We know, we know – the news of Australia's first Disneyland coming to Melbourne has been wheeled out several times over the years, but there seems to be genuine momentum building with a local politician getting behind the idea. Last year, fresh speculation swirled that Melbourne could be the next home of Mickey and Minnie, with our city's mayor even jumping on the hype and giving her support to the campaign. Now, a Victorian MP is also joining the push for Melbourne to become home to the theme park known as the happiest place on earth.
We can totally see it happening – there’s no doubt that Melburnians would jump at the chance to ride Space Mountain, hug our fave characters, eat pretzels as big as our heads and take adorable pics in front of Sleeping Beauty’s castle.
Libertarian MP for Melbourne’s South East metropolitan area David Limbrick has called on the state government to work with Disney, after the entertainment company announced last year that it was upping its theme park budget to a massive $90 billion. He even declared that he'd narrowed down the best locations in the state for the attraction after extensive research, which all happen to be in his own electorate, in the outer South East. He flagged the suburbs of Frankston, Cranbourne and Dandenong as the top spots, claiming residents would welcome the iconic theme park to the area.
Limbrick is calling on Victoria's tourism minister, Steve Dimopoulous, to set up a meeting with Disney and get the ball rolling.
There have been rumours that the iconic theme park could open in Melbourne for a looong time, and potential plans even got as far as Disney execs visiting Australia back in 2005 to scout locations, but sadly nothing eventuated.
Previous Melbourne locations that have been in the mix include Avalon, Docklands or Fishermen’s Bend – we don’t care where it is, we just hope this dream becomes reality.
Even though nothing has been confirmed just yet, there's plenty of excitement in the air. As always, watch this space for more info as it comes through.
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