Downtown Disney Downtown Disney Downtown Disney (officially the Downtown Disney District) is an outdoor shopping center located at the Disneyland Resort in Anaheim, California. It opened on January 12th, 2001; a component of the Disneyland Resort expansion project alongside the Disney California Adventure theme park and Disney's Grand Californian Hotel & Spa. Downtown Disney connects the two Disneyland Resort theme parks with its three resort hotels, running from the western side of the property's Esplanade to the Disneyland Hotel. West Street, which bordered Disneyland's western side, was rechristened Disneyland Drive and lowered to accommodate a pedestrian bridge that connects much of Downtown
Walt Disney Parks and Resorts theme parks hosted over 140.4 million guests, making Disney Parks the world's most visited theme park company worldwide,<ref name="TEA/AECOM"></ref> with United Kingdom-based Merlin Entertainments coming in second. It is by far Disney's largest business segment according to employee headcount, with approximately 130,000 of the company's 180,000 employees as of 2015. In March 2018, Parks and Resorts was merged with Disney Consumer Products and Interactive Media to form Walt Disney Parks, Experiences and Consumer Products. In 1949, Ice Capades added a Disney segment to its performances. Costumes from those shows were used at the opening of Disneyland in 1955 with some