Organizers behind The International Dark Sky Discovery Center have released an update on progress being made on the facility planned for Fountain Hills.

Since the last update, The IDSDC has received a directed gift pledge of $250,000 with the request that this amount be applied to various components associated with the Hyperspace Planetarium. Many options are available for directed gifts, with information on the IDSDC website. Other donation opportunities can be reviewed on the donor page at darkskycenter.org. The Discovery Center is reporting it has received $6 million in gifts, grants and pledges as of May 1, 2022. The fundraising objective is $25 million as of this date.

Project principals are meeting weekly with a focus currently on design details. These sessions include the IDSDC design partners.

Represented in person or via Zoom are IDSDC board members, McCarthy Building Companies, Swaback Architecture, PGAV Destinations, Peterson Associates (MEP), PK Associates (structural), and various other engineers and consultants as needed.

For those who may be wondering about the decisions being made by the groups, here are some examples.

*What type of air conditioning system should be installed and where to put the units?

*What level of acoustic soundproofing is needed for the theater, planetarium, etc.?

*How many degrees should the planetarium be tilted?

*What should be the space between rows of seats in the planetarium and theater?

*How can a required second egress be added from the planetarium and minimize space taken from the Immersion Zone for this?

*What style of landscaping is desired?

The list of decisions seems endless, and as the “owners” the IDSDC board makes the final decisions, but they have put together the team of design partners with expertise to guide the process and keep it moving forward.

Recently the partners from PGAV Destinations traveled from St. Louis to present an update of the designs for the Immersion Zone.

“Our recent workshop helped everyone see how the architecture and exhibits are coming together to create something very special from both an education and attraction standpoint,” Tom Owen, PGAV Vice President and Project Principal stated after the meeting.