H.R. MacMillan Space Centre — Attraction in Vancouver

My Girlfriend and I went on a Monday morning - we had the place to ourselves! We found it to be mainly aimed at school groups and youngsters in general. As an adult that is a bit of a space-geek, most of the information alongside the exhibits is pretty basic. The Cosmic Courtyard was rather dated in terms of exhibit quality (many 'under construction', CRT's, Czechoslovakia gets a mention, old software, sticky trackballs) and some were poorly thought out. For example, the dark meteorite samples are backlit on a lightbox in a dim room and viewed through a magnifying glass. You cannot see them! The piece of kit on display there was a Rocketdyne J-2 engine - I got a picture with that! The Groundstation Canada presentation we saw was 'Rocket Lab.' It explained Newton's Laws of Motion and how they apply to rocketry on a level aimed at ~8+ yrs/old. The host, Raphael, did a good job, as did all of the staff at the centre. Our time was best spent in the planetarium. We saw 'The Seacher'; A very Sagan-esque 35 minutes zooming around the universe, observing the structure of galaxies, solar systems, supernovae and Earth. It got pretty psychedelic at times, like LSD trip-out visuals, encompassing 180 degrees of your vision. A bit too much for the lady. I kinda liked it. The information that the host presented after The Searcher was pretty up-to-date. She lets us know about the asteroid that was recently discovered with a ring system and Enceladus' cryovolcanoes. The sound and visuals were good, as was the show. Both the Planetarium and Groundstation Canada have around 5 different shows per day, so the ones you get are a lucky dip depending on how long you stay. The science demos are 20mins every hour, and the planetarium shows are 35mins every hour. It would also have been nice to learn more about Canada's involvement in space. The Canadarm gets a little corner with a model, and there's pics of some crew hung on a wall up the back. More!

All in all, I think the level of information on display was great, it just needs a bit of a face-lift and a re-think. It's all mostly aimed at kids 8-15, which is fine! Most adults will learn something too. You can spend about 1-1.5hrs in the Cosmic Courtyard, then there's the shows. So you can spend a half a day here with the...

Pretty disappointing. I was expecting quite a lot more. Very disappointing for us as Vancouver residents.

The Space Centre itself is quite small, so it'll take you less than an hour to see and read all the exhibits. It's too expensive for what you get. You also have to pay for parking, which could come to at least $8. Also the planetarium itself hasn't been updated to show HD video resolution. It's barely SD quality, so all the stars and planets are smudged. It felt like I was in the 1980's again. Plus the show that we saw (Our solar system) was quite boring and some of the kids around the theatre were complaining about that. I could hear "Can we go now?" on many occasions. The commentator wasn't very alive at all. You also have to choose your planetarium show when you pay your entrance fee, so you can only see one show and you can't change it. Why they do that I don't know, the theatre was less than 1/4 full.

They have several electronic exhibits too, but we found most of them were either out of order or malfunctioning.

No coffee or tea anywhere.

The only redeeming quality was the live presentation, which we saw was about rockets.

This is located right next to the Museum of Vancouver, which itself is dated and only 6 out of 10. They should sell a ticket which includes both museums and then you maybe pay a supplement for the planetarium. Overall the MOV and the Space Centres are a disappointment, they really should knock them down and rejuvenate the two facilities.

Sorry guys but if you want repeat customers you're going to have to try a heck of...

My recent visit to the HR MacMillan Space Center left me somewhat disappointed. With the anticipation of witnessing the upcoming annual solar eclipse, I had high hopes for an engaging afternoon. Unfortunately, it seemed not much had changed in the 12 years since my last visit.

The main floor appeared unchanged and lacked fresh exhibits. Some displays pretended to engage but fell short, and the restroom still featured an old, possibly non-functional, female hygiene items machine. The once-empty water pool in front of the building left me wondering if it would ever be filled or repurposed. Even the Star stuff room which felt new to me was non-functional - nothing happen when we went in there and followed instructions.

The highlight of any visit to the Space Center is typically the planetarium. However, our disappointment continued as our entry allowed access to only one planetarium show, which turned out to be underwhelming. It felt like a documentary that could have been watched at home, and the moderator's mention of upcoming event related to Vancouver's solar eclipse but directly mentioned the total eclipse in April 2024 which felt completely irrelevant since the total eclipse won't even by passing by Vancouver.

In summary, my return to the HR MacMillan Space Center was marred by stagnant exhibits, disappointing planetarium content, and a lack of attention to solar local events. It's clear that the center needs a revitalization to keep up with the evolving world of space science and...