Utah's museums begin to reopen with reduced capacity, strained budgets

SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — Utah’s museums are beginning to reopen, but many are still struggling.

The Leonardo in Salt Lake City remains closed.

Virtual tours of the museum, for members only, begin on Monday.

Summer camps — adapted for the coronavirus era — also begin Monday. Groups will be capped at eight children, according to a spokeswoman, with a maximum of 40 kids in the 60,000-square-foot space.

Staffers are still working on how and when parts of the museum can reopen to the public.

Thanksgiving Point

Several of the museums are now open, including the Butterfly Biosphere. Time ticketing only is available, and capacity is running at 25% to 30%, which has forced cost-cutting measures.

“We have a large catering — a food and beverage operation — those went dark and are still mostly dark,” said Lorie Millward, vice president of possibilities for Thanksgiving Point.

Millward said visitors will notice changes, from workers assigned to sanitizing to one-way traffic. Some of the highly interactive exhibits are closed for now, but she’s hopeful more of Thanksgiving Point can open shortly.

She also expects innovation to the museum sector at large.

“We could see some great innovations and some really interesting new ways to interact with arts and culture and science coming out of this,” she said.

Southern Utah Museum of Arts

The museum in Cedar City just reopened on Monday. High-risk visitors can get into the exhibits an hour early from 10 a.m. to 11 p.m., and the number of people allowed into each exhibit has been reduced.

No huge financial impact from the pandemic because the funding source is largely Southern Utah University and private donors.

Check with your favorite museum to find out what their plans are. Some of the options are available on the Now Playing Utah website.