Nuuksio National Park to provide Nature Centre for visitors

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According to plans, a new nature centre will be set up in Espoo’s Nuuksio National Park in a couple of years.
      The planned centre called Nuuksiokeskus - Nuuksio Centre will be located in the neighbourhood of the Solvalla Sports Institute on the shore of Lake Pitkäjärvi.
     
Metsähallitus - the Administration of Forests, a state-owned enterprise managing most of the protected areas of Finland, is to rent the new building and to run a nature centre there.
      In addition to exhibition premises, the building is planned to accommodate a 200-seat auditorium, a cafeteria-restaurant, and a nature school.
      ”The aim is to create a destination for guided tours. The centre is to be a window into the entire network of national parks and nature in Finland”, reports Stig Johansson, the chair of the board of Nuuksiokeskus Oy and the Regional Director of the natural heritage services of Metsähallitus in Southern Finland.
     
The constructors expect the annual number of visitors to amount to some 200,000.
      ”Primarily various kind of recreational travellers are expected to visit the centre. Foreign visitors are likely to need guidance, and so are also city people who do not know even the basics of how to walk on nature trails. In addition, there are active hikers”, lists Timo Kukko, the Managing Director of Nuuksiokeskus.
      The new Nuuksio Centre will attempt to attract particularly congress visitors in the Greater Helsinki area as well as travellers changing planes at the Helsinki-Vantaa airport.
     
Another significant target group includes those who will participate in educational programmes. The aim is to give wilderness education particularly to schoolchildren, the number of whom is around 350,000 in the economic zone of the new centre, Kukko calculates.
      ”The idea is that all schoolchildren would visit the Nuuksio Centre at least once during their school days”, Kukko reports.
      Most of the Nuuksio Centre’s operations are to be financed by the municipalities in the Greater Helsinki area.
     
The plan is to turn the new nature centre into a flagship of all nature centres.
      This and the new centre’s role as an environmental educator are the reasons why Stig Johansson regards it as important that the energy solutions of the new building should represent a prime example of today’s construction.
      The Administration of Forests is the majority owner of the real estate company responsible for the project. In addition, the City of Espoo and the Solvalla Sports Institute are both minority shareholders in the company.
     
The estimated budget for the construction of the Nuuksio Centre is EUR 10.5 million.
      Helsingin Sanomat interviewed some passengers at the Helsinki-Vantaa Airport, asking whether they would be enticed into visiting the Nuuksio Centre while waiting for their connecting flights.
      Most of the travellers thought that one would need more time for such a visit.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Lucky escape for backpacker in Nuuksio National Park (13.10.2008)

See also:
  FACTFILE: Nuuksio lake upland used for recreation since 1950s (25.2.2003)

Links:
  Nuuksio National Park (Wikipedia)
  Metsähallitus - The Administration of Forests

Helsingin Sanomat