2008-09 Need 450 Acres Near Disney?

KISSIMMEE (Orlando Sentinel) – One of Osceola County's grandest tourism visions remains an illusion. A 450-acre tract planned for a theme park mixing magic and Transcendental Meditation remains vacant in the tourism corridor. Almost two decades later, the two men behind the project are dead, and the land has a $150 million price tag. The former plant farm has remained a swatch of green foliage and wetlands that runs for nearly three-quarters of a mile among U.S. 192's glitz and kitsch, flanked by Old Town and a Cracker Barrel. Vedaland, which means land of knowledge, was announced with much fanfare in 1989 by magician Doug Henning and the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, a guru to The Beatles who introduced the West to Transcendental Meditation. Henning died of cancer in 2000, and the Maharishi died at his home in the Dutch town of Vlodrop this year. A Maharishi subsidiary closed on the property in 1990 for $20 million in cash. In 1996, it was on the market for $60 million after the group shifted efforts to a site in Niagara Falls, Ontario. The park plan originally included a building seemingly suspended above water without supports, a "magic flying chariot" that took riders inside the molecular structure of a rose, and robots that would fly through the air, performing magic tricks. The development was projected to cost $1 billion. The backers spent hundreds of thousands of dollars planning the project and getting government approvals, which expired years ago. While the property is listed on tax rolls as agricultural land because of a tree-farming operation, an Internet sales listing cites a study that "suggests potential development scenarios up to 800,000 square feet of commercial space and as many as 4,300 multifamily residential units." While the tract is zoned for a planned development, the original approvals expired in 2005. A new owner would have to start the process from the beginning, county officials said.