Walt Disney World's Test Track to close June 2024 to begin reimagining

Apr 05, 2024 in "Test Track"

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Gallery / 5 Photos
New Test Track concept art

Posted: Friday April 5, 2024 9:25am ET by WDWMAGIC Staff

Disney has announced that Test Track will close starting June 17, 2024, to begin work on the new version of the popular EPCOT thrill ride.

Concept art showing the new exterior of the reimagined Test Track

In this new piece of concept art, we see the new entrance marquee and note the removal of the overhead entrance area canopy to reveal a more sleek arrival area. The concept art also retains the existing outdoor track and suggests that it remains open and will not be enclosed.

Concept rendering of the exterior track section

Concept art of new Test Track marquee and entrance

Disney previously announced that Imagineers, along with teams from Chevrolet, are reaching back into history for inspiration – from the original World of Motion – and bringing that spirit of optimism to the next iteration of the Test Track attraction at EPCOT.

New Test Track concept art

Details of the ride experience are scarce, but Disney has released a piece of concept art of the new experience. The look of the concept art suggests that Test Track may be moving into the EV era.

New Test Track concept art

The current version of Test Track opened in December 2012, and as part of Chevrolet's sponsorship deal with Disney, the attraction is due for a refresh. The last day to ride the current version of Test Track will be June 16, 2024.

Test Track at EPCOT

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UNCgolf5 days ago

The pre-show is nice but the ride is still bad.

Fox&Hound5 days ago

I did the exact same thing. Maybe that is why I think the ride is so poor? Have you done the real pre-show? Did it change your impression of the ride?

Jayspency5 days ago

Changing the subject back to Test Track, do we have any theories about what specifically will be in the new version?

etc985 days ago

Funny that both GOTG rides have this issue. Cosmic Rewind also builds up a ton of urgency in the preshow and then tosses you into another slow moving line

andre856 days ago

Especially as the boiler room is the least changes room from ToT, practically looking the same, which definitely feels off thematically. I wonder...do they actually need to use as much of that post pre-show queue as they do? Cutting that down would be an somewhat quick fix to it dragging down the energy Side note: Am I the only one who found the new pre-show to just kind of end abruptly? Like it just runs out of steam and stops lol. Feels like it needs at least one more like from Rocket or something

Jayspency6 days ago

Uh… FLY!!! 🏆🏆🏆

splah6 days ago

i don't mind the boiler room wait because you can see the finish line. but for me GOTG falters becaue, you waited a long time then the preshow builds up the energy that we need to be on the move quickly and then it's another 20 minutes to get on the ride. the preshow to onboard time should decrease with the more energy in the preshow. ToT and HM are slower atmospheric experiences to start so taking it slow after makes sense, but GOTG loses all the momentum it built up in the preshow The acting/delivery of the FoP preshow drags the experience down.

C33Mom7 days ago

After I posted last night, it occurred to me that pre-show plus bonus line is one of the more egalitarian things Disney has adopted lately. It makes the experience better for occasional and low skill visitors but slows down park experts, ride warriors, and people who can pay $$ to skip lines.

andre857 days ago

The Boiler Room at DCA is notable larger (and worse imo), and I'm pretty sure usually takes longer than at WDW

C33Mom7 days ago

I might just have terrible luck, but we did Mission Breakout yesterday, tapped LL at 6:50, was in the preshow by 6:52 and didn’t get on the elevator until 7:15– both the upstairs and downstairs elevators were loading… as we queued up the stairs it did look like the downstairs queue was shorter. When we were at ToT in August, the queue was all the way back to where you leave the pre-show room. I have had it be a 10m wait or less, but I’d say that’s less than half the time— it’s possible the DLR version is worse.

FiestaFunKid8 days ago

On balance, IMO a preshow is probably better than a non-discript line. However, longer preshows can suffer from poor repeatability (Muppets for example is rough for me now, but Soarin' is ok). I guess I can only speculate on what's not there, but I'm not sure I'd prefer on rides I've riden over and over again (Thunder, Splash, HM, Pirates, SE), etc

MisterPenguin8 days ago

Are you saying the pre-shows makes it take longer to get to the ride?

DisneyCane8 days ago

On the pre-show thing, I think it depends on if you consider the pre-show an integral part of the attraction. If you do, then your wait time was only however long you waited up until the pre-show. If you don't then it's a longer queue disguised as part of the attraction. IMO, in something like HM, ToT or RotR, the pre-show is definitely an integral part of the attraction. In FoP, not so much. For both pre-shows in there I'm just counting the seconds until it ends and I can get to the ride. For my first examples, if I had an option of a 10 minute wait and all I got to do was the pre-show or a 2 hour wait for the entire attraction I'd actually just do the pre-show sometimes.