Random Palaeo-Work idea of the Day #11

Hello, and welcome back to Mesozoic Mind. So while on vacation, my family visited on the highway the Big Apple. No, not Ney York, but a roadside attraction featuring a giant fibreglass apple, tacky and saccarhine rustic decor, kiddie attractions, and a petting zoo of stinking pens. It's as cheesy as you'd imagine, and the only thing I like about it were the animals in the petting zoo, like turkeys and hissing geese. I'm honestly surprised they haven't added some animatronic dinosaurs while at it too. Really, dinosaurs are a pretty common choice for roadside attractions. Most famously are those from around the Cold War era, like Dinosaur Park in South Dakota, but in recent years they have been suplanted by relatively cheap animatronics made in the 90's and early 2000's, and in my opinion age horribly from a scintific standpoint and sn artistic one, remaining unfeathered and pronated-handed and barely functioning, while the fibreglass and concrete models do have a charming retro flair to them, long past outdated and in vintage historic art territory.

So without further ado, here is my idea for a dinosaur park/roadside attraction!

Pangaea Park


A hybrid mix of museum, roadside attraction, and adventure park with a theme around a specific part of the Mesozoic: the Triassic period and the supercontinent Pangaea (and to a lesser extent the Early Jurassic afterwards). Ideally it would be located in southern Ontario where I live.

I took most of the inspiration for Pangaea Park from Moab Giants in Utah for the attractions, by the way.

Triassic Trail

The main section of the park, a section where you walk by statues and animatronics of fauna from the time. Species that would be represented here would include (but won't be limited to)
  • Coelophysis
  • Postosuchus
  • Plateosaurus
  • Desmatosuchus
  • Caelestiventus
  • Herrerasaurus
  • Rutiodon
  • Isanosaurus
  • Tanystropheus
  • Nothosaurus
  • Lisowicia
  • Dilophosaurus
  • Scelidosaurus
  • Massospondulus
  • Heterodontosaurus
  • Anchisaurus
Additional attractions in the section include a ropes course and a fake digsite sandpit.

Museum of the Triassic

The entrance compound. It would feature the following:
  • The museum itself, about Pangaea, life during the time, and its breakup, with a focus on Canadian fossil sites from the time, like in Nova Scotia.
  • A motion simulator ride about the Triassic seas off what is now western coast of Canada, culminating with an encounter with a pod of the giant ichthyosaurus Shastisaurus.
  • A 3D theare (cheaper to maintain then a 4D one)
  • A themed resturaunt.
  • Classrooms for education.

Living Fossils

A zoo partially within and partially next to the MOTT for animals of two kinds: 1, animals which evolved or have origins in the triassic, and 2, those considered living fossils, having barely changed in millions of years, whether from before the Triassic or during it. That means you can expect to find arthropods, turtles, alligators, and birds exhibited, for example.

This park as a whole would not just be an entertainment complex with cheap animtronic models. I would have the models and ani,atronics be as up to date, perhaps getting Blue Rhino or Hall Train for it, as well as fellow Ontarian institution Research Casting International, and partner with whatwver educational institutions are in the area for learning opprotunities.

Hope you like it. What's an idea for a prehistoric-themed attraction do you have or have made? I'd love to hear them.
Location: Colborne, ON K0K 1S0, Canada

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