Which Zoo Has More Animals Franklin Park Or Stoneham
The newspaper gushed that "Boston is destined to have the about wonderful park in the globe." At present, 105 years later, those words seem almost sad.
Which is not to say the zoo is terrible. "I get compliments all the time almost the zoo," says John Linehan, the Canton native who is president and CEO of Zoo New England, which operates the Franklin Park Zoo and Stoneham'south Rock Zoo. "It frustrates me. I know it's non a great zoo nevertheless."
The question is why? Was a century not enough fourth dimension? Afterwards all, Boston overflows with great cultural institutions, some much younger than the zoos. The Institute of Gimmicky Art started in 1936 as the Boston outpost of New York's Museum of Modern Art, then split off from MoMA and shot to prominence when it adopted its electric current moniker in 1948. Today information technology is a landmark feature of Boston's burgeoning waterfront. Boston Ballet was founded in 1963; it was the offset American ballet company to appear in Communist China and serves as an important venue for premieres. Or how about the New England Aquarium? Opened in 1969, its Behemothic Ocean Tank was once the largest in the world, and it remains a global leader in oceanographic inquiry. Which institutions are Bostonians more proud of — and more likely to send their visitors to: the aquarium or the zoo? The Museum of Fine Arts, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and Boston Children'southward Museum all befit the nation's 10th largest metropolitan area. But Boston'southward zoo wouldn't make anybody's meridian 10 list, while zoos in San Diego, Omaha, St. Louis, Seattle, fifty-fifty Toledo, Ohio, are fixtures.
"How strange information technology is that with Boston's cultural institutions more often than not at the peak of their areas, it has never had a zoo anywhere near the class of the MFA or the library or the symphony," says Jeffrey Hyson, an assistant professor of history of Saint Joseph's Academy in Philadelphia who studies zoos' place in civilisation.
In that location are some perfectly understandable reasons for information technology, and we've gathered a few ideas from experts that could assistance improve things. But first, a little history lesson.
Those forlorn one-time raccoon and behave homes were supposed to be office of a dandy collection of animals in the Long Crouch Woods, connected to what is today's Franklin Park Zoo, so a vast expanse with exhibit halls called The Greeting. Merely zip more was built in the woods. That'south considering the original zoo was a pet project of John F. "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald during his second stint as mayor of Boston from 1910 to 1914. When he lost to James Michael Curley, the zoo was swept up in Curley'southward zeal to overturn what he called Fitzgerald'southward corruption.
Fitzgerald had started the zoo with money from a bequest to the city, and the money might non have been meant for a zoo. Just Fitzgerald fabricated certain top-notch, experienced conservationists and landscape architects were involved in its design and operation. Curley starved information technology of cash and stuffed it with patronage jobs and attacked a Brahmin-backed Boston Zoological Social club for taking over a people'due south institution, thus scaring off important sources of private back up. Since Curley served four terms as Boston mayor and one as Massachusetts governor between 1914 and 1950, the zoo was effectively stunted for more than 35 years.
"This zoo, if built as planned, would have given united states of america a pretty good zoo and certainly a state-of-the-fine art zoo" in its mean solar day, says Rory Browne, a zoo historian based at Boston College and a member of Zoo New England'south board of directors.
Instead, information technology emerged piecemeal. Information technology got elephants in 1914, thanks to a campaign by The Boston Postal service, which paraded them from South Station all the manner to Franklin Park, where a building had to be constructed hastily to firm them. Browne says Curley declined to accept any Works Progress Administration money during the Great Depression, a source of back up for zoos elsewhere. Curley created his ain jobs plan during the Depression and started, simply never finished, an antelope house on a hill backside the warthogs. The zoo farther struggled after Globe War II as Boston went into economical pass up.
The zoo didn't fifty-fifty have a perimeter argue until 1958, when the city asked the Commonwealth to run the facility. The land merged Franklin Park Zoo with what was so Middlesex Fells Zoo, fourteen miles to the north in Stoneham. The state hired prominent zoologist Walter D. Rock to run the two zoos, and he brought renewed energy earlier his decease in 1968, after which the Middlesex Fells Zoo was renamed for him.
Simply state management could not protect the zoos from budget cuts in tight times. In the late 1970s, a major redesign was proposed featuring four vast new exhibit halls at Franklin Park. But even then, merely one of those exhibits was ever congenital — the Tropical Forest, which opened in 1989.
'Watch this," John Linehan says every bit he walks up to the glass at the gorilla exhibit at the Tropical Forest. Okie, a 22-year-old male gorilla, storms up to Linehan and pounds on the glass. The Zoo New England CEO doesn't flinch. Linehan knows Okie'due south just at that age where he wants to affirm himself. "He knows I'm the boss," he says.
