There is a dearth of zoos in African cities, but one wonders if they should invest their money in better infrastructure and education for their residents first, as a great deal of African urbanites currently live in slums.
I think this thread might be losing the plot. Cities with zoos, aquaria etc require tourism (and space) to support them, certainly Western zoos. Rarely can they survive on purely on local visits alone. Residents of Wakefield would more then likely visit animal collections in nearby Leeds, if not going further afield to Yorkshire WP. Having had the misfortune of living in Stoke for a month, I can guarantee nobody would be a willing tourist. Anyway the revamped Peak Wildlife Park is not far away. My closest big city is Bath, which is already a tourist destination, does not have a zoo. It would be illogical/uneconomical to site one in the city based purely on the relatively close proximity of Bristol and Longleat.
Having the misfortune of living close to Stoke its one big zoo of which its animal attraction in fenced off from the rest of Stoke to protect the animals from the people that live in Stoke.As for Peak I wouldn't waste my time these days it was far better when it was Blackbrook then it was a collection to be proud of!!
Never seen as much security fencing as I have in Stoke... Pity about the transition of Blackbrook to Peak. The former had an amazing collection of birds, but I guess that just because you are sited near a big population/city does not guarantee financial stability for a zoo.
It is surprising some of the places that do manage to support zoos. For example, the state I live in supports four zoos and is the least visited state in the USA. Somehow the zoos are supported.
What about the city of Orlando Florida it’s a well known city (thanks to Disney and other stuff like that) and is directly in the center of my home-state sure it has the Central Florida Zoo and other animal attractions here and there but none the less this city has not a single offical zoo at least..
I would say the market is pretty well cornered on needing a zoo in Orlando. Between Animal Kingdom, SeaWorld, the SeaLife, Gatorland, the aquarium at Epcot, and the Central Florida Zoo, I would think a new start up zoo just couldn't compete. Granted, I could see the need for a zoo because most of those are tourist attractions and spendy so probably excludes locals from many day trips. Even still, I would say the Central Florida Zoo fills the market for a local zoo for Orlando. I know it's not huge, but I don't think Orlando could ever be a market for a major zoo because of those other attractions. I also think if Orlando would get a zoo, Central Florida would close, but that isn't guaranteed. On top of this, Tampa also is accessible pretty easily to those who want a bit bigger zoo. Overall though, I'm not from there like you, so I couldn't tell you about local demand for a zoo, but I would guess its minimal. Maybe you can tell us differently. You make at least one that thinks differently. As a comparison, I live in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota. Minneapolis is the largest city in the state, but doesn't have a zoo. I would say it doesn't need one though because there are two zoos close enough to fill the cities need. Como Zoo in St. Paul and a major zoo in the suburbs in the form of the MN Zoo. I think Orlando is in the same situation. There may not be a zoo within city limits, but plenty of them nearby and accessible to the locals if desired.
Well then I do admit I did make mistakes when writing my previous post but rest assured I do say you are right about the whole zoo thing and thus I should have made some more thought into my post so I apologize for my mistakes I did on my last post but they we all make mistakes every once in a while so yeah again I should have made more thought into my last post so basically I apologize for not thinking through with my actions and thus this is where I will conclude with this post..
No need to apologize. You brought up a topic for discussion and I gave you my personal opinion on it. That's what these forums are for. Nothing to apologize for. I have some posts in this thread that suggested a few cities and people didn't agree with all of them. Someone else might think Orlando is a great spot. I just happen to think no for now, doesn't mean someone can't change my mind. Big thing is to be willing to listen and discuss.
I think I'll add a few opinions, I apologize if any of them have been previously mentioned. I feel like Eastern Iowa needs a zoo of some sort. Iowa City has a good sized population, but the nearest zoos are a few hours away. Myrtle Beach/Wilmington need a zoo as well. Wilmington has a good sized population and is close to a major US Navy base, but no zoo except the crappy Tregembo. Myrtle Beach has tons of tourists coming in every year, but no proper zoo. They do have Alligator Adventure and the monstrosity that is the Wacatee Zoo, but a proper zoo would be a good idea. For Florida, Tallahassee and Cape Coral both are large areas without a major zoo. Naples is the closest to Cape Coral I believe but that's about an hour away Guam could use a proper zoo as well. The zoo they have there is tiny, and not the best. I feel like if a proper zoo were to open up, although quite costly, it could be an interesting collection as I imagine it could obtain many rare species from Asian governments.
I think Washington Island could use a zoo. The island doesn't have too many permanent residents, but it does have a few and the island is immensely popular as a summer vacation destination. Currently there is a small petting zoo with domestics, but I think something with some exotics would be very popular and get lots of visitors.
Does eastern Iowa get enough tourists? A zoo in Iowa City would be nice but I would be curious how well it would do. Then again I guess nobody said it had to be a big zoo. Myrtle Beach seems like a great place for a zoo as there are plenty of tourists. I wonder also if Branson, Missouri could support one. I know virtually nothing about that place so could be way off base.
Tons of people round here go to Branson, although I'm not sure why. (I've heard it's terrible). Iowa City is home to University of Iowa, one of the state's top universities. The other major one is Iowa State in Ames (go cyclones!) but Des Moines is pretty close.
I also think that Eastern Iowa could use a zoo as well. My thought would be to put it somewhere more near Cedar Rapids though for the same reason as the main airport in the region being there, it's a more centralized location between Waterloo and Iowa City. I think any zoo there would need to be one focused on serving the region to get enough attendance, which I think being in Cedar Rapids would help. I thin another option would be trying to find a place east of there to get the population from Davenport as well. That idea would be a little bit more like North Carolina's process of trying to find a centralized location between the big cities. As people mention quite a bit on this site, main attendance for zoos is locals, so I don't think a huge concern would be the need to draw in tourists. I don't think the area could support a major zoo, so I doubt it could attract many tourists to begin with. As for Branson, it has a zoo currently. The Promised Land Zoo. I visited it this summer. It's nothing special and enclosures are hit or miss, but it would be just one hindrance to starting up a bigger zoo.
