The Pittsburgh Zoo & Aquarium has announced a new 20-year plan to upgrade its entire campus.
The plan, announced Thursday, includes a $55 million first phase that will last five to seven years and include new front gates and accessible path; an enlarged and modernized giraffe barn; expanded giraffe yard; and a renovated orangutan habit with multiple levels, to encourage natural swinging. The orangutan habitat will also include tapirs and the Southeast Asian gibbon known as the siamang, and will incorporate pools and waterfall.
Phase one also includes an update of the zoo's Education Complex.
Ultimately, the master plan will affect the entire Highland Park campus, said zoo spokesperson Matt Phillips.
“Every inch of the zoo is going to see some sort of change,” he said.
Later phases of the makeover will include a reworking of the area immediately after the entry, so that visitors will see animals sooner than they do now. Other long-term plans include bringing back bears in a “Yellowstone Springs” exhibit near the aquarium.
A temporary entrance path will be the first physical sign of the project starting in November. The “Zoo Fit Path,” a pedestrian alternative to the escalator from the parking lot, will also be remodeled, Phillips said.
The new front gates are scheduled to debut next summer.
Phillips said a capital campaign will be announced soon.
The zoo, which welcomes nearly one million visitors a year, is home to about 8,600 animals representing 500 species.
