Long Beach : Disney to Run Queen Mary If Port Pays All Expenses

The Walt Disney Co. has estimated that it could cost the Long Beach Harbor Department anywhere from $1 million to $2 million a month to keep the Queen Mary tourist attraction open, according to city officials.

Although Disney will stop operating the Queen Mary and Spruce Goose attractions at the end of September, the company has offered to continue managing the landmarks afterward, provided the port pays all the expenses of keeping them open.

Recently Disney estimated those costs would run at least $1 million a month, setting off cries of complaint from one councilman and raising the possibility that the hotel portion of the Queen Mary might be closed after September to save money.

Upon hearing the figures, Councilman Warren Harwood protested that the stage was being set “for abandonment of the ship.” The port, he predicted, will point to the expense as justification for dumping the 1930s ocean liner.

Other officials, emphasizing that no decision has been made on the ship’s future, say an outside consultant may be called in to verify the Disney estimates. “I think it’s still very fluid,” Councilman Evan Anderson Braude said.

Nonetheless, he added that if the Disney cost projections prove correct, there probably would be support for closing the hotel at the end of September and for getting rid of the ship entirely. “If they’re accurate figures, we’re not going to hold onto it,” Braude said.

In the meantime, the port is planning to hire a consulting team to suggest development schemes for the Queen Mary site, both with and without the stately liner and the Spruce Goose, Howard Hughes’ “Flying Boat.”