LAs quirkiest landmark closes for yearslong Olympics reno and locals are furious
LA’s one-of-a-kind landmark may be focused on the Ice Age, but the prehistoric relic needs an update.La Brea Tar Pits, an active paleontological research site in Hancock Park, Los Angeles where discoveries are made daily, is undergoing a two-year transformation.
The Ice Age Fossil Site digs fossils in the heart of L.A.for visitors to watch.The $240 million renovation will modernize the museum, which opened in 1977, with new exhibition galleries, visible research laboratories, expanded collections storage, a theater and a rooftop terrace overlooking the tar pits and surrounding park.
But locals aren’t all happy.“Yes, the museum needs a facelift.
But it doesn’t need a three year overhaul.They’re just going to screw it up and make it full of video screens and take away all of the charm that everyone loves about the museum.
I really hope they don’t take away the hill,” a user on social media complained.The beloved landmark at Hancock Park was originally formed around a group of tar pits, where natural asphalt seeped up from the ground for tens of thousands of years.
Over many centuries, the bones of trapped animals have been preserved.The site serves as a working paleontological research center and exhibition space.It documents the Ice Age by housing and studying over two million specimens of extinct plants and animals, including mammoths, saber-toothed cats and dire wolves.
The museum does active digging and excavations where visitors can watch paleontologists uncover prehistoric fossils in real time.It operates a visible fossil lab where scientists clean, study and catalog the bones found. There are thousands of Ice Age fossils and skeletons to analyze.
This is not merely an exhibit for visitors, but serves as a global hub for research, where scientists can study ancient ecosystems. The revamp is scheduled to be completed just in time for the 2028 Olympic games.Multiple L.A.
institutions like the Los Angles County Museum of Art and the Californ...