Campaigners trying to stop the ongoing closure of Bristol Zoo are holding a second big public meeting this week. The Save Bristol Zoo campaign are holding an open meeting on Wednesday evening, starting from 7.30pm at Christ Church, Clifton.
The campaign is calling for the Bristol Zoological Society, which runs the zoo, to reverse their decision to close it and move to the Wild Place on the edge of Bristol, in countryside between Easter Compton and Cribbs Causeway. The save the zoo campaign, which is backed by many leading figures in Bristol, from TV historian Prof Alice Roberts to former mayor George Ferguson, claims Bristol Zoo’s decision to close the famous Clifton Zoo Gardens site has been done for purely financial reasons, to earn as much money as possible from a 220-apartment development that is planned for the site.
The zoo closed on September 1 last year, and since then many of the animals have been moved on to other zoos or moved to the Wild Place by junction 17 of the M5. The Save Bristol Zoo campaign claim that so few of the animals at the zoo - particularly the large mammals - are moving up to the Wild Place, that this is effectively the zoo closing its doors and redeveloping the site.
