The Calgary Zoo is celebrating after setting new attendance and membership records and officials say the increase in visitation was propelled by the opening of Panda Passage last spring.

The zoo says 1.48 million people visited the facility in 2018, which broke a record that was previously set in 2012 when the Penguin Plunge opened.

Panda Passage opened in May 2018 and in the first month, over 190,000 guests visited the giant pandas, smashing the facility’s visitation record for that month.

Zoo memberships also set a new record surpassing 100,000 members in September and officials say it is a 25 per cent increase over typical levels.

“By so many important standards, it is fair to say 2018 was the zoo’s best year ever,” said Dr. Clément Lanthier, President and CEO, Calgary Zoo, in a statement.

The facility is also celebrating its conservation achievements and according to Lanthier about 200 endangered animals were released back into the wild in 2018.

“One of our big goals is to reach the point where each year we are releasing more animals into the wild than we care for at the zoo, and this year we took some important steps to build our capacity to achieve that goal.”

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