Residents and visitors got their first tours of the new National Park Visitor Center in Cruz Bay Friday. About 200 people attended the open house celebration that featured mocko jumbies, steelpan music and a lavish smorgasbord.
V.I. National Park spokesperson Paul Thomas said visitors were given tours of the new two-story building and shown where different divisions of the National Park Service will set up shop. R.W. Jenkins, park chief of maintenance and engineering, said departmental moves are expected to be completed by next week.
Among those on hand for opening were Delegate Donna Christian-Christensen, St. John administrator Julien Harley, Coral Bay author/educator Guy Benjamin, park service personnel from St. Thomas and St. Croix, and representatives of the Friends of the Virgin Islands National Park, the Tourism Department and the Small Business Administration.
The imposing new pale yellow building with green shutters, built on the site of the old and much smaller visitor center, includes handicapped-accessible ramps and restrooms. And, Thomas said, it has been wired for Internet accessibility.
Jenkins said the $3.2 million construction budget gave contractors an opportunity to create a center able to meet the needs of the park service for the next 20 years. "We've done some things that are considered state of the art, that will last a long time," he said.
Inspectors from the National Park Service regional office in Atlanta gave final approval to the project last week, Jenkins said. This is the go-ahead for the ranger station, interpretative section and administration to move in, he added.
Bookstore manager Zena Matthias was one of the first park employees to move from the tiny temporary quarters they had worked in for the last two years at the Morris F. DeCastro Clinic. "I'm elated. I have ample room," she said. "I have air-conditioning and storage and outside storage."
Matthias said she has a lot of new stock for the bookstore. She hasn't had a chance to put it all up yet, she said, and will be adding T-shirts and native crafts to her inventory.
New visitor center exhibits are still being developed.
The center is open seven days a week from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
