Visit the World's Most Overhyped and OVERPRICED Zoo!
Written: May 30 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: It helps if you know you'll only visit once in a lifetime
Cons: Even Donald Trump thinks its expensive
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| mrkstvns's Full Review: San Diego Zoo |
I'll probably be strung up for saying this, but the San Diego Zoo is just not that great. There! I said it...and I mean it!
Two reasons: too much hype and WAY too high prices.
The San Diego Zoo is sort of a sacred cow of tourist attractions in southern California, and heaven the help the poor person who says a word against it! Heretic that I am (not to mention being safely located some 1,303 miles away, according to my latest frequent flyer account statement) I don't mind risking the slings and arrows of outraged Californians. Let me tell you why...
Money Talks, You Know What Walks...
Let's cut to the chase. The reason the San Diego Zoo sucks so bad is that it's overpriced. Not just a little, but a LOT.
I don't mind getting gouged a little when I travel. In fact, I sort of expect it. But unless you squeeled with delight during the rape scene in Deliverance, you're going to feel like a fat greased up pig when you see the prices at the San Diego Zoo!
Bare bones admission: $18. EIGHTEEN! Just to walk in the gate!! Want full access, including the privilege of riding the aerial tram? You're talking $26 PER PERSON! For a ZOO!!
Hope you didn't pack that vaseline too deep down in your purse. You'll need it even as you pull into the parking lot and find that the good folks in San Diego want you to PAY FOR PARKING! As if $26 a person wasn't shame enough!
Compare these prices to what most zoos charge. Many of the country's top zoos are completely FREE. At most others, admission is affordable enough that a family can actually take the kids to the zoo for a day, and still afford to pay the mortgage...
Want to visit the National Zoo in Washington? It's FREE. Want to visit the first-rate zoo in Chicago? It's FREE.
Of course it costs money to run a zoo, but a zoo is a park and its an educational facility. Parks and educational facilities are legitimate uses for tax funds. Most cities are smart enough to realize that investing in an accessible, affordable zoo is an investment in the local quality of life and an investment in their children. A family with kids CANNOT afford a day at the zoo in San Diego. They can in Chicago, New York, Washington, or even here in Houston where the zoo has free parking and charges $2.50 for adults or 50 cents for kids. Affordable public facilities are not a pipe dream, unless you're in San Diego...
A Failure to Educate...
When I was a kid, my parents took the whole family to the zoo once or twice a year. Sometimes we'd get lucky, and be able to get in on a school field trip too. We loved going to the zoo, even more than a day at the beach. The zoo is a place that opened our eyes to the wonderful variation of species in the animal kingdom. It gave us a sense of wonder, and an appreciation for the power, dignity, majesty, or genius of different animals. I feel very fortunate to have grown up close to the National Zoo in Washington, rather than near the walled off palace that is the San Diego Zoo.
By pricing admission so high, local taxpayers and working families cannot afford to walk through a large chunk of their local park. Sure, you gouge the tourists for all you can, but you've denied the children of local working families a valuable experience. A guy doing day labor for $6 an hour cannot shell out $50-100 to show his kids what elephants look like. He can't. The San Diego Zoo therefore becomes the province of only well-to-do tourists and the richest local denizens. Sorry kids, no zoo for you!
Walking through the San Diego Zoo, I was also struck by how poorly the zoo communicates with its local people. While Southern California has a huge hispanic population and a location a mere dollar trolley ride away from the Mexican border, the zoo does not have much in the way of bilingual signage. In fact, I've seen better language outreach efforts in Wisconsin -- which is not exactly hot on the list of top latino travel destinations. I guess it doesn't really matter though. Wealthy hispanics speak english, and the poorer classes sure aren't going to be coughing up $50-100 for a day at the zoo...
All That Jazz...
The San Diego is a very nice zoo, no doubt about it. They have a big chunk of real estate in Balboa Park, criss crossed with pleasant walkways, and all of it beautifully landscaped with lush tropical greenery and towering palm trees. Many of the exhibit areas try to emulate natural areas found in the animals' natural habitats. You really don't see many animals in small cages here.
The zoo also has a lot of different animals. Whereas many zoos have only one or two breeds of each species, the San Diego Zoo may offer five or more, and often more exciting or more popular species. For example, while the Houston zoo's bear area had black bears and some spectacled bears, they didn't have any polar bears, grizzly bears, or most important to San Diego Zoo patrons -- panda bears.
The San Diego Zoo gets a lot of mileage out of promoting its panda exhibit. It is special in that not that many zoos have pandas, but it's also somewhat disheartening to know that with such a small (and diminishing) natural population, zoos feel the need to pressure the Chinese government to send more of the distinctive animals, and that they then plaster their images everywhere just to draw more people who will fork over more money...
Bottom Line
I feel that the San Diego Zoo is one of the worst values for family travel that's out there. After having visited the zoo in March of this year, I'd have to say that it was not worth the money. In all fairness though, it is also one of the most beautifully laid out, lushly landscaped zoos I've ever seen. If you just inherited the Hearst fortune though, by all means go -- it's a great place -- but if you work for a living, you'll probably end up feeling ripped off, like I did. Bottom line: there are better zoos in the country that you can enjoy for a heck of a lot less money (see my epinion of the National Zoo in Washington D.C.)
Recommended:
No
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