4 /5 Dmitriy Mykalo: Texas Science & Natural History Museum is a fairly compact museum for a name that implies something much larger. The entire experience is spread over four levels, beginning with a lower-level floor you descend into after entering. This is where the main dinosaur exhibit is located—skeletons of species that once roamed the land now known as Texas. The space is tightly packed, and the number of visitors makes it feel even more crowded. It might have made more sense to distribute the dinosaur displays across the first and lower floors, as the first level features a spacious atrium with only two dinosaur skeletons and little else.
Also on the first floor, you’ll find a museum store and a small theater showing a video about the shifting geography of Texas—how it was once underwater and moved across the globe over millions of years due to continental drift. The exhibit gives a decent idea of what kinds of creatures could have lived in the region through time.
The third floor is dedicated to the animal life of Texas, though again, the space is quite limited. It’s essentially a hallway with a few side rooms where you’ll see local mammals, a small insect corner, and a separate bird room. The fourth floor appears to be more of a temporary exhibit space, which during our visit featured mannequins dressed in themed clothing—possibly part of a fashion exhibit.
While it’s informative and makes the most of its space, Austin clearly deserves a more spacious, modern, and technologically advanced natural history museum. This one feels more like an introduction than a destination.
