Agreed: I think London Zoo probably is more famous than San Diego Zoo.
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San Diego Zoo San Diego: The Perfect Zoo?
- Thread starter ThylacineAlive
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London may be more famous, but nobody will describe it as the best zoo, whereas San Diego seems synonymous to the best for many....
I agree with that too although, personally, I wouldn't consider San Diego to be the best.
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London may be more famous in Europe, but I can assure you that it’s not as well known in North America. Over here it seems like San Diego is much more famous. For example, a family member of mine heard that I’d been to San Diego, and the first thing they said was “did you go to the zoo?”. This person didn’t know about my zoo obsession, but San Diego’s marketing group has done such a good job that they associated San Diego with the San Diego Zoo. I’d like to see if that holds true with the likes of Berlin and Singapore.
I accept this. I think the zoo is one of the top attractions in San Diego, whereas London has a far longer list of well-known attractions.
I think weather is central to the San Diego advantage. Most (perhaps almost all) other (at least) American zoos must design and build to overnight and in most cases overwinter critters to protect against severe cold. And the few that don't (mostly Florida zoos) have to deal with issues like hurricanes. That's a huge huge advantage when displaying animals.
Their map is accurate -the problem is the layout. (And the reason is understandable and obvious- it just sort of expanded that way).
Its impossible to follow a smooth layout to visit the whole thing. There is a
large amount of backtracking -made worse by the hilly nature of the zoo
(again understandable). Really that would be San Diego's chief detraction.
I suppose a more "perfect" zoo would make that a much easier path but Hell who is able to predict the future 100 or more years into the future?
The other solution is to bulldoze the old- but I think most of us zoonerds appreciate the older architecture and history of many display houses/spaces.
Their map is accurate -the problem is the layout. (And the reason is understandable and obvious- it just sort of expanded that way).
Its impossible to follow a smooth layout to visit the whole thing. There is a
large amount of backtracking -made worse by the hilly nature of the zoo
(again understandable). Really that would be San Diego's chief detraction.
I suppose a more "perfect" zoo would make that a much easier path but Hell who is able to predict the future 100 or more years into the future?
The other solution is to bulldoze the old- but I think most of us zoonerds appreciate the older architecture and history of many display houses/spaces.
Liking the Bronx Zoo to New York City is similar to comparing apples to spaceships.
I hate the city, the zoo is not the city. There are really only two, maybe three spots within the zoo's walls (not counting the parking lots) where you can actually tell you're inside one of the world's largest cities, and even then you kind of have to be looking for it. In fact, there's at least one section of the zoo that, if you were dropped there randomly, you wouldn't even realized you were at a zoo!
Going along with what @lintworm said, if they haven't actually been, then they can't know it's the greatest. More to the point, if you refer to my opening post, basically everyone I know outside of the zoo world who has actually visited SDZ no longer think it's the greatest.
As a side note, as @TeaLovingDave mentioned, I'm still interested in hearing your thoughts (and everyone's really) on the specific categories I've been discussing thus far. A few people have commented with their own thoughts about some of the exhibits/enclosures I disliked, but I really am interested in hearing your and others who have praised the zoo's excellent exhibitry takes on some of the poorer areas I've mentioned.
~Thylo
I would, sort of, disagree with you on this. Tbh I'd actually say SDZ is more like this than Bronx. The zoo isn't like, say, Plzen where they keep a series of rarely exhibited species often just for the sake of keeping them, but rather they try to focus on species the WCS has programs for in the wild as well as working with AZA programs. The zoo keeps odd stuff like Ring-Tailed Vontsira, six lemurs, nine Asian deer species, two Tiger subspecies, Maleo, a plethora of odd and endangered turtles, Kihansi Spray Toad, and various Malagasy cichlids because, well, they work with them directly in the wild and want to make sure captive assurance populations are firmly established. This is the kind of thing that pushes Bronx ahead of the rest for me. It does, indeed, create what I imagine is a nostalgic feel for many older zoo nerds. This is largely helped, I think, by the grand and extremely historic architecture and what I find to be an expertly done mix of both old and new exhibit design; the indoor Komodo Dragon enclosure, Madagascar!, and the sea lion pool are perfect examples of this.
~Thylo
I have already pointed out a great deal of other flaws and "legitimate arguments" against the zoo. If several people think the map and the overall layout of the zoo is confusing then you can't say it's not a legitimate argument just because you didn't have that problem. I got turned around on several occasions while visiting for the first time, more than once in an area I had already visited. I think the extremely varied geography and the fact that multiple exhibits have paths at different elevations that need to accessed at completely different areas can make things extremely confusing.
That's an impressive time for you to have seen the whole zoo, but I think you are very much in the minority. I've also heard of people seeing all of Bronx in a few hours or Tierpark Berlin in one day, but that does not mean this is the norm. I dedicated two days to the zoo, and I'm glad I did. I hit bad traffic heading down on my first day and did not get there until two hours after opening. Due to this I barely saw half the zoo. On my second day I was there opening to when they kicked me out at closing and even then I didn't get to revisit every exhibit. Those who have met me can tell you I'm not exactly a slow visitor unless there's something in particular I want to sit around and hunt for. At SDZ it was various birds in the Owen Aviary, an exhibit I spent maybe around 1/5th of my entire visit time in and still did not see everything in it..
