The Dinosaur Museum of Salas increases its visits by 40%

© Dinosaurs Museum

From the agency itself they estimate that only the visitors of the museum have generated a contribution of more than 10 million euros to the municipality and its region

Dinosaur Museum of Salas de los Infantes (Burgos, Castilla y León) continues to gain visiting public since the years of the economic crisis. The worst year in that sense, coinciding with the decline recorded in other museum centers in the country, was in 2010 when 10,300 visitors were received.

Since then, the recovery of the public has been constant, so that before the end of this year a maximum of annual visits have already been reached: more than 14,500, which is 40% more than the 2010 results. The salense museum has reached 220,000 accumulated visitors since its inauguration in 2001.

It is estimated that only the visitors of the Museum have generated a contribution of more than 10 million euros in Salas and its region, an amount that exceeds several times the investment made by public administrations in the 18 years that the space has been running.

From the Museum itself, the relationship between "low investment" that goes to the Museum and the economic return that it produces in Salas de los Infantes and the region is underlined. "The numbers of visitors are very favorable, especially if we compare them with those of a large part of the provincial museums of Castilla y León, which enjoy much higher budgets per visitor per year," they detail from the Museum.

These good figures also point to something that is repeated in museums dedicated to dinosaurs in Spain and in other countries: dinosaurs remain in the forefront of popular leisure and cultural concerns. They excite and attract audiences of different ages and with diverse motivations. In addition, the Salense Museum has been changing and expanding its exhibition offer.

It also maintains a series of events and activities around Science and paleontology that take place throughout the year. This ensures the arrival of visitors to Salas and its region during the 12 months of the year, but also that there is a quality cultural offer for the inhabitants of the mountain town.

Among the elements that have reinforced the attractiveness of the Dinosaur Museum, a virtual reality installation stands out, in which the environment in which the mountain dinosaurs lived is recreated, and has Demandasaurus darwini as the main protagonist. This installation is an example of collaboration between two institutions, such as The Dinosaurs Foundation in Castilla y León and the Caja de Burgos Foundation, which are committed to dinosaur paleontology as a tourist and cultural resource in the rural world.

Another factor that reinforces the role of the Salense Museum as a focus of attraction is the research that is carried out constantly, and that has provided significant milestones of international scope, such as the description of two new dinosaur species (Demandasaurus and Europatitan). Also, the excavations that are carried out year after year since 2002, and these last three years in Torrelara, show the enormous wealth in dinosaur fossils that the region treasures and serves as a claim for many people to dare to visit the Museum where they are exposed Much of the findings.

The Salense Museum is, in short, an instrument that contributes to the settlement of the population, with the generation of specialized works, and is an important tool for the fight against empty Spain.

elcorreodeburgos.com