Being boss was non Linehan'south plan in 1980, when he took a temporary job in the zoo's bird cages after graduating from the University of Maine with a degree in wildlife management. Linehan liked going to the zoo as a kid growing upwards in Canton, just envisioned himself working not at a zoo only in the field. He went to Franklin Park expecting to stay no more than six months earlier heading off to Africa or Alaska. "I thought the zoo was a joke," he says. "The thing that kept me here was the ability to brand a difference." That started with improving animals' bones living quarters. The 1980s saw many zoos expand their educational and conservation efforts, leading to more naturalistic environments for animals. The trend meshed well with Linehan's interests.
He was still at the Franklin Park Zoo in February 1984 when it made an infamous Parade mag listing of the country'due south 10 worst zoos. Other large-metropolis zoos on the list — Oakland, California, Atlanta, and Brooklyn — sought to improve. The Brooklyn Zoo and New York's other civic zoos were somewhen brought under the Wildlife Conservation Guild, which already ran the Bronx Zoo, considered then and at present among the best in the world. The Oakland Zoo added a series of naturalistic habitats, specially for its elephants. The biggest changes happened in Atlanta, where "the zoo was a national disgrace," says Terry Maple, a psychology professor specializing in animal behavior at Georgia Tech who was hired to aid save the zoo or close it.
Atlanta's major corporations and its denizens, led by and so mayor Andrew Immature, rallied around the zoo. A $17 1000000 bond was passed, and a massive fund-raising campaign begun. The zoo was partially privatized in a model now common for zoos, meaning the country and its facilities were endemic by the government but the zoo was operated by a nonprofit, privately run organization. In less than five years, Atlanta was well on its way to having a world-class zoo. In 2014, Zoo Atlanta'southward operating upkeep stood at near $19 meg, Oakland's at $15 million, and Chicago'south Lincoln Park Zoo's at $23 1000000. Meanwhile, Zoo New England operated two zoos on $13 million.
Linehan acknowledges Franklin Park has not risen as far equally those zoos. Just it was never as dismal as Atlanta's in 1984, either. "We'd been languishing for decades. In that location were about no animals," he says.
Or facilities. At the time of the Parade story, Richard G. Naegeli, who ran the Boston zoo for the Metropolitan District Commission, noted that the elephant and king of beasts houses had been torn down and the bear den closed. The children's zoo was under construction and opened a few months later. The Tropical Forest was a construction site and was slated to open in 18 to 24 months (it needed five more years).
Linehan calls the 1970s and 1980s, when few people came to the zoo in Boston, a lost generation of visitors. He thinks this made it harder for Zoo New England to go interest and support from local foundations, civic groups, and corporations.
Things got ameliorate at Franklin Park, but by 1991 the state faced a budget crunch. Stone Zoo was closed for eighteen months. That closure cleared the way for a long-stalled proposal from state Senator Richard Tisei and others to hand zoo management over to a private organisation, which became Zoo New England.
Zoo New England's climb to respectability has had its steep sections, including the issue du jour: Rock Zoo must ready problems by September or information technology lose accreditation from the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, which sets zoo standards. Linehan has corrected many of the bug, merely he needs nearly $three one thousand thousand to renovate some of Stone'south older facilities. The state has $16 million remaining from a $30 1000000 bond passed in 2008 for zoo capital projects, but so far has non released coin to the zoo.
Permit's exist clear: We will never run into our own version of the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. Boston doesn't accept i,800 acres available; all of Franklin Park comprises less than 500 acres, and the zoo takes up 72 acres. But Franklin Park Zoo doesn't need to get a lot bigger to become a lot improve. Atlanta and Philadelphia have terrific zoos sitting on roughly 40 acres. And Franklin Park Zoo does take space to expand.
Linehan, who became president and CEO of Zoo New England in 2002, wears his dearest for the zoo on his sleeve, and his chest, and his caput — his typical outfit includes a Zoo New England hat and shirt; for important meetings, he'll don an creature-themed tie. He's been successful in many small means. He'southward whittled the state's contribution to Zoo New England's budget to well-nigh xl percent (it had in one case been upward of 70 percent), meaning the zoos' survival is no longer in question every time the land has a upkeep crisis. The Tropical Woods was revamped in 2007, in part to thwart Little Joe, the clever and pop gorilla who twice escaped in 2003, injuring 2 people the 2d time. Franklin Park opened the Aussie Aviary in 2010, letting zoogoers walk amid the birds and even feed them. Visitors tin can, for a fee, get eye to eye with giraffes or ride a camel. At Rock Zoo, eagles and owls and other birds swoop over audience members' heads at special shows. Conservation programs accept helped reintroduce Mexican gray wolves to the wild and are helping save the Panamanian golden tree frog.
