Museum Closer to Reality

By Tom Wharton, The Salt Lake Tribune

Jul. 30–Curious mountain bikers riding the Bonneville Shoreline Trail gawked at a large dinosaur puppet Tuesday, as ground was broken for a new $103 million Utah Museum of Natural History.

“This is a little bit about people, a little bit about land and a little bit about our heritage,” Gov. Jon Huntsman told about 700 people gathered on the site south of Red Butte Garden where the museum is scheduled to open early in 2011. “It all comes together in this museum.”

The new museum features a futuristic design with elements of concrete, stone and copper incorporated into a building that will be terraced into the foothills near the edge of what was once Lake Bonneville.

Its location has prompted concern among some of the bicyclists, hikers and joggers who use the Bonneville Shoreline Trail. Julie Wolfe, who walked the trail with her two dogs moments before the start of the ceremony, said she worries that access to the trail will be limited as the museum is built.

“Trail users are not happy,” she said. “The museum is fine but it’s access to the trail that is the problem.”

Museum spokeswoman Patti Carpenter said the trail will remain open during construction. One reason is that the trail segment near the museum is built over a large pipeline that can’t be moved. But the new building will eliminate some trails higher up the mountain to prevent erosion, she said.

The existing museum, housed in a building that once served as the University of Utah’s library on the old lower part of campus, contains about 1.2 million artifacts, many of which cannot be displayed because of a lack of space.

The new 161,000 square feet museum will be double the size of the current facility. It will be named after Rio Tinto, the parent company of Kennecott Copper, which contributed $15 million towards construction.

Exhibits in the new museum will be organized into eight thematic areas and three learning labs, ranging from Utah Sky, an indoor-outdoor interpretive space, to Past Worlds, which will examine Utah’s ancient environments.

Money for the museum has come from federal grants, state government and private donations. University of Utah President Michael Young said $81 million has been raised, and $22 million more is needed. He announced that the George and Dolores Dore Eccles Foundation had issued a $5 million challenge grant to jump start the project’s final fundraising push.

wharton@sltrib.com

A peek inside the museum

The new $103 million Utah Museum of Natural History, expected to be completed in 2011, will have eight thematic exhibit areas:

–Utah Sky, an indoor-outdoor interpretive space.

–Native Voices, designed in consultation with Utah’s American Indian communities.

–Life, a celebration of Utah’s biological diversity with an adjacent naturalist’s lab.

–The Land, an interpretation of Utah’s mountain, basin and range and plateau regions.

–First Peoples, a look to the state’s prehistoric people with an adjacent cave lab.

–Lake, a narrative look at the Great Salt Lake.

–Past Worlds, a depiction of Utah’s ancient environments with an adjacent Earth Lab.

–Utah Futures, a place to explore pressing contemporary issues with local and global implications for the future.

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