AmbikaFan
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Slow day?
Smithsonian National Zoo Smithsonian National Zoo News 2019
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Slow day?
AmbikaFan
Well-Known Member
I was at the zoo yesterday, and parking was a huge issue. The lots were all filled well before 10:30, so the Connecticut and Harvard entrances glowed red for a mile on GPS. It wasn't until 1 that we got close enough for me to show my handicap placard and explain I couldn't walk the miles necessary to find a space on the streets that we got in. From that moment, security was eager to help and even worked the radios to find an empty spot.
However, I have changed my mind on the garage proposal. I have NEVER seen the zoo remotely this full, and at the security checkpoint at the B lot entrance where all belongings were wanded and checked, even the guards couldn't believe what we had seen out in the community around the zoo. We had circled all the way up to the top of the heights overlooking Harvard Street, and there was only bumper-to-bumper traffic and streets stuffed with parked cars.
This is a significant problem. I usually have the flexibility to come during the week and had originally planned to come on Easter, but people with 40-hour daytime workweeks don't have that advantage--and must face what I did to come on weekends. I can see this discouraging many from coming at all. For an institution like the Smithsonian with a mandate to educate and serve the people, it seems like a gross misstep. It's consistent with decisions on The Mall to put programming over parking, but it's also why I rarely get to the museums any more. This is very disheartening.
I didn't get anywhere near the retaining wall and what used to be lot C. Can they open this huge space up on days like this? Is there any way for visitors to get up from this lot to the stairs behind the reptile house?
The Smithsonian institutions including the Zoo and Museums at The Mall are well served with transit options (both rail and bus), where most people should be able to take transit there. Although your situation may be an exception where driving is necessitated, the Smithsonian could better promote the general use of transit and discourage people from driving to prevent the traffic issues.
AmbikaFan
Well-Known Member
I know what you're saying is true. DC didn't start building its subway until very late--the 1960s--and I actually remember the entire Mall being torn up with the open-cut construction and waited in anticipation to see the final product. I ived in NYC for 12 years and still work there, and I was such a subway enthusiast that I went on tours of abandoned stations and to history lectures. I'm very much a proponent of mass transit.
However, there are three groups of people--not just the mobility-challenged--whose only practical option to go to the zoo is to drive. DC streets everywhere else were relatively empty, but all those car-clogged curbsides I described were also lined with something else--solid lines of moms pushing strollers, most often with additional kids in tow. No matter how far they have to walk, it's a breeze compared to struggling with a stroller on either stairs or escalators, even without additional little ones, who always seem dangerously drawn to the vast open tracks. I was hardly the first mom to discover this and move to the suburbs.
I also fall into the third category--the out-of-towner. The Smithsonian is mandated to offer such excellence and diversity and research that it will always draw folks from far away, both professionals and the merely curious. It's a national treasure. I grew up in PA but was taken to DC at least once a month. As an adult, I've lived at least 200 miles away for more than 30 years, but I nevertheless did the same with my daughter. 9 hours of driving in one day is a small price to pay for the Smithsonian, bu it does require a parking spot.
It's the young mothers and their children whose potential deterrence is the most important, though, for it's those generations who need to learn about conservation and take up the mantle for the future. And though perhaps not affecting as many individuals, the zoo's terrain makes it such a rough go for many, that it's really not a small matter that providing parking for the handicapped is really providing the bare minimum toward compliance with IDA.
However, there are three groups of people--not just the mobility-challenged--whose only practical option to go to the zoo is to drive. DC streets everywhere else were relatively empty, but all those car-clogged curbsides I described were also lined with something else--solid lines of moms pushing strollers, most often with additional kids in tow. No matter how far they have to walk, it's a breeze compared to struggling with a stroller on either stairs or escalators, even without additional little ones, who always seem dangerously drawn to the vast open tracks. I was hardly the first mom to discover this and move to the suburbs.
I also fall into the third category--the out-of-towner. The Smithsonian is mandated to offer such excellence and diversity and research that it will always draw folks from far away, both professionals and the merely curious. It's a national treasure. I grew up in PA but was taken to DC at least once a month. As an adult, I've lived at least 200 miles away for more than 30 years, but I nevertheless did the same with my daughter. 9 hours of driving in one day is a small price to pay for the Smithsonian, bu it does require a parking spot.
It's the young mothers and their children whose potential deterrence is the most important, though, for it's those generations who need to learn about conservation and take up the mantle for the future. And though perhaps not affecting as many individuals, the zoo's terrain makes it such a rough go for many, that it's really not a small matter that providing parking for the handicapped is really providing the bare minimum toward compliance with IDA.
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I'm pretty sure Lot C is still used. You just walk to the crossing at the stairs from the lot. We've parked there within the last year. I think it just gets filled up fairly quickly, so it seems like its always closed.
AmbikaFan
Well-Known Member
I usually visit on weekdays so I haven't had the need to go past lot B in years. There was once a plan to wall off lot C to the public and create a separate entrance for staff from the outside perimeter. I never noticed if this had happened with the retaining wall project.
AmbikaFan
Well-Known Member
I remember reading above that there would be a Smokey Bear exhibit and a bee mural. Perhaps I was being too traditional to think that the Bears/Honey link was what joined the two ideas. But then I saw the big bee mural all over the Great Ape House! What connection is there between great apes and honeybees?!
I also took a close look at Happy's old pool adjacent to the bull elephant pool. The original plans called for a bull suite to provide for at least two bulls. Then last summer, keepers explained that they wanted the outdoor spaces to be merged and used now for one male and deal with a second one if/when that should come to pass. However, Happy"s old yard and pool are completely unchanged, so all the big equipment someone mentioned being there must have been to alter the 2-male suite indoor space, perhaps creating one bigger space for Spike.
I also took a close look at Happy's old pool adjacent to the bull elephant pool. The original plans called for a bull suite to provide for at least two bulls. Then last summer, keepers explained that they wanted the outdoor spaces to be merged and used now for one male and deal with a second one if/when that should come to pass. However, Happy"s old yard and pool are completely unchanged, so all the big equipment someone mentioned being there must have been to alter the 2-male suite indoor space, perhaps creating one bigger space for Spike.
AmbikaFan
Well-Known Member
An interesting thought on the Bird House: my friend identified some things o the construction lot as very heavy machinery plus a protective wooden cage excavators use to down into deeply-dug spaces so that the walls won't collapse in on them. This led us both to wonder if subterranean levels were being constructed underneath the historic structure. This piques my curiosity and would help to explain why the project's completion is still over two years into the future.
I'll miss her
she was one of the individuals (as opposed to species) I most looked forward to seeing. I don't remember her seeing her in the yard much with Colby; usually just one or the other at a time. Does anyone know why this was, if they were companions? Also is it customary for gray wolves to be kept solitarily?
RIP - a common species, maybe, but a really iconic individual imo.
I believe they were originally kept together, but if I recall correctly, they had some issues that resulted in a couple fights, so they were separated. Could be remembering wrong however.
^ This isn't the first year they've done it, and that's just a nickname people call it, it's actually called: International Family Equality Day at the Zoo
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