Following in the footsteps of the Disney Train and Station, Disney World Castle, and the original Disney Castle, LEGO has released their newest set based on a Disney theme park property, 43302 Main Street, USA. This set scales Disneyland’s iconic Main Street USA down to minifigure scale, including three of the more iconic buildings, a bunch of minifigs, a popcorn stand, a fire truck, and new “Mickey Ears” pieces galore.

When LEGO offered to provide BrickNerd with the set, I knew that I had to find a place for it in my amusement park layout, which I’ve writ ten about before including this article involving a couple of the other Disney Parks sets. Some might find my interest in this set surprising (after all I’m not a “Disney Adult”) because the set doesn’t have rides or motion, and it’s not as visually striking as something like the Loop Coaster .

I was lucky enough to visit Disneyland as a kid a few times. From the time I got lost on Tom Sawyer’s island (R.I.P. in Disney World), to being there in the pouring rain, and, yes, even throwing up in the parking lot after too much cotton candy, I have a lot of warm, fuzzy feelings about the place. In addition, as a certified “Middle Age Dad®” I have strong feelings about the way things used to be. But the Disneyland of today is obviously geared to today’s kids, which makes sense. And to be clear, I’m not upset about it, I’m glad they’ve updated it. That said, the park is almost unrecognizable to my warm, fuzzy feelings.

One thing that has not changed is Main Street, USA. This is obviously a deliberate choice by Disney, and it’s written into the attraction’s core DNA. Based on Walt Disney’s own hometown of Marceline, Missouri, Main Street USA is designed to feel familiar to visitors the very first time they see it. It’s one of the few parts of the park that look the same from when I went as a kid. While I can recognize that getting a LEGO set based on Main Street, USA before, say, The Matterhorn or Epcot, may seem strange, it makes perfect sense to me.

When the box arrived, I began building with the goal of incorporating the set into my home amusement park.

MILS Plates Conversion

A few years ago I began the process of converting my amusement park to the MILS standard. MILS, or Modular Integrated Landscaping System, uses plates on top of bricks on top of baseplates to build the floor level of your MOC. This style of building is expensive, both in brick resources and actual cash. Each MILS plate needs dozens of bricks and plates, but the tradeoff is a vastly more stable base that makes updating a layout much easier. In addition, you can build ‘down’ for water features, or tunnel cords under for lights and motors. If you’re able to make the investment, it’s worth it.

Main Street, USA set has three buildings, each of which they intend for you to build on a standard 16x32 baseplate. I went ahead and ignored those and built them on spare plates I had.

This worked fine for the most part, but I didn’t have enough large plates and had to improvise here and there. For the next building, I built on the plates I had and trusted that the building would eventually connect the two plates, which it did. The bottom was obviously less stable, but as it’s all going on a MILS plate, it was fine.

From there, it was just a matter of finishing the set as instructed. For Disney fans, there are a ton of of fun details in the set to discover. As I built, I started noticing Easter eggs everywhere, from the recreation of Walt Disney’s apartment above the Fire Station—complete with the iconic lamp that still burns in his window—to tiny models of attractions like the Disneyland Railroad, Sleeping Beauty Castle, and the Haunted Mansion tucked inside the Emporium.

The shops are filled with miniature Disney merchandise referencing franchises and LEGO sets including Star Wars, Marvel, Tangled, WALL-E, Up, Toy Story, and more, while the streets feature the Dapper Dans barbershop quartet, Mickey and Minnie ear hats, popcorn carts, churros, and even Disneyland’s distinctive green trash cans. A green bench beside the Fire Station also appears to nod to the Griffith Park bench where Walt Disney is said to have first imagined Disneyland.

Next step was to build the MILS plate. When I build MILS plates, I try to avoid ordering new pieces and focus on using the pieces I have on hand, which means I rarely follow the MILS recipe exactly. The space I had in my park was 32x80, which gives me space for the buildings as well as a small stretch of the street in Main Street. In this case, knowing that I’d never separate these buildings, I built one monster MILS plate rather than two and a half and connecting them with pins.

Once I had the buildings placed, I realized I needed to rearrange the buildings as it will need to avoid a Ferris Wheel in its final location. I also rearranged the lamp posts based on the length of LED wire I had on hand.

Lights On

When I think of Main Street, I think of the lights coming on at dusk and the parades, and I knew I wanted to incorporate that. The theme of this build was doing the most with what I had on hand, so after harvesting from a few mid-flight projects, I had the following available from Brickstuff:

5 white Pico LED strands
1 expansion board to connect the LEDs to power
1 power Functions converter cord

The ends of the LED strands, as well as the Power Functions cable simply plug into the expansion board. I do recommend tweezers, as the plugs are very tiny and I was having trouble plugging them in with my big, dumb hands.

Lighting is one of the places where MILS plates really shine. I was able to hide the wires for the most part by tucking them under the planters. For the lampposts, I wound the cord around and under the post.

For the most part, you can just put plates on top of the wires, as they’re so thin. For certain sections, like a 90° bend, we need to be more careful, so I threaded it through a round 1x2 plate with holes.

After lighting the lampposts, I decided to use the other 2 LEDs to light up the Crystal Arcade sign.

And now it’s ready for placement in my layout!

Ears On Parade

Main Street, USA is also the home of the parade each evening at both Disneyland and Disney World, so it seemed fitting to incorporate recent sets, 43212 Disney Celebration Parade and 43264 Toy Story Celebration Parade into a representation of the nightly spectacle, as well as the fire truck that came with Main Street and its four Dapper Dans.

I’ve wanted a parade in my park for a while, but never got around to it. In fact, I had both of these, unopened, so this set brought some serendipity and helped continue the theme of using what I already had. I think it does a pretty good job of capturing the spirit of Main Street.

Disaster Interlude

Naturally, in getting ready to place it into its spot in my amusement park, the whole build shifted in my hands, and I lost the Emporium to gravity.

While I was able to recover all the pieces and reassemble it, it sadly ripped the cable that brings power to the LEDs and I don’t have a replacement at the moment. Main Street, USA’s final location is a corner of the amusement park that’s difficult to reach, so I don’t want to place it until I solve my power issues. In the meantime, Main Street will live closer to the castle on a shelf. I used some half technic pins to cover the front of the MILS plate to make it slightly more attractive.

Seeing it on the shelf makes me want to leave it there and build a gondola ride to the castle. Maybe next time!

At the end of the day, I think that’s why this set works so well. Main Street, USA isn’t the biggest landmark at Disney parks, but it’s the part that ties everything together. Every visit starts there, every visit ends there, and now it does the same thing in my LEGO amusement park. Once I replace the broken power cable and get it into its permanent home, I think it’ll feel like it was always supposed to be there.

LEGO Disney 43302 Main Street, USA is available for around US $400 | EU €350 | CA $570 | UK £320 | AU $550.

DISCLAIMER: This set was provided to BrickNerd by LEGO. Any opinions expressed in this article are those of the author.

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