Noah's Ark coming to Kentucky

A company associated with the Christian apologetics ministry Answers in Genesis has announced plans to build a full-scale replica of Noah's Ark in Grant County, Ky., southwest of Cincinnati.

The 500-foot ark will serve as the main attraction in a theme park to be constructed by Ark Encounter LLC, a partnership headed by AIG.

Despite the economic stimulus the park is expected to provide, critics have condemned the project as a potential violation of the separation of church and state.

The Louisville Courier-Journal quoted attorney David Tachau:

"It
certainly sounds as if the mechanism for supporting a particular
religious dogma would violate the establishment of religious
prohibitions in the state and federal constitutions, but there may be
slippery ways this could pass muster."

"We see increasingly in our nation a generation of kids who don't hear about the Bible anymore in the schools," said Ken Ham, founder of Answers in Genesis, the ministry that runs the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Ky, about 40 miles from the planned location of the ark.

"We believe that rebuilding Noah's ark out of wood according to the dimensions in the Bible would be a tremendous way to get people to think about the Bible and that particular story," Ham explained.

"People have heard about Noah's ark all around the world. There's been a lot of interest in the searches for the ark on Mt. Ararat. In a survey a year ago by CBS and Vanity Fair, 43 percent of people said the archaeological object they'd most like to see is Noah's Ark," Ham told WND.

The target date for opening the $150 million park is the spring of 2014. Initial studies project as many as 1.6 million visitors to the park in the first year of operation.

Under an incentive program designed to bring more tourism revenue and jobs to the state, the Tourism Development Act, Kentucky is providing a rebate of 25 percent of tax revenues generated by the park for the first 10 years of operation.

Ham said the park plans to employ 900 people, and another 14,000 jobs will be created by hotels, restaurants and other businesses expected to spring up to cater to the massive number of visitors.

"People are making false claims" that the state is subsidizing the park, said Ham. He said Ky. Gov. Steve Beshear "looked very carefully at the plan to make sure there were no problems with church-state separation."

"They've given us incredible publicity. It's been in media all around the world, and the more the critics have said things, the more people contact us.

"A lot of left-wing media and bloggers have reacted very negatively, writing a lot of false information. They only represent a minority of the people in this nation. The majority of people in this area and across the nation are supportive. The statistics show about 200 million people would want to come if the ark were rebuilt. Locally, the majority of people are really thrilled because it's family-friendly and it would bring hundreds of jobs to the region," said Ham.

"There is a growing anti-Christian element in this nation," Ham added. "This has opened people's eyes about how anti-Christian these people and some in the media have become."

Construction will begin when Ark Encounter has raised enough money to fund the project, a process Ham expects to take several months.

"Construction will take 30 months as soon as we pull the trigger," Ham told WND. "We already have the land under contract, and design is well under way."

AIG will serve as managing partner, operating the park on a day-to-day basis.