Niles: Disneyland looks to accommodate all with new Mickey Mouse ride

Of all the new rides and attractions teased at Disney’s D23 Expo in Anaheim earlier this month, the first to open to the public likely will be Disneyland’s Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway. The anchor attraction for the reimagined Mickey’s Toontown is a trackless dark ride through a modern Mickey Mouse cartoon. But that’s not the most significant thing about this new ride.

Unlike many new “E ticket” attractions opened at the Disney theme parks in the recent past, Runaway Railway will not have a height restriction, at least if it follows its Florida predecessor. Guests of all ages will be able to ride. And that’s a smart move by Disney.

It’s not that there is some huge cohort of young children emerging that would move Disney to start building more rides to accommodate preschoolers. America’s long-running baby bust continues. But an aging population creates its own demands upon the theme park industry, Disney included.

There’s an old joke that we exit life as we enter it — bald, toothless and wearing diapers. Of course, many of us work hard to stay active as long as we can, and countless theme park fans enjoy roller coasters and other thrill rides deep into their golden years. But the bell curve tolls for extreme theme park attractions. The more intense a ride’s physical experience, the more limited its audience will be, often focusing on younger and more physically active visitors.

Over the past decades, as ride systems have advanced to allow more dynamic movement in a variety of environments, Disney’s Imagineers have taken advantage by creating new generations of innovative thrill rides: Star Tours, Indiana Jones Adventure, The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror, Soarin’, Radiator Springs Racers and — most recently — Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. As popular as each of these attractions have been, they have left some Disney visitors behind. Their height restrictions keep out younger riders, while their sometimes wild motion deters some older riders as well.