A revamped, and larger, board freed from state control has helped boost fund-raising. Information technology's no coincidence that Zoo New England finished a $6.six million capital campaign this year that included its beginning one thousand thousand-dollar gift from a single person.
That capital will go to build Nature's Neighborhoods, a complete remaking of the children'south zoo. The electric current barn and domestic animal exhibit will be untouched, but a multipurpose building about the chief entrance on Franklin Park Road will be replaced, and the prairie dogs, the red panda exhibit, and the current wetlands exhibit will be redone. Visitors will be able to sit down in a imitation eagle's aerie and so slide downwards, climb upward false bamboo across from the new ruby panda exhibit, and peer at sloths hanging overhead.
Nature'southward Neighborhoods is the kind of signature project that should heave the zoo, says Jeffrey Bonner, primary executive of the St. Louis Zoo. "That sounds to me like a phenomenal thing to do," he says. "I wish we could do that. We're kind of out of space."
Bonner thinks Zoo New England is poised to bound to a new level. "You've got talented people there. John's a remarkable human being. There's probably the intellectual and creative force at that place to [build a keen zoo]. You all are missing the resources, that's all."
So if Boston is poised for a zoo renaissance, what will it take to get there? Here are five recommendations, based on conversations with leading zoo officials locally and effectually the state, as well as people who study the role of zoos in cities. They range from doable to pie in the sky (run across NUMBER One below), all things considered.
1. Pass a tax.
Done choking? OK, then note: Boston's zoos are chronically underfunded. "I've looked at the numbers of what's been invested in the Boston zoos," says Lee Ehmke, president of the Minnesota Zoo, and they pale "in comparison to just nearly any major metro expanse zoo I can remember of." (Ehmke will leave Minnesota this month to head up the larger Houston Zoo.) A tax could go Zoo New England's budget out of the easily of politicians forever.
Proficient luck with that, says Rick Biddle, sometime main operating officer of the Philadelphia Zoo and now vice president at Schultz & Williams, a consultancy that works with zoos and aquariums nationwide. He says at that place would be plenty of political wrangling in a city like Boston, which has a vast number of cultural institutions that would want a cut of whatever tax. "We oasis't seen many cultural revenue enhancement initiatives like this east of the Mississippi," Biddle says. "Absolutely they work. But you demand to have the political and community leadership in identify to get them passed. A big percentage of cultural organizations are underfunded and undercapitalized. This is not unique to but Zoo New England."
Yes, the country is trying to close a $1.viii billion budget gap, and no ane in Massachusetts feels undertaxed. But Kansas City's zoo got a sales tax passed in the teeth of the Great Recession, giving it an eighth of a cent on purchases in two counties. The zoo gets equally much every bit $13 meg a twelvemonth from it, the entire budget of Zoo New England. Since the tax passed, Kansas City has added a $fifteen meg penguin exhibit, spent $six million updating its orangutan exhibit, and added a 100-seat eating place besides as made a number of behind-the-scenes improvements. Denver has a similar cultural tax supporting its zoo and some other institutions, and Oklahoma City has a dedicated sales tax for its zoo. The St. Louis Zoo is great — and free — in part considering it was given a piece of the property tax back in 1916. Meanwhile, admission at Franklin Park Zoo is $xx, $13 for children ages 2 to 12; the Stone Zoo is $sixteen and $12.
2. Improve the two-zoo strategy.
Stone Zoo'south aging facilities have put it at risk of losing its accreditation. Some suggest shutting it down and focusing on Franklin Park. But when Rock Zoo closed temporarily in 1991, it did not lead to an influx of visitors to Franklin Park. Plus, Stone draws a much higher percent of visitors than its portion of the upkeep. Metropolitan areas can support multiple zoos. New York has one in each borough while Chicago, Minneapolis/St. Paul, and Philadelphia all have multiple zoos. The Boston surface area supports at least five institutions with significant live-animal attractions: Franklin Park, Rock, Southwick'due south Zoo in Mendon, Buttonwood Park Zoo in New Bedford, and the Museum of Scientific discipline, which has almost 120 creatures, not to mention the aquarium. Plus, the Roger Williams Park Zoo in Providence is as short a drive from Boston as Southwick's Zoo. John Linehan, Zoo New England CEO, thinks Stone Zoo "is an asset; it volition touch on many more people than just Franklin Park, and many of them won't come into the urban center." Linehan is orienting Stone Zoo around families with young children. It's already an intimate zoo where it's easy to get near the animals. If he had the money, he'd replace the Windows to the Wild building and improve the exhibit spaces.
three. Get a better front end door and get social.
