Port Canaveral aquarium should break ground by fall 2024, feature manatee rehab facility
Construction should begin by October 2024 on the Brevard Zoo-spearheaded $100 million aquarium and nature conservation campus at Port Canaveral, which will now feature a manatee rehabilitation center to treat sickly and struggling sea cows.
And after the first phase opens in early 2027, Brevard Zoo Executive Director Keith Winsten said the aquarium will serve as a key economic generator for the Space Coast, showcasing underwater creatures and features from the Atlantic Ocean to the St. Johns River.
“It's really important for tourism. It gives us a critical mass of attractions that are authentic, right? If you go over to Orlando, there are world-class attractions, and I love Harry Potter World — it's authentic to the books, but you know it's not a real place," Winsten said, generating laughter during a Melbourne Regional Chamber speech.
"But Kennedy Space Center, the zoo, the aquarium, these are real authentic things," Winsten said.
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Winsten unveiled a promotional video and artist's renderings of the future aquarium's manatee healing center during a Thursday chamber breakfast speech at the Viera zoo's Nyami Nyami River Lodge.
Fundraising continues. In December 2021, zoo officials launched a $100 million campaign to construct the aquarium and conservation campus on 14 acres of Canaveral Port Authority-owned property along the Banana River shoreline south of State Road 528, near the exit for Exploration Tower and The Cove.
Winsten said the nonprofit zoo's parent organization, the East Coast Zoological Society, has raised $55 million so far by creating a philanthropic drive extending into Orlando, Volusia County and Indian River County.
The Brevard County Commission approved a $5 million tourism-tax grant for the project in September, adding to the commission's previous $10 million grant from 2018. Zoo officials hope the Florida Legislature bolsters aquarium funding during this session.
Winsten said the design-engineering phase will take about another year to complete. Fully built, the campus will house 12 buildings. He called California's Monterey Bay Aquarium "our North Star" in showcasing conservation and the surrounding ecosystem.
Projected annual attendance: 525,000
The Port Canaveral aquarium and conservation center is projected to attract 525,000 visitors per year, Winsten said, per the most conservative of six attendance models.
That would help generate $85.5 million in annual economic impact, according to a 2017 study prepared by the Economic Development Commission of Florida’s Space Coast.
Winsten labeled the 2017 EDC estimate "super conservative" because the aquarium vision was of a much smaller scope than it is today.
He said the aquarium campus will probably employ about 100 full-time staffers. By comparison, Brevard Zoo employs 130 to 140 full-time workers, who are bolstered by 60 to 70 part-time employees and 400 to 500 volunteers. He said aquarium staffing should follow a similar model.
Manatee healing-rehab facility
Winsten's speech touted the future aquarium's manatee critical care center to treat ailing and injured sea cows from the imperiled Indian River Lagoon. Today, many of these manatees are transported to SeaWorld Orlando's rescue center for emergency medical attention.
“We also move manatees all over Florida. And our crack manatee-moving team is our horticulture department, by the way. They are the best at driving big vehicles and moving heavy things in the heat,” Winsten said during his speech.
SeaWorld and Florida's similar medical facilities “are up to their eyeballs in manatees," he said.
“We can't actually wait for the aquarium. We're actually building an acute-care center for manatees at the zoo. So imagine stabilized patients from places like SeaWorld that come to us to finish their rehab," he said.
This manatee rehab facility at Brevard Zoo will include a 20-foot round pool, two 20-by-40-foot oval-shaped pools, two walk-in coolers to store lettuce for the manatees, a storage shed for medical equipment, and a rescue transport truck.
De Freese Coastal Conservation Hub
The aquarium campus will include the Dr. Duane De Freese Coastal Conservation Hub, a three-story structure with wet laboratories where university researchers and students will study the Indian River Lagoon.
A longtime Space Coast environmental advocate, De Freese serves as executive director of the Indian River Lagoon National Estuary Program. Winsten described the research facility as "the heart of the aquarium."
In addition, the aquarium's second construction phase will include a 5,000-square-foot “changing exhibit gallery” featuring wall-to-ceiling digital imagery, projected across a 360-degree visual field.
“That will allow us to take you anywhere across the world. We’ll immerse you with the Great Barrier Reef," said Winsten, who also cited the Galapagos Islands as a virtual destination.
“That space will allow us to transport you. We can also stage art exhibits in it. You could also hold a corporate fundraiser in it and use that 360 projection to talk about your products," Winsten said.
"If we're going to take you across the world, we'd rather do it — in this case — digitally and virtually because we have so (many) authentic things right here," he said.
Rick Neale is the South Brevard Watchdog Reporter at FLORIDA TODAY (for more of his stories, click here.) Contact Neale at 321-242-3638 or rneale@floridatoday.com. Twitter: @RickNeale1
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This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Port Canaveral aquarium worth $100 million to feature manatee center
