Walt Disney World Resort (also known as Walt Disney World, and colloquially as Disney World), is the world's largest and most-visited recreational resort. Located approximately 21 miles (34 km) southwest of Orlando, Florida, United States, the resort covers an area of 30,080-acre (47.00 sq mi; 121.7 km2) and includes four theme parks, two water parks, 23 on-site themed resort hotels (excluding eight that are on-site, but not owned by the Walt Disney Company), including a campground, two health spas and physical fitness centers, and other recreational venues and entertainment.
It opened on October 1, 1971 with only the Magic Kingdom theme park and has since added Epcot (October 1, 1982), Disney's Hollywood Studios (May 1, 1989) and Disney's Animal Kingdom (April 22, 1998).
To avoid a burst of land speculation, Disney used various dummy corporations to acquire 27,443 acres (11,106 ha) of land.[2] Some of these names are memorialized on a window above Main Street, U.S.A. in the Magic Kingdom
Despite marketing claims and popular misconceptions, the Florida resort is not located within Orlando city limits and is actually located about 21 miles (34 km) southwest of Orlando within southwestern Orange County, with the remainder in adjacent Osceola County. The property include the cities of Lake Buena Vista and Bay Lake which are governed by the Reedy Creek Improvement District.
The 25,000 acres (101 km2; 39 sq mi)[4] site is accessible from Central Florida's Interstate 4 via Exits 62B (World Drive), 64B (US 192 West), 65B (Osceola Parkway West), 67B (SR 536 West), and 68 (SR 535 North), and Exit 8 on State Road 429 (Florida), the Western Expressway. At its peak, the resort occupied approximately 30,000 acres (120 km2) or 47 square miles (120 km²), about the size of San Francisco, or twice the size of Manhattan. Portions of the property since have been sold or de-annexed, including land now occupied by the Disney-built community of Celebration
During the resort's early planning stages, Walt Disney referred to the project as Project X, The Florida Project, Disney World, and The Disney World. Early visual references used the same medieval font as Disneyland. Walt Disney was very involved in the site selection and project planning in the years before his death. The secretive names were chosen because of the high confidentiality of the project during the initial planning. After Walt Disney's death, Roy O. Disney added the name Walt to Disney World as a permanent tribute to his brother.
The resort's original logo had an oversized "D" with a Mickey Mouse-shaped globe containing latitude and longitude lines, with the property's name presented in a modern, sans-serif font. Walt Disney World Resort retired its original font and symbol during its 25th anniversary celebration in 1996–97. The old "D" symbol still can be found in many places, however, including the SpectroMagic title float, the front car of each monorail, manhole covers, select merchandise items and flags flown at several sites across the property.
As part of a competition run by Disney for 2010, Walt Disney World Resort has an unofficial twinning (sister city) with Swindon, England, since 2009
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