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Arctic exhibit to offer more room for polar bears
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Premier Greg Selinger and Minister of Conservation Bill Blaikie (front) take part in a snow turning for a Polar Bear Conservation Centre to be built at the Assiniboine Park Zoo.
While orphan polar bear cubs may return to Winnipeg this fall to reside at a new Assiniboine Park Zoo rescue centre, adult bears will have 20 times more room at a new Arctic exhibit slated to open in 2013.
Construction will begin this month on the International Polar Bear Conservation Centre, $4.5-million educational centre and polar bear "transition centre" in Assiniboine Park Zoo, provincial officials and the Assiniboine Park Conservancy said today.
The centre will include a research and educational facility run by Polar Bears International in a new building to be constructed west of the zoo's existing bear enclosure.
The enclosure itself will be renovated to meet Manitoba standards for housing polar bears. Orphan Canadian polar bear cubs may be housed there as soon as the fall, but problem adult bears or injured bears could follow.
The transition centre will be off limits to the public most of the time.
But an expansive new Arctic exhibit with room for six adult polar bears will be built on zoo grounds west of the conservation centre.
The polar bear enclosure will have hills, an underwater viewing area and possibly a tundra-buggy viewing platform, conservancy operations officer Don Peterkin said.
Construction should begin in 2012 and be completed in 2013.
The changes are part of a long-term $90-million overhaul of Assiniboine Park Zoo.
The provincial government is funding $31 million of the work.
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