Richard C. Wheeler Bay Learning Center
Discover your Bay at the Buzzards Bay Coalition’s Richard C. Wheeler Bay Learning Center, a free environmental exploration center located in downtown New Bedford’s Historic District. The Bay Learning Center is your destination to learn about our local waters and how you can protect and enjoy them.
Features
Kids love discovering life in Buzzards Bay at the Bay Learning Center’s free, hands-on AHA! Night programs and Bay Adventures.
The centerpiece of the Bay Learning Center is a large, colorful 3-D map of Buzzards Bay. The map gives visitors a bird’s-eye view of the Bay and southeastern Massachusetts. Reach out and touch the map’s surface to feel the contours of the land and the reefs and ledges underwater. Find your community and learn how we are all connected by water.
Protecting clean water is what the Coalition is all about. At the Bay Learning Center, you can learn about Buzzards Bay’s biggest pollution problems and what you can do to solve them. Staff and volunteers at the welcome desk are happy to answer your questions and share stories about the Bay.
Just outside the Learning Center’s doors is Habitat, an artistic celebration of clean water. Seven steel sculptures along the walkway depict eelgrass, an underwater plant that is essential to life above and below the Bay.
What’s Nearby
The Bay Learning Center is located inside the Buzzards Bay Center. This award-winning model of green design and historic renovation is the Coalition’s headquarters. The center is also part of the New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park.
The Buzzards Bay Coalition is a membership-supported nonprofit organization dedicated to the restoration, protection, and sustainable use and enjoyment of our irreplaceable Bay and its watershed.