Franklin Park Zoo's entrance is ho-hum; Stone Zoo's takes yous showtime past a restroom trailer. Both are squandered opportunities to entice and excite visitors. At that place are also also many chain-link fences; they helped the zoos cheaply develop exhibits in the dire 1990s, but they're ugly and anything merely natural. Linehan hates them but doesn't take the money to create more than naturalistic exhibits. Cosmetic upgrades would make people feel better about the zoos, increasing the likelihood that they'd be back and that they'd tell their friends.
A better marketing entrada wouldn't hurt, either. Did you know the zoo is touting "zoofies," selfies taken at the zoo? Probably not. That's because of an underwhelming social media and Web presence. Zoo New England has long had zero marketing upkeep. Even in the freefest that is social media, Franklin Park Zoo cracks just 20,000 likes on Facebook. Roger Williams has 49,000, San Francisco 74,000, Minnesota Zoo 99,000, Chicago'southward Lincoln Park Zoo 119,000, Toledo — Toledo! — 140,000, Zoo Atlanta 148,000, and the San Diego Zoo 449,000. One viral video on social media tin build buzz. Buzz tin can bring eyeballs. Eyeballs can bring visitors.
iv. Elephants, rhinos, and more. oh, my!
Charismatic megafauna describe crowds and brand important points about conservation; Lee Ehmke sees them as a must-have. Boston has gorillas, giraffes, and lions and some other big cats. Just following upwards Franklin Park Zoo's Nature'due south Neighborhoods with a new exhibition dedicated to a major brute would engage more people with the zoo. Elephants are almost as charismatic as you can go far the animal world, simply keeping them in captivity is controversial. They demand a lot of space and are very expensive — Buttonwood Park Zoo'south two Asian female person elephants toll almost $300,000 a year in upkeep. Now, at minimum, zoos accredited by the Association of Zoos & Aquariums need iii females (or the space to hold iii females), 2 males, or at least some variety of genders. Wichita'south Sedgwick County Zoo is building a new exhibition at a toll of $10.six million that will firm vi African elephants and be the starting time in the world to put zoo visitors in boats in the same h2o the elephants volition utilize. Elephants aren't cold weather animals, though. While there may be no elephants left in the wild in a decade and zoos can play an of import role in keeping species alive, they might not work for Boston.
Linehan himself would prefer rhinos. These are too critically endangered, but rhinos could be added to the existing zoo; elephants would require expanding beyond its current footprint. In fact, why couldn't Asian rhinos exist the centerpiece of a new Asian exhibition, underscoring Boston and America's deepening links with Asia and perhaps tying into the philanthropic interests of some of the major Asian business organisation figures setting up store in the city?
5. Prove it the beloved.
Zoos create complicated feelings; the animals are amazing, but they're also not living in the wild. That can sour people on zoos. But Irus Braverman, author of the forthcoming book Wild Life: The Institution of Nature, notes that what used to be wild is now managed. Scientists suggest that we live in an age of mass extinction, and zoos accept been positioning themselves as bastions of conservation. Cities like New York, Chicago, Seattle, and Houston take impressive cultural institutions, keen sports teams, and better zoos than Boston. These cities take philanthropists, companies, and local foundations that lavish money on their zoos. Millions of people go to their zoos every twelvemonth. Why does this matter? Boston has no giant pandas, even though it has historic ties with Red china, while the Memphis Zoo is one of four United states of america zoos that take giant pandas. That'due south because FedEx executives made it their business to ensure the Memphis Zoo got them. Ford Motor Co. was a big reason Zoo Atlanta was revitalized. Boston is flush with successful tech and biotech companies and rich investors. Would we really cringe at the Biogen Rhino Exhibit or the Raytheon Zoo Zipline? Nosotros similar culture, and we give lots of money for it. The Museum of Fine Arts raised $504 million and built a new wing, and a $200 million fund-raising campaign is underway now. We like science, too: The Museum of Scientific discipline just pulled in $284 meg for renovations and additions. Tin can we not do better than $six.6 million in fund-raising for the zoo?
One last point that dovetails with another thing we love to complain almost: transit. Permit's say we do rally behind the zoos and they become great, really great, a truthful destination for residents and visitors. We accept a transportation event. Other than a few buses, there is no swift and easy way to achieve either Franklin Park or Stone Zoo on public transit. Could we not see a Zoo Limited (or the JetBlue Zoo Express!) from the Fairmount Line'southward Four Corners/Geneva Avenue Station or from the Orange Line in Jamaica Apparently? Or mayhap tap into the transit analytics expertise at Bridj, a local shared-ride startup, to solve the problem. That'south how to connect new-world applied science with old-globe Boston, and that's an thought worth roaring virtually.
Michael Fitzgerald is a frequent contributor to the Globe Magazine. Transport comments to magazine@globe.com.
Source: https://www.bostonglobe.com/magazine/2015/07/30/why-doesn-boston-have-better-zoo/fFCK2sB3gx9mtcGQ7mcI1O/story.html
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