Materials: 2,715 tons of structural steel and 200,000 concrete blocks.
Area
Building: nearly 370,000 sq.ft. (34,374 m2), a 68 percent increase over the museum’s old space 220,000 sq.ft. (20,439 m2).
Indoors: 8.5 acres (3.4 hectares).
Outdoors: 10 acres (4.05 hectares) of parkland, including a landscaped amphitheater, right along the Mississippi River.
William L. McKnight-3M Omnitheater
Seating: more than 400 seats, compared to 330 in the old facility. This is a 26 percent increase—the size of a 747 airplane—only all the seats are first class!
Theater screen: a seven-story-tall, nine-story-wide flat screen converts to a nine-story-wide domed screen—the first convertible IMAX® Dome Theater in the United States.
Volume: 1.2 million cu.ft. (339,802 m3)
Auditorium
Seating: 331, a 17 percent increase.
3D Laser Show: the tenth of its kind in the world, and the first of its kind in the Upper Midwest. (The next closest one is in St. Louis, Mo.)
Access & Getting Around
Parking ramp: holds 825 cars, a 28 percent increase in capacity.
Elevators: 11 (5 in the old museum)
Restrooms: 15 sets instead of two—a 650 percent increase.
New Features
Room for visitors: twice as much space as the old museum.
Windows: 37,000 sq.ft. (3,437 m2) with dramatic views of the Mississippi River and downtown St. Paul. (The window washing bill will be nearly three times that of the old museum.)
Research & collections: 24,240 sq.ft. (2,252 m2). Scientists now have 110 percent more space to research and preserve the museum’s 1.75 million artifacts.
Classrooms: 7, located in a specially designed suite on a floor dedicated to educational facilities. Four of these classrooms can be partitioned, making the grand total 11.
Events: nearly 24,000 sq.ft. (2,230 m2) of space, whereas the old museum had only one room for special events.
