3,800 animals, and a closed Brutalist landmark
Toronto Zoo & the Ontario Science Centre
One of the largest zoos in the world by area, and a beloved Brutalist science museum the province abruptly closed in 2024 — two very different fates for two of Toronto's classic family attractions.
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Two of Toronto's classic family-outing institutions, both born out of 1960s civic ambition — one still going strong, the other now a genuine architectural loss.
Toronto Zoo
Opened August 15, 1974 as the Metropolitan Toronto Zoo (renamed simply Toronto Zoo in 1998, matching the wider amalgamation), replacing an older, cramped municipal zoo in Riverdale Park. At 287 hectares (710 acres), it's one of the largest zoos in the world by land area, home to roughly 3,800 animals across nearly 450 species, laid out in geographic zones connected by a monorail.
Ontario Science Centre (1969–2024)
A hands-on science and technology museum in Flemingdon Park, founded in 1964 and opened to the public in 1969 — an example of ambitious Brutalist civic architecture, its buildings and exhibit halls connected by bridges and escalators across a ravine site. It housed Ontario's only IMAX Dome theatre starting in 1996. In June 2024, the provincial government abruptly and permanently closed the building, citing deteriorating infrastructure and a risk of roof failure under snow load — a closure that drew significant public backlash and remains a genuinely contested local story.
What's left
With the Science Centre shuttered, the Toronto Zoo — alongside High Park and the Toronto Islands — remains one of the city's most reliable large-scale family attractions, and the province has said a scaled-down science centre replacement is planned for Ontario Place on the waterfront, though that project remains years out.
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