THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 1, 1994 TAG: 9406010010
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A14 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Medium
DATELINE: 940601 LENGTH:
The success of the Virginia Marine Science Museum is reason to think so. The still-young Virginia Beach museum, where fish in aquariums are the principal attraction, is at the easternmost end of Hampton Roads. It prospers without a big marketing budget that would make it highly visible. Yet it drew 340,000 visitors last year - area families, travelers, schoolchildren - and will be expanded to three times its size over the next three years.
{REST} Virginia Zoological Park in Norfolk recorded more than 300,000 visitors in 1993; the Norfolk Naval Base tour, 165,000; the Chrysler Museum, 140,000; Norfolk Botanical Garden, 119,000.
Nauticus is pricier (adults, $10; seniors and military, $8.50; children ages 4-17, $7.50) than the Virginia Marine Science Museum (adults, $4.75; seniors, $4.25; children, $4) or the zoo or botanical garden. So Norfolk must promote Nauticus energetically, and the venture must deliver on its promise to be worth the price of admission.
The public will judge whether it does, voting with its wallet for or against the contents of the distinctively shaped gray building.
If the public judgment is favorable, it will be in part because Nauticus stands not alone but with the Waterside festival marketplace, Town Point Park (with its crowd-pleasing Festevents activities), the Waterside Convention Center, the MacArthur Memorial, Harbor Park, Scope, Chrysler Hall, the Chrysler Museum and the financial/commercial center.
Three decades ago, Norfolk's downtown waterfront was a wasteland of rotting piers. Today it is an oasis for pleasure seekers. Nauticus is the waterfront's latest, and most expensive, delight.
We wish it well.
Norfolk, too.
by CNB