teased Magic Kingdom expansion actually occurs.

However, on the other hand, the company may decide to move on from the original Reflections concept — which has now been publicly available for almost 7 years — and instead focus on a new theme for a hotel on this valuable real estate. 

We can actually find a similar example of Disney doing the latter in the recent past. Back in the early 2000s, Disney was building the value resort we now know as Pop Century. The original plan for the hotel was to have the 1950s-1990s Classic Years buildings we have today on one side on Hourglass Lake and the 1900s-1940s Legendary Years on the other. However, following the 9/11 attacks and related travel slowdown (which ironically also played a role in the closure of River Country) Disney halted construction on the Legendary Years, only opening the Classic Years in 2003.

For the next 7 years, the buildings already constructed for the Legendary Years sat abandoned, fully in site of Pop Century guests. Finally in 2010, Disney announced that they would be resuming construction on the site. However, instead of completing Pop Century, the area was turned into the Art of Animation resort, which opened to great success in 2012. 

We’ll just have to wait and see if there’s any more forward motion on this new DVC resort. We’ll keep you updated with everything we hear, so stay tuned to DFB!

Here’s why Disney World just scrapped all these projects

How do you feel about this potentially scrapped project? Tell us in the comments!