GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) – The Children’s Museum of Green Bay is packing up and moving across from Bay Beach Amusement Park later this month.
They plan to start their move to 1230 Bay Beach Road on April 21 and then reopen at their new location in early May.
Museum and city officials think the new location next to other family-friendly attractions is perfect and gives the Bay Beach area more momentum when paired with a new Ferris Wheel in the works and the return of the beach to Bay Beach.
Quantifying the move in terms of dollar figures is difficult this early in the process, but officials have stated that the new location and enhance space should allow them to serve more visitors each year.
According to Museum Board Chair Chris Cumicek, “We anticipate serving up to 120,000 visitors a year, up from our current average of 72,000 annually.”
And estimates of roughly 50,000 additional visitors a year means more money coming into the area, as well.
“It looks like their expectation is to double their numbers,” explains Brad Toll, President and CEO of the Greater Green Bay Convention and Visitors Bureau. “Which typically would double your revenue.”
For him, it means that if the museum is doing well that people will frequent the other attractions nearby and maybe make an entire day out of it.
“Maybe they would have spent a half day, now they’re going to spend a whole day,” he explains. “For visitors into our community that might mean now an overnight.”
Something he brings up, which outgoing Mayor Jim Schmitt highlighted as well, is the concept of bringing in an established attraction to a well-known area.
“Creating a destination within a destination is beneficial,” he says.
Really, there are two sides to this move, though.
The move to Bay Beach for the museum should provide them with better space and enhance the overall appeal of the area, but it also clears out their soon-to-be former space in downtown Green Bay.
For Toll, having a chess piece like that to play with is a rare opportunity.
“It always provides opportunity,” he explains. “Whether it be for a visitor type attraction, an art gallery, or something like that, a new restaurant.”
Even if the end result of the space isn’t a visitor attraction, it can have long-term positive effects on the area.
“If it ends up being that a business moves in, it’s those businesses that create the density that encourages housing, which encourages restaurants,” says Toll.
