The Exploratorium unveils new outdoor exhibits in Fort Mason, beginning March 13

Posted by admin on Feb 14, 2009

Dotted along the waterfront in San Francisco’s Fort Mason, the new Outdoor Exploratorium opens to the public on March 13. Featuring a collection of 20 brand-new interactive science exhibits and artworks that harness the wind, the waves, marine life, and the man-made and natural environments, the Outdoor Exploratorium seeks to reveal the more subtle phenomena surrounding us.

The free-admission installations are presented by the Exploratorium, the popular Presidio-based museum that offers hands-on science, art, and human perception exhibits to children of all ages. The Outdoor Exploratorium marks the museum’s first extended foray into outdoor exhibits, and took the staff more than two years to assemble.

Among the exhibits is "Bridge Thermometer," in which a San Francisco icon — the Golden Gate Bridge — is transformed into an instrument that lets visitors measure changing temperature patterns. A calibrated telescope trained on the bridge reveals fluctuations in the structure’s height as its metal skeleton expands and contracts (in fact, the center span of the bridge is designed to move up and down as much as 16 feet as the temperature changes).

At "Tasting the Tides," special low-flow drinking fountains invite visitors to taste a range of salt concentrations typical of water flowing from the Sacramento Delta through the San Francisco Bay to the Pacific. (The fountains don’t provide actual Bay water, of course!)

Using sailboat wind indicators arranged on a vertical pole, "Wind Arrows" reveals the complex wind stratification patterns of the San Francisco Bay shoreline. By comparing the directions of waving flags at different heights and locations along Hyde Street Pier, Fisherman’s Wharf, and Aquatic Park, the surrounding urban architecture reveals itself as a large-scale wind observatory.

Visitors are also encouraged to examine pier pilings oscillating in response to incoming waves, interpret signs of geological change, and investigate the unique growth of plants adapted to colonizing the fractures in an asphalt parking lot.

A full list of the exhibits and their locations is available at the Exploratorium’s website.