On the Minecraft land speculation - it did say in the research survey that there would be 1-2 indoor attractions, 3-4 outdoor rides plus themed retail/f&b with optional interactive wristbands. We can see from the plans that there are 2 indoor rides, one existing outdoor ride outlined plus the playscape and use of the terms interactive/fully themed/immersive experiences - this kind of 'fits the brief'.
It feels far better suited to Chessington than Alton Towers (I'd like to see Alton rely solely on their own IP other than Cbeebies) purely because it has a mystical and 'lore' based feel to me! I want Towers to continue to tell stories using their amazing landscape and history. I did see a comment somewhere about Universal (US) possibly getting Minecraft rights, not sure how that would impact Merlin here if UK Universal goes ahead?
IP is a good thing for Chessy though & having more portals to different IP lands like Jumanji, possibly Minecraft, Julia Donaldson etc works really well for families with younger/pre-teen children. It's great to see so much potential development in the pipeline! Looking forward to more reveals over the next couple of years.