Lincoln Park Zoo - Just About Enough For One Visit
Written: Feb 23 '01 (Updated Jul 22 '01)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: It's free and easy to get to from downtown Chicago.
Cons: It's very small, limited selection of animals, and they need more space.
The Bottom Line: Too small, with cramped quarters for some of the animals, and they don't look too happy.
|
|
|
| swoeste's Full Review: Lincoln Park Zoo |
I went to Lincoln Park Zoo in May of 2000 as part of being a temp' at the University of Illinois at Chicago. I was working as an administrator there in the Minimally Invasive Surgery Department, and I needed to take some photographs for a brochure I was making. I needed pictures of Chicago attractions, and the zoo was one of them. So, one day, I took the department's digital camera, got in my car, and went to the zoo (all paid for by the University).
I wasn't expecting a lot, since I knew the zoo was a free attraction. Still, I wondered how much of a zoo you could have in the middle of one of the country's largest cities; the real estate ain't cheap. Once I got there, it was quickly obvious that the zoo was really small, and even with the small areas given to most of the animals, there were not very many of them to see.
Certainly, things you find in larger zoos were absent at the Lincoln Park Zoo. No big reptile house with lots of snakes and dozens of alligators. No huge aviary with hundreds of birds. No aquarium with eels, sharks, and sea turtles. No amusement park rides. No petting zoo. And, for the humans, a very limited selection of restaurants on the property, and equally limited refreshments. Still, the last part doesn't really matter, since you won't be there long anyway; you can easily see everything in the zoo in under an hour.
Some of the animal enclosures are very tight for space, especially where they keep the cheetahs. I saw one female cheetah in a chain-link-like fenced enclosure that day; looking extremely bored, she slowly sauntered around the little patch of muddy ground where she had worn a trail. Other animals looked equally bored, like the lone Zebra in its pen.
If you happen to get to the zoo when one of the animal houses is being cleaned, like the cat house, then you can miss a good portion of the animals ordinarily on display. While their enclosures are being cleaned, you don't get to see the animals. If they're doing that to three or four animals at once, that's most of what's in the building.
I shouldn't be so negative, but I've been to other zoos just as small, or smaller, and somehow they were better. Do they still have the zoo in Duluth, Minnesota? Now that was small!! Just one turtle!! (Just kidding.) But seriously, the Lincoln Park Zoo borders on not being a zoo at all, but a sideshow. But, you can always form your own opinion by going to see for yourself. Please do. You'll see everything you need to see in one visit.
Recommended:
No
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
swoeste
|
 - Top 1000 |
|
Member: Steven Woeste
Reviews written: 420
Trusted by: 52 members
About Me:
Please see my new book, To Wake The Dead, at Amazon.com.
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.