Universal U.K. Set To Take Visitors From Disneyland Paris Says Government

Disneyland Paris may look more empty when Universal United Kingdom opens. (Photo by Lyvans Boolaky/Getty Images)

Getty Images

Disneyland Paris is expected to lose visitors to Universal’s upcoming theme park in the United Kingdom according to a new report by the U.K. government which is partly funding the 540 acre resort.

Due to open in 2031, Universal United Kingdom is set to feature a 500-room hotel, a sprawling shopping and dining district and a movie-themed park tipped to have rides based on Jurassic World, Back to the Future, Paddington and Harry Potter. It is Universal’s first park in the U.K. and it isn’t cutting any corners for its premiere.

Universal is investing $8 billion (£6 billion) in the complex which is being built on the site of a former brickworks between the historic cities of Oxford and Cambridge. The project is due to create 20,000 jobs during construction and a further 8,000 jobs once the resort is running. It is forecast that by 2055 it will have generated around $66 billion (£50 billion) in economic impact so the U.K. government has rolled out the red carpet for it.

The government is spending $626 million (£474 million) on upgrading local roads and railways while a further $1.1 billion will be paid to Universal in two stages. Once Universal has completed its work on the community infrastructure, the government’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) will hand it a $579 million (£438 million) grant with a subsidy of $528 million (£400 million) paid when the resort opens.

As this author revealed in the Daily Mail, company filings show that the DCMS has the right to seize the land if Universal breaches its obligations in its agreement with the government though there is no suggestion that will happen. In fact, the park is set to have a magic touch.

In its first year, 8.5 million visitors are due to stream through the park’s turnstiles rising up to 12.5 million within 20 years which would put it ahead of Disneyland Paris as Europe’s most-visited theme park. The dark spell it could cast on Disney’s Parisian outpost is outlined in a report produced in August by the Subsidy Advice Unit (SAU), part of the U.K. government’s Competition and Markets Authority.

The SAU has to review subsidies that are higher than $33 million (£25 million) and the payment to Universal passes that threshold. The reasons for granting the subsidy are outlined in the SAU’s report along with details of which local competitors could suffer most from Universal’s arrival. “At the international level, the assessment identifies Disneyland Paris as the closest competitor,” says the report. It adds that Universal’s U.K. resort “is expected to attract some visitors who would otherwise have visited competing attractions overseas, particularly other European theme parks, including Disneyland Paris.”

It presents a particular risk as more visitors to Disneyland Paris typically come from the U.K. than any other country outside France. They have had a roller coaster ride in recent years. In 2023 the direct rail link between London and Disneyland Paris was canceled and since then they have faced lengthy queues at airport border checkpoints due to the introduction of the European Union’s Entry/Exit System for U.K. citizens. The surge in the price of oil due to the war in the Middle East is another challenge as 54% of Disneyland Paris visitors get there by car, with 32% arriving by plane or train and 14% by local rail and coaches according to data the resort released in 2016.

In the U.K., the SAU report identified “Merlin Entertainments as the competitor most likely to be affected by the project.” Part-owned by the investment firm that controls the Lego Group, Merlin runs Alton Towers, which is the U.K.’s most-visited theme park even though it had just 2.5 million guests in 2024 according to the latest data from the Themed Entertainment Association (TEA).

The report downplays the risk of cannibalization due to the overall increase in tourism. It explains that “any potential displacement from wider U.K. attractions, including museums, heritage attractions, wildlife attractions and other visitor destinations, would only represent a low share of the overall market and may be partly offset by additional domestic and international visitors attracted by the project.” So even if Universal poaches visitors from other U.K. attractions it should ultimately open them up to a wider audience and that really is a happy ending.