THE ENTERTAINMENT CHALLENGE
by Lim Lay Ying
Property Times, New Straits Times
09th April 2004

Textbooks are out. In a world where the harsh realities of life are played out before us every other day, our children wise up to calamities such as tsunamis, earthquakes, viruses and diseases, and terrorism, from the media instead of their school books.

Educational facilities such as schools and universities are finding themselves pressured by these 21st-century societal and technology changes, and trying hard to adapt to limited public funding. In order to enhance their appeal to prospective students, universities for instance, are moving towards incorporating commercial services and retail entertainment as a way to improve their links with the surrounding urban neighbourhoods.

In the United States, the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia recently developed 40th@Walnut Street to serve the retail and entertainment needs of the campus and the community. It includes a state-of-the-art Bridge Cinema Delux, a gourmet grocer, various retail uses, a performing arts center housed in a restored historic church, and a public library.

Incorporating some form of entertainment offers the university an opportunity to broaden its markets and compete more effectively for consumers’ time and attention in a crowded marketplace. Public edutainment destinations such as museums and aquariums are also recognizing the challenge to ensure that their guests’ experience is powerful enough to bring the customer back again and again.

Adding more buzz

In Australia, the Melbourne Aquarium located along a stretch of the Yarra River in Melbourne, is a shining example of how entertainment has been successfully introduced and integrated to make it more in tune with the lifestyles of today’s consumers. (see pictures).

Images from www.melbourneaquarium.com.au

In an effort to draw more visitors and add more buzz to the underwater world experience, the Melbourne Aquarium offers a motion-based simulator ride. Known as ICE RUN, the ride takes one on a turbulent simulated journey as an ‘ice berg’ on a roller-coaster ride through arctic conditions. Previous simulated rides include the Shipwrecked Ride that transports one on a futuristic underwater journey to explore the inside of a real shipwreck. Rides at the aquarium are continually changed to encourage repeat visitations.

Opened in January 2000, the Melbourne Aquarium receives around one million visitors a year. Aside from the simulator rides, it also features interactive multi-media displays such as Fishworks which allow visitors to view the world from a fish’s perspective. There is a Rock Pool where children can touch and inspect sea stars, hermit crabs, balmain bugs, and shark eggs.

The greater part of the aquarium contains a 2.2 million litre Oceanarium featuring species native to the Southern Ocean. A large tunnel and Fishbowl in the heart of the Oceanarium provide a 360-degree live “circle vision”. There are also display areas simulating natural marine habitats such as the Aussie billabong, mangrove swamps, and rock-pools, and floor-to-ceiling coral atoll and sea jellies from the Great Barrier Reef.

World-class facility

Expansion plans are already in place for the Melbourne Aquarium. New additions include a world-first Antarctic exhibition, a temporary exhibit hall, education facilities for students, and a 24-hour rooftop conservatory for functions and conferences.

The A$170 million (approximately RM510 million) expansion project will also feature car parks, retail shops, an arts incubator, and 500 apartment units named H2O on Flinders – offering 1, 2, and 3 bedroom units with views of the river, nearby park, and Flinders Street.

Malaysia too, will soon be unveiling a world-class aquarium equivalent to the size of the Melbourne Aquarium, as well as Korea’s Busan Aquarium. Named Aquaria@KLCC, it will be the country’s largest aquarium and will eventually outdo that of Singapore’s Sentosa Underwater World when it is opened sometime this year.

Aquaria@KLCC, located at levels B1 & B2 of the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre and accessible from Jalan Pinang, spans a total floor area of 5,576 square meters (60,000 square feet). The RM60 million project is built (and will be operated) by Aquawalk Sdn Bhd, a joint venture set-up between Aquawalk International Ltd – a specialist in aquarium development, and project management consultant Capping Corporation, both of which are New Zealand-based companies.

State-of-the-art technology

It is designed to be a “next-generation” aquarium by Marinescape Pte Ltd, (also New Zealand-based), which is renowned for its development and construction track record of over 20 aquatic exhibition facilities throughout the world. The team behind the project promises edutainment and fun for its targetted one million over visitors each year.

Visitors to the aquarium will get to conduct simulations, virtual experiments, and learn about marine science and ecology. A key highlight includes a 929 square meter (10,000 square feet)-Discovery Centre where visitors can attempt to create their own species of fish, conduct virtual experiments in cross breeding and genetic engineering, and simulate marine life’s reactions to environmental changes. State-of-the-art technology has been applied to enhance the underwater world environment and increase the appeal to visitors through interactive games so that learning becomes a fun process for them.

Themed around Asian and the Amazon rainforests, Aquaria@KLCC will feature more than 5,000 aquatic and terrestrial animals from 150 different species (including sand tiger sharks and a three-metre arapaima). A 90 metre (295 feet)-long walk-through acrylic tunnel will allow visitors to admire the 3,000 sea creatures gliding through the “depths of the ocean”, and also witness the fish (including stingrays and sharks) being fed by divers.

Educate and entertain

An Aqua Theatre which has a 7 metre (23 feet)-wide viewing window of the main tank, offers visitors more opportunities to observe the fish feeding and diving activities seen at the Underwater Tunnel. Here, visitors can engage in conversations with the divers equipped with dive communicators, during the daily shows. The theatre is also a venue for corporate functions and special events.

Other highlights in the aquarium include a rock pool where visitors have the chance to touch several species of coastal sea creatures, a 5.3 metre (17.4 feet)-high flooded forest tube tank, a hanging garden which is a replica of the upper layers of the rainforest, and a souvenir shop. Programs such as “Back-of-House Tour” for visitors and “Sleepovers” for school children, are part of the planned activities to enlighten (and at the same time, entertain) patrons on what goes on behind the scenes.

In an age of intense competition and rapidly evolving entertainment environments surfacing in different formats, the consumers’ demand for more enjoyment in whatever they do in their daily lives will lead to new and unprecedented forms of entertainment development – be they in the retail world or on the education front.