Tammy Takaishi, left, Lauren Daly, Hannah Fiechtner and Justin Eakes work on their “Spy Twins” project at the Disney Imagineering headquarters in Glendale, Calif. The team was a finalist in the ImagiNations competition. All are Kansas University students except Takaishi, who attends the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

Ride of their lives

Kansas team makes finals in Disney design competition

By Terry Rombeck (Contact)

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Reader poll

What's your favorite type of amusement park ride?

Roller-coaster 77% 24 votes
Ferris wheel 3% 1 vote
Bumper cars 3% 1 vote
Carousel 9% 3 votes
Other 6% 2 votes

31 total votes.

Gary Krueger/Special to the Journal-World

The team’s entry, which was selected as a finalist in the competition, centered on a new amusement ride with a spy theme.

Special to the Journal-World

This poster was part of the presentation a team of Kansas University and University of Missouri-Kansas City students used to present their entry in the Disney ImagiNations competition. The students used a spy theme, and their entry was selected as one of 11 finalists.

Disney rides

Dinsney.com: A look at past projects in the competition

When she was a little girl, Hannah Fiechtner never thought about where the rides at Disney’s theme parks came from.

“You think they automatically show up there,” she says. “Poof — like magic. When you’re little, you think they have magicians on staff and never give it a second thought.”

After the past year, Fiechtner now realizes those rides are the result of a lot of hard work.

The Kansas University senior was part of a four-member team that recently was a finalist in Disney’s ImagiNations design competition.

The team — which consisted of three KU design majors and a student from the University of Missouri-Kansas City — was one of 11 finalist groups invited to Glendale, Calif., to meet with Disney “imagineers,” who are responsible for designing attractions at all 11 Disney theme parks.

“This was definitely a great opportunity,” says Fiechtner, who is from Sioux Falls, S.D. “Our degree is very much product-based — consumer electronics, cars, that sort of thing. I’m more interested in experiences, like them parks. They don’t offer that at our school.”

‘Spy Twins’

Members of the team, in addition to Fiechtner, were Lauren Daly, an Olathe senior; Justin Eakes, a Lawrence senior; and Tammy Takaishi, a music major at UMKC and friend of Daly.

Their task, which they started working on about a year ago, was to come up with a proposal for a ride, attraction, hotel or land within an existing Disney theme park or resort. This year’s finalists included a Disney airline, rides, an audio tour for people with visual impairments and an interactive attraction that uses Disney characters to teach about different cultures.

Fiechtner says the team decided early on to design a ride. They met with children in the Kansas City metropolitan area to get ideas and realized the children were united by an interest in spies.

“I would imagine it has something to do with a sense of adventure and the cool gadgetry,” Daly says.

Their end result was a ride called “Spy Twins.” At the start of the ride, Disney guests would enter the headquarters of the International Spy Organization, with a video of Mackenzie and Conner, the “spy twins,” playing.

An evil doctor would interrupt the broadcast to tell the guests he’s just stolen a computer chip with secret information on it. The guests then go on a “chase” to capture the evil doctor.

The ride itself is a roller-coaster combined with a three-dimensional screen.

The team created posters and sculptures to help explain the attraction.

Talent search

During their 11 days in California, the finalist teams made presentations about their proposals to Disney executives. They also interviewed for internships while they were there.

Disney has organized the competition for 16 years to identify potential future employees.

“For us, it’s really an opportunity to open our door to new creative talent,” says Allie Braswell, the Disney manager who oversees ImagiNations. “We want to see how fresh they are. They have to be relevant in their storytelling, innovative and creative. We’re looking for people from all walks of life, all different backgrounds.”

Though the projects presented for ImagiNations won’t be built by Disney, Braswell says several former competitors do work as “imagineers.” Once people are hired on, he says, they usually stay for a long time.

“I think that’s what the participants learned this year,” Braswell says. “It takes two to five years to build an attraction. It’s a challenge for them, but it’s a lot of fun. That’s why we have such longevity in the imagineering group. There’s nowhere else in the world you can do that.”

Next step

Though the KU and UMKC students didn’t win any of the overall awards, the students say it was worth their efforts.

“I’d have to say theme park ride design is No. 1 on my list” of employment interests, Fiechtner says.

Daly says she would love to work for Disney someday and be able to see one of her ideas become reality.

“That would be amazing,” she says, “to see something I’ve designed go up and be manufactured.”

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