~Thylo
mweb08
Well-Known Member
The San Diego Diego can be hard to navigate. I don't think that's the fault of the map though. That's a very easy map to read. But again, it doesn't make it easy to see the zoo without doing a fair amount of backtracking, because the zoo has a ton of exhibits densely packed throughout the zoo, and as has been mentioned, it's not like all this was planned out in the early days of the zoo.
I'd say most very large and dense zoos have some navigation issues. I'd include the Bronx in that too. Saint Louis, which I just visited as well.
Either way, a map shouldn't be a big point of contention when debating what's the better zoo.
I'd say most very large and dense zoos have some navigation issues. I'd include the Bronx in that too. Saint Louis, which I just visited as well.
Either way, a map shouldn't be a big point of contention when debating what's the better zoo.
There are ways to do Bronx with very minimal backtracking, though I agree it can be a little difficult and confusing for first-timers.
~Thylo
~Thylo
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mweb08
Well-Known Member
I'm not sure how that's possible to do literally zero backtracking so you'll have to share your expertise.
I guess I shouldn't say no backtracking. You have to do very minor backtracking to exit the Asia Plaza, see the Lion enclosure, and you pass the Dancing Crane Cafe twice but that's still significantly less backtracking than one would expect and you never have to backtrack down entire trails like you have to at SDZ.
~Thylo
sooty mangabey
Well-Known Member
I’ve only just caught up with this very interesting thread. I am wholeheartedly in the San Diego camp, and reading some of the comments above I am reminded of the (world’s best) film critic, Mark Kermode, who recently opined that the only people who liked the film Hereditary were Those who didn’t really understand horror. Cue, lots of responses from slightly miffed listeners, claiming that they did indeed like and understand horror – and also liked and understood this film.
As of today, I have visited 382 zoos around the world, and I would absolutely claim that San Diego was at the top of the list. Only Berlin comes close. This isn’t just the point of view of zoo muggles, as is possibly implied above. This does of course betray my own very subjective point of view, as any such claim is going to do. I’m not sure that I could add a great deal more to what has been said above. Except this: more than any other American zoo I have seen, San Diego really celebrates its past, and its heritage (quite difficult to do when there aren’t the historic buildings that a similarly ancient European zoo would have). In its publications, its signs, and what it says about itself, there is a constant reference back to the past – helping, I think, to really establish that sense of its historical greatness. In contrast, yesterday I visited Columbus zoo, and the only reference I could find to the place having some sort of a history, some sort of a heritage, was a sign celebrating the life of Colo the gorilla, and a second sign briefly outlining the history of the carousel. And that was it. As Topeka zoo proved in the 1970s, one of the ways to establish greatness, and in this case importance, is to tell people about it as often as possible. Topeka became known as “the world famous Topeka zoo” by unabashedly referencing its world famousness in all it did!
As of today, I have visited 382 zoos around the world, and I would absolutely claim that San Diego was at the top of the list. Only Berlin comes close. This isn’t just the point of view of zoo muggles, as is possibly implied above. This does of course betray my own very subjective point of view, as any such claim is going to do. I’m not sure that I could add a great deal more to what has been said above. Except this: more than any other American zoo I have seen, San Diego really celebrates its past, and its heritage (quite difficult to do when there aren’t the historic buildings that a similarly ancient European zoo would have). In its publications, its signs, and what it says about itself, there is a constant reference back to the past – helping, I think, to really establish that sense of its historical greatness. In contrast, yesterday I visited Columbus zoo, and the only reference I could find to the place having some sort of a history, some sort of a heritage, was a sign celebrating the life of Colo the gorilla, and a second sign briefly outlining the history of the carousel. And that was it. As Topeka zoo proved in the 1970s, one of the ways to establish greatness, and in this case importance, is to tell people about it as often as possible. Topeka became known as “the world famous Topeka zoo” by unabashedly referencing its world famousness in all it did!
I 100% agree with you on the history thing. San Diego doesn’t shy away from its history, it celebrates it. Did you get the centennial history books? They looked incredible, but it was super expensive and I’d already spent enough money at the zoo. I also liked the long panel near the reptile walk in which the entire zoos history was covered.
The history thing is perhaps a by-product of how American zoos are funded, and what they must do to create an ongoing perception that they are keeping up. It’s an endless arms race to build ever more expensive branded exhibits, and sometimes I wonder if the price tag is perceived as a virtue in itself. When you’re constantly on the lookout for the next $50m in donations, it’s hard to sustain an argument that the past must be preserved, and much easier to bulldoze it on the basis that it is old, and therefore bad.
All that said, though, what built heritage does San Diego retain, really? The reptile house and Mesa, certainly. There’s the bear pits, but I don’t think even the fiercest SD partisan could argue for their unique heritage value. The big aviaries are old but remain fully functional, so there’s no reason to pull them down... but is there anything truly distinctive about them? The rest of the zoo is, if not new, certainly contemporary in its appearance and presentation.
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The Reptile House didn't really strike me as all that historic apart from the signage nearby. As for the aviaries, I think the grandness of them is distinctive enough. They're massive and, while one can't really see the entirety of any of them at once, I think that's the point. Not to mention the botanical life contained without shows that the structures are old, it takes a while for lushness like that to fill in.
~Thylo
I think the reptile house was a WPA project (it was a jobs scheme implemented by President Roosevelt that helped end the Great Depression, and was one of the standout achievements in US politics of the 20th century) so it has enormous social heritage value on that basis alone.
I didn’t mean to detract from the aviaries at all - they are amongst the greatest in the world. I only meant that they don’t have specific heritage value, though your point about the foliage is well made.