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2014 – April 2016
The decision: Preparing for its fiftieth anniversary, the zoo chose renovation over growth. "About 15 years ago, we decided that we didn't need to get any bigger, we just needed to get better," Director Jim Anderson said as the work finished. The subject was the twenty-seven-year-old Australian Adventure. The zoo announced a three-phase renovation at $7 million; Anderson told Business People the zoo had solicited $7.5 million in donations to cover the project. Both figures are the record's — the announced cost and the raised sum — and they are printed as their speakers gave them.
The phases: Phase one opened in 2014: a new entryway beside the train station, expanded restaurant seating and restrooms, and the station renamed the Z.O.&O. Railroad — the name the zoo's train carries today. Phase two followed in 2015: The Reef, opened in May, with a 17,000-gallon tropical tank and a 50,000-gallon tank holding 2,000 schooling fish and five sharks; and Stingray Bay, opened 3 September 2015, built inside the former Nocturnal Building, where the bats and echidnas gave way to rays guests could touch and feed. Phase three, completed in April 2016, added the Crocodile Creek play stream, new aviaries and a reptile exhibit, rebuilt the kangaroo yard and dingo exhibit — and built the new Tasmanian devil display whose animals were expected by late summer.
Sources:
- Fort Wayne Children's Zoo news release, "Stingray Bay opens today at the Zoo," 3 September 2015 (the $7 million three-phase renovation; the phases and their contents; Stingray Bay in the former Nocturnal Building; The Reef's tanks), via AroundFortWayne.
- "The Zoo That We Built," Business People, 1 July 2016 (Anderson, quoted; the $7.5 million raised; the three-phase project completed in April 2016; the devil display awaiting its animals).