The Prospect Park Zoo is a 12-acre (4.9 ha) zoo located off Flatbush Avenue on the eastern side of Prospect Park, Brooklyn, New York City. Its precursor, the Menagerie, opened in 1890. The present facility first opened as a city zoo on July 3, 1935 and was part of a larger revitalization program of city parks, playgrounds and zoos initiated in 1934 by Parks Commissioner Robert Moses. It was built, in large part, through Civil Works Administration and Works Project Administration (WPA) labor and funding.
After 53 years of operation as a city zoo run by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, Prospect Park Zoo closed on June 1988 for reconstruction. The closure signaled the start of a five year, $37 million dollar renovation program, that, save for the exteriors of the 1930s-era buildings, completely replaced the zoo. It was rededicated on October 5, 1993 as the Prospect Park Wildlife Conservation Center, joining an integrated system of four zoos and one aquarium managed by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), all of which are accredited by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA).
The Prospect Park Zoo presently offers children's educational programs, is engaged in restoration of endangered species populations, runs a Wildlife Theater and reaches out to the local community through volunteer programs. As of 2007, the zoo housed nearly 630 animals representing 141 species; it was visited by about 234,000 people in 2007.
Read more about Prospect Park Zoo: The Zoo Today, Evolution of Brooklyn Zoological Gardens
Other articles related to "parks, park, prospect park zoo, zoo, zoos":
... National parks in the Netherlands were defined in the 1960s as areas of at least 10 km² consisting of natural terrains, water and/or forests, with a special landscape and flora and fauna ... The first two national parks were founded in the 1930s by private organisations ... The first official national park, Schiermonnikoog National Park, was not established until 1989 ...
... The Wildlife Conservation Society supports the Prospect Park Zoo through a combination of private funds and subsidies from the city, so the zoo is vulnerable to funding shortfalls ... an overall $3.8 billion budget deficit, the Mayor proposed to cut all city funding for The Prospect Park Zoo and the Queens Zoo, and trim funding for ... The two zoos were the smallest among the facilities managed by the Wildlife Conservation Society, and had the lowest annual attendance rates, approximately 200,000 for each ...
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... The main section of the park contains 1,754 acres (7.10 km2), or 2.75 square miles (7.1 km2), along the Rock Creek Valley ... Including the other green areas the park administers (Glover Archbold Park, Montrose Park, Dumbarton Oaks Park, Meridian Hill Park, Battery Kemble Park, Palisades Park, Whitehaven Park, etc.), it is over 2,000 acres (8.1 ... The major portion of the area lies north of the National Zoo, and was established by act of Congress made law by President Benjamin Harrison on September ...
... Big Park is a census-designated place (CDP) in Yavapai County, Arizona, United States ... Big Park is more commonly known as the Village of Oak Creek (VOC), and is a bedroom community for Sedona, Arizona ... Big Park, the pioneers' name for the large open area that became the Village of Oak Creek in the early 1960s, is set among scenic red-rock buttes and canyons ...
Famous quotes containing the words zoo, prospect and/or park:
“The zoo cannot but disappoint. The public purpose of zoos is to offer visitors the opportunity of looking at animals. Yet nowhere in a zoo can a stranger encounter the look of an animal. At the most, the animal’s gaze flickers and passes on. They look sideways. They look blindly beyond.”
—John Berger (b. 1926)
“I do not mean to exclude altogether the idea of patriotism. I know it exists, and I know it has done much in the present contest. But I will venture to assert, that a great and lasting war can never be supported on this principle alone. It must be aided by a prospect of interest, or some reward.”
—George Washington (1732–1799)
“Is a park any better than a coal mine? What’s a mountain got that a slag pile hasn’t? What would you rather have in your garden—an almond tree or an oil well?”
—Jean Giraudoux (1882–1944)