For the first time since the Eisenhower administration, the Miami Seaquarium is shuttered. The waterfront landmark that once defined the city’s family outings and tourist brochures closed its doors on October 12, marking the end of an era that spanned everything from the filming of Flipper to animal-rights fury.
The closure followed years of controversy. Miami-Dade County evicted the park in 2024, citing chronic safety and animal-care violations. The Dolphin Company, which had operated the Seaquarium under lease, filed for bankruptcy months later. As part of the bankruptcy process, Miami-based Terra Group has offered $22.5 million to take over the lease. The developer plans to modernize the property’s aging infrastructure and transform the area into a public destination, complete with a bay walk, marina, restaurants and shops.
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Terra Group CEO David Martin said the new vision will include an aquarium focused on conservation and education—without any marine mammals—and aims to celebrate the site’s coastal setting rather than confine it. He also intends to preserve one of Miami’s most recognizable landmarks: the gleaming gold geodesic dome designed by futurist architect R. Buckminster Fuller.
The Seaquarium’s decline had been coming for years. Videos of aging dolphins in shallow pools, reports of crumbling infrastructure and controversy and protests around the orca Lolita and her death in 2023 all deepened public criticism. For many Miamians, the end feels both sad and inevitable. Animal advocates gathered outside the park on its final day to celebrate the closure as justice delayed but not denied, while longtime residents reminisced about school trips and family visits.
Few places captured Miami’s contradictions as vividly as a sunny tourist paradise built on uneasy compromises. Its disappearance simultaneously leaves a gap in the city’s landscape and space for something more sustainable to emerge. The same waterfront that once staged choreographed dolphin flips will hopefully tell new stories about ecology and conservation. The water will keep lapping against Virginia Key, but the performance is over. What remains is the memory of applause echoing across the bay, fading into the sound of the tide.