“We are nowhere near ready to reopen,” : Exploration Place CEO

Phase Two of BC’s Recovery Plan is set for Tuesday as museums, art galleries, and libraries are eligible to open.

However, don’t expect The Exploration Place to begin operating anytime soon.

CEO, Tracy Calogheros told MyPGNow.com the doors will remain shut for a while.

“We’re looking right now at late-summer, early September maybe but some of that will have to do with when we can put the funding together to do the work that we need to do and a lot of it is going to have to do with public behaviour.”

“Something as simple as our front doors don’t allow for social distancing when either entering or exiting the building do that’s got us looking at the entire facility and realizing that we’ve got some actual structural changes that we have to make, there are components that are very popular like our children’s galleries that there is just no way to sterilize it in some of the sections where only kids can get to.”

Calogheros states there are nowhere near ready to open and while the phase they are opening does include museums, the Exploration Place is also a hands-on science centre, pre-school as well as several high-touch exhibits.

“The fact is you can’t just follow science when it’s convenient and the science hasn’t yet had a chance to catch up to this virus and we are a science centre so while our industry was among the first to close, I don’t believe for a second we’ll be among the first to open.”

When asked about how tough the closures have been on her and facilities of similar nature, Calogheros explained that it’s been a bit of a mixed bag.

“Our industry is really broad, so you’ve got everything from botanical gardens, zoos, and aquariums to encyclopedic museums like the Royal BC Museum or art galleries like Two Rivers and then you have hybrids like Exploration Place so it really varies depending on what part of the country you’re in and which piece of the industry. Aquariums and botanical gardens are going to do quite well on the back end of this because they have so much physical room and outdoor space for people whereas a place like Scienceworld is going to run into more challenges.”