Is 'Pre-booking Essential' still in force in European Zoos?
- Thread starter Pertinax
- Start date
Haliaeetus
Well-Known Member
It isn't no longer compulsory in the main French zoos.
A lot of visitors buy their tickets online, but without prebooking a special date.
I suspect that some zoos in the UK are still doing pre-booking primarily for the benefit of being able to at least estimate how many guests will actually be coming to the zoo to factor into on-the-day decisions (catering, guest services etc.) rather than because of COVID.
That is the reason given here too. Working with time slots also seems to spread out visitors during the day, making crowds more easy to handle. Normally most people would arrive from 10 to 1, now it seems that rush hour lasts from 9 to 2.
It has never been in force here in Denmark. A couple of them have had limits on visitors, and thus occasions where they couldn't let in more visitors, but even that has been quite rare.
Denmark has almost been the opposite of most other European countries when it comes to zoos (along with museums). The government has generally cared very little about them, not opening them until the very last phase of a given lockdown. When they closed for a month this winter, we were the only country in Europe to totally close zoos and museums as far as I remember.
But when they have been open, there have been surprisingly few (some may say delightfully few, others may say scarily few) restrictions compared to most of Europe. All indoor areas have been open, and as mentioned no pre-booking required and no real visitor number limits in outdoor areas. Masks in indoor areas were also only required for a few weeks during the spring of 2021 and this January, and have never been mandatory in outdoor areas.
Denmark has almost been the opposite of most other European countries when it comes to zoos (along with museums). The government has generally cared very little about them, not opening them until the very last phase of a given lockdown. When they closed for a month this winter, we were the only country in Europe to totally close zoos and museums as far as I remember.
But when they have been open, there have been surprisingly few (some may say delightfully few, others may say scarily few) restrictions compared to most of Europe. All indoor areas have been open, and as mentioned no pre-booking required and no real visitor number limits in outdoor areas. Masks in indoor areas were also only required for a few weeks during the spring of 2021 and this January, and have never been mandatory in outdoor areas.
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The opposite appears the case in the UK. Pre-booking was never required by our Government, and generally only introduced by zoos to show due diligence as a defence against potential future Government action for irresponsibility, following the bad press given to the huge crowds at beaches and National Trust properties after the first lockdown was eased. Now on-line pre-booking is here, the UK public like it and like pretty much everything else they buy, be it cars or take-aways or simply bottles of milk, most zoo entry tickets are ordered (and pre-paid for) on-line.
Prebooking an arrival time slot, at least for non-members, is still required at several, if not most, large Dutch zoos, including to my knowledge at least Beekse Bergen, Rotterdam, Burgers' and GaiaZoo.
Although yesterday at Beekse Bergen the staff didn't really seem to be checking the prebooking at all.
Although yesterday at Beekse Bergen the staff didn't really seem to be checking the prebooking at all.