This Saturday Florida’s Disney World will re-open to the public and while some Disney fans are thrilled, others are worried as Florida is among the 12 states that hit a record-high in COVID-19 cases this week.

California is hitting record numbers as well, but that park is not reopening. Last month Disney announced its California attraction will not reopen on the same timeline as the Florida parks, blaming a lack of guidance from the state.

In its statement, Disney explains: “The State of California has now indicated that it will not issue theme park reopening guidelines until sometime after July 4. Given the time required for us to bring thousands of cast members back to work and restart our business, we have no choice but to delay the reopening of our theme parks and resort hotels until we receive approval from government officials.”

Disney plans to announce a reopening date for the California parks and resort when it has a clearer understanding of the state’s expectations.

“Once we have a clearer understanding of when guidelines will be released, we expect to be able to communicate a reopening date,” the company added.


Meanwhile, Universal Orlando reopened Florida parks on June 1, and SeaWorld reopened its parks on June 11.

According to CNN, the theme parks capacity will be “significantly limited to comply with governmental requirements and promote physical distancing.”

Visitors to theme parks this summer can expect to submit temperature checks before being admitted, increased cleaning measures, including capacity limits, frequent closures of rides to allow for cleaning and disinfection, and changes in how meals can be ordered and served at the parks.

“We’ve done everything we can to open up responsibly,” Bob Chapek, Disney’s CEO, told CNN Business last month. “Taking the guidance of local health officials, state health officials, national health officials, plus our own well-qualified doctors on staff to create an environment to create new operating procedures, to create new policies, to do new training, new standards of hygiene.”

Still, it’s a hopeful sign that summer 2020 isn’t entirely canceled—maybe just delayed.

[A version of this post was published June 11, 2020. It has been updated.]