Atlantic City Aquarium Offers Half-Price Admission During Reopening

Following a $4.5 million renovation and a March reopening, the Atlantic City Aquarium still doesn't have all its finishing touches in place for visitors. That's why city officials have decided to charge half-price admission ($6 for adults and $4 for children ages 3-12) to explore the facility.

On a recent tour of the aquarium, The Philadelphia Inquirer noted that several familiar occupants have made their way back home, including Groman, the 225-pound loggerhead sea turtle. The giant permit and drum fish have returned to the Fish of the Mid-Atlantic tank and little sharks, horseshoe crabs, moon jellies, and seahorses fill a first-floor touch tank.

However, fish tanks on the remodeled second floor stand empty.

Sarita DuCote-Stroud, the city's aquarist, told the Inquirer she didn't have an update on the arrival time for the additional sharks, rays, sea urchins, and sea stars that will occupy the second-floor tanks. She said that she and other staff members have been repeatedly communicating this information to visitors.

“When we do get the animals, they'll be flown in, and then our husbandry department will have to go to Philadelphia or New York to pick them up. Then they'll be quarantined for a time. We just can't introduce them into our regular population,” DuCote-Stroud explained.

Other areas of the aquarium have already been engaging visitors. On the third floor, panoramic views highlight the back bay and sea wall, where fishermen once lined the wall to catch local wildlife.

Outside the aquarium, visitors are greeted by new murals and a colorful sculpture with the Atlantic City Mayor Marty Small's famous line, “Can we say great day?”