It's gut wrenching to think of the original big cats housed here, but it just looks so like a children's zoo book of old, I can see why it appeals to the visitors.
May be it could house smaller cats such as geoffroy's cat in stead.
I don't think this was a big cats cage... It was used for bears up until the 50's?. Lions and tigers were housed in the old big cat row up until 92-93? were the cheetahs are now. The metallic lion is used to denote its current use as part of the new lion enclosure.
I think this is a great example of zoo history, it shows how far zoos have come, but it is good for zoos to display such old enclosures in this way. It is far too easy to demolish them these days.