African Adventure Phase 3 - Rhinos: I'm glad this is still happening, but I have to admit after almost a decade of discussion it's hard to feel excited. There's not much gimmick to this compared to the elephants and hippos, certainly we'd all be happy to see rhinoceros back though.
Front Entrance Reconfiguration: Do we have any idea what the plans are for this?
Demo of Oceans Pool area: My mind went to the Oceans of Fun sea lion pool. Do we think that might be the target? It doesn't feel like it makes sense, but I'm not sure what else they might mean.
Tropics Building: For a moment I thought this was the Primates rehash. Most of the species in Small Mammal House and the Aquatic and Reptile Center are tropical so this could be a change to either of those buildings, though 'tropics' often refers more to rainforest species in zoo circles... perhaps even neotropics! I think as mentioned, a neotropics building off SMH could be a smart step forward, especially if they move the spider monkey, callimicos and tamarins.
Primate Refresh: Much-needed. The zoo has a great primate collection that could shine in a modern complex. I think one of the smartest choices here would be to create a mixed orangutan/siamang enclosure. Four ape habitats won't come cheap though and there'll still be space needed for monkeys...
Gold Coast: I'm a little glad this is on hold, to be honest. I don't think the previous public plans for this exhibit are feasible and even if they stick to the concept they might want to start from scratch and possibly merge it with the moose and wolf renovations from the Woods project proposal.
Front Entrance Reconfiguration: From everything that I know thus far they are looking to move the ticket sales and parking away from the street and place it at the entrance of the zoo. The hope is to get more people in the zoo and lessen the number of cars waiting on the road to get in. Also part of this remodel of the front they are hoping to expand the penguin exhibit and restructure the zoo mobile area a bit so that they will go under the walkway to the primates building instead of going thru the main plaza.
Demo of Oceans Pool area: I do recall part of the Alaskan Gold Coast they were going to move the seal lion show down from where it currently is to the corner that has the bear and badger in it. That would it would free up the land at the time for moving the outdoor traveling experiences over there and freeing up that land where that experience would have gone for the Woods expansion.
Thought it might be a name of a specific area that we as guest don’t know they call it that, I guess we will see in due time.
Tropics Building: This is one that I’ve struggled to wrap my head around the most because there’s several different projects that could fit into it.
Starting off with the one that I think it will be is the expansion to the ARC building. This one is suppose to expand the building, including the addition of saltwater tanks and a Komodo dragon too.
The next likely would the the expansion of the primates building to include a much larger and expansive space for the orangutans and could include additional exhibit space for smaller primates and tropical animals.
The less likely option would creating a tropical building for several different species, including primates and pigmy hippos and tapirs, etc. Though this would be something that I would like to see milwaukee get because it would expand their indoor offerings in the cooler weather, I haven’t heard any rumblings of this.
Alaskan Gold Coast: I’m sadden by this because it would have changed and would have finished off the south portion of the zoo. It would have moved the seal lion show down below, would have brought back polar bears (maybe, if there’s any to spear), and would have set up for the expansions in the northern area. Though I’d be excited for what’s replacing it.
Adventure Africa: Rhinos: I will say from what I’ve seen this will be a much more themed area then the previous expansions. So I know the previous have been lackluster but I have a bit more hope for this one. This was also designed under the new zoo director a little more.
