Visitors can now enjoy an enhanced experience at the newly revamped Al Khor Family Park, which was reopened to the public on Sunday morning after around three months of renovation works.

Already a popular destination, the park now has more to offer to visitors thanks to a host of new attractions and facilities.

Senior officials of the Ministry of Municipality and Environment (MME) took part in the opening ceremony on Sunday. They included Ahmed Mohamed al-Sada, assistant undersecretary for Public Services Affairs at the ministry; Abdullah Ibrahim al-Sada, director of Al Khor and Al Thakhira Municipality; Nasser Abdulla al-Sarami, director of the MME's Public Relations Department; Khalid Abdulrahman al-Nuaimi, administrative officer of Al Khor Family Park; Dr Mohamed al-Khayareen, general superviser of veterinary services at the park, and other officials.

Ahmed al-Sada said it took around three months of closure of the park to carry out maintenance and development works, including the expansion of the mini-zoo and creation of new sections there.

The works included adding seven new sections to the zoo, which now has 315 animals of 49 species, including 290 ones. A wide variety of animals and birds have been introduced to the park, including big cats such as lion, tiger, cheetah and jaguar, besides crocodiles, different types of monkeys and other animals as well as birds.

The official stressed that the park features all necessary facilities to provide a wholesome family entertainment experience. Besides, it has a good veterinary clinic with specialists to take care of the animals and birds in the zoo.

He added that an assessment will be conducted later to ascertain the need for further expansion and development.

Abdullah Ibrahim al-Sada noted that the renovation of Al Khor Family Park marks a quality addition to the services offered in the municipality, as well as to the tourism landscape in Qatar, offering people a great place to visit for recreation. It would help increase the numbers of visitors to Al Khor city from across the country, he added.

Further, he said the park has adequate facilities to host cultural and artistic activities and co-operation is welcome from all interested parties.

Al-Nuaimi said people have been eager to visit the park and the turnout of visitors was considerably good on the opening day.

He noted that the number of visitors used to be around 12,000 a day on weekends prior to the renovation works. Now, with the enhanced attractions, the expected figure would be around 20,000, he said, adding that the park also sees regular visits organised by schools.

Al-Nuaimi said the park is equipped with a good number of eateries, including those operated by eight local producing families in order to give them an opportunity to market their items while giving the public a taste of the original local flavours.

He welcomed co-operation with related entities to organise various cultural, educational and artistic activities by using the state-of-the-art facilities available at the park.

Dr al-Khayareen said all the animals introduced at the park were transferred locally from the Doha Zoo and they underwent the due health checks and vaccination for their well-being and the safety of the public.

He said the animals are well-cared for and provided with a convenient and safe environment that seeks to give them a feel of their natural habitats as far as possible. Besides, there is an adequate number of specialists and guards to attend to the particular needs of each type of animals and birds.

The park's timings are from 8am to 11pm, Saturday to Thursday; and from 2pm to 11pm on Friday. On Tuesdays, entry is only for women and children.

The entry fee is set at QR15 for adults and QR10 for children up to the age of 10 years, while QR5 is the fee for the train ride.

Besides a large number of animals, the park has 42 species of trees, shrubs and plants. The 240,000sqm park also features waterfalls, a battery-operated train, a large restaurant, mosque, museum, mini golf area, wall murals, skating area, children's play areas, a basketball court, food kiosks, water coolers and an amphitheatre, QNA adds.

The number of visitors is expected to reach about 500,000 annually, according to the MME.





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