The Phoenix Zoo is moving ahead with plans for a sprawling conservation park on the western edge of Sahuarita, a project that could bring safari-style enclosures and major breeding programs to southern Arizona. The idea is to shift some endangered-species work out of the zoo’s tight Papago Park footprint and into a much larger, more natural landscape that can support reintroductions and bigger, managed herds.
Lease and site overview
The Arizona Center for Nature Conservation and the Phoenix Zoo have locked in a long-term lease with mining company Freeport-McMoRan for roughly 1,120 acres near Pima Mine Road, just east of Interstate 19, and early site-planning studies are expected to start soon. “This has been a goal of the Arizona Center for Nature Conservation for quite some time,” ACNC President Bert Castro said in a statement as the organizations prepare surveys and designs, according to KGUN9.
What would live there
Local reporting says the proposed conservation park would cover almost 1,100 acres along Sahuarita’s western edge, with about 160 acres inside town limits and the rest in unincorporated Pima County. Planners expect the first public phase to occupy roughly 600 acres, built out with enclosures that range from about 10 acres to 100 acres or more.
Possible residents on the drawing board include Arabian oryx, addax and other arid-adapted antelopes, along with giraffes and rhinos. The site is also being eyed to bolster breeding programs for Arizona natives such as Mexican gray wolves, California condors, ocelots and the imperiled masked bobwhite quail. The Phoenix Zoo has a long history with Arabian oryx conservation, and its captive “world herd” played a key role in reintroduction programs decades ago, according to a genetic study of the species’ recovery.
Zoo history and conservation work
The Phoenix Zoo opened in 1962 at Papago Park and today occupies roughly 125 acres in central Phoenix. Moving some species work to a rural Sahuarita site would mark the organization’s first major expansion beyond that long-time campus.
The zoo and its Arizona Center for Nature Conservation arm already run multiple local recovery programs, and staff say a larger, more remote footprint would let animals display more natural behaviors and rotate through larger ranges, which is especially important for breeding herds. Those efforts are outlined by the Phoenix Zoo.
Approvals, access and the price tag
Sahuarita’s Town Council approved a pre-annexation agreement with the zoo and the landowner on Jan. 26, clearing an early local procedural step toward development. For now, the site has no paved routes leading into it, and zoo officials say they are working with the town on a road cut to provide basic access…