Woodland Park Zoo’s WildLights draws huge crowds

If you’ve been to Woodland Park Zoo’s WildLights this year, you have to wonder how many people are actually streaming in through the gates.

A recent trip on a chilly Saturday night was met by nearly stroller-to-stroller crowds dotted by starry-eyed couples on date night.

Jim Bennett, Director of Marketing at the zoo, says they’re on pace to welcome over 77,000 visitors to WildLights, which wraps up Saturday night, Jan. 4. In comparison, they had 66,000 guests over the span of 42 nights last year. This year’s event is six days shorter.

Obviously, the extra business is huge for the zoo, which normally sees about 1,000 people daily during daytime hours in December, the lowest attended month of the year.

Bennett says WildLights is a three-year experiment aimed at attracting a new audience to the zoo at times other than sunny days in July and August. This year, the thousands of LED lights wrapped all the way around the North Meadow and more of the animals were on display, including the meerkats and nocturnal animals. The visiting reindeer returned for a second year and the faux snowball fights at “Snowmazium” were also big hits.

The zoo hopes to continue WildLights past the experimental phase. Bennett says the staff will come together to figure out what worked and to come up with new ideas for next year. He does know if they’ll have a new parking lot expansion, which should help ease congestion on neighboring streets.

Extra traffic was a major issue for Seattle neighbors in 2012, but Bennett says they’ve had very few complaints this year. He says they tried to encourage visitors to check out the zoo on weekdays, offered free parking in the lots, and employed a trolley service in hopes of dispersing large weekend crowds.

Bennett says they plan to check in with the neighbors for feedback when WildLights ends.