Here is what to expect at the new downtown Allentown Da Vinci Science Center, which will open to the public next week

There are a few things that set the new Da Vinci Science Center in downtown Allentown apart from its former location that closed last month.

It is much bigger, with at least three times the exhibit space the museum had on Cedar Crest Boulevard.

Plus, it is more centrally located in Allentown, at 815 Hamilton St., which is within 1 mile’s walking distance for 52,000 Allentown residents.

Also: It has dinosaurs.

As it gears up for its grand opening May 22, the new Da Vinci Science Center is holding a series of preview visits, including media days and exclusive tours for museum members and Central Elementary students, who soon will call the center a second campus.

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“I’m in some ways overwhelmed with emotion, it’s so exciting,” Lin Erickson, CEO of the Da Vinci Science Center, said Wednesday of the center’s long-awaited opening.

Da Vinci leaders first announced plans for a larger facility in 2016, and broke ground on the new $80 million museum in early 2022.

Students from Central Elementary school had the chance to tour the facility Wednesday morning, one week ahead of its grand opening.

Those students, most of whom were seeing the main exhibits for the first time, soaked it all in. They banged on drums, controlled a giant animatronic dinosaur, climbed through a model human body and designed a virtual “flying machine.”

“That one’s my favorite,” said Hadassah Lozada, a fifth grade student at Central Elementary, pointing to a contraption that allows visitors to hoist themselves in the air with a pulley.

You could be forgiven for thinking the center served as more of a playground than an educational center Wednesday morning. But that will change with time as students continue to have access to the center, Erickson said. All families with children enrolled in Allentown School District will receive a free family membership to the center.

The partnership with Central Elementary is believed to be the first of its kind, according to Erickson, as students will visit up to twice a week to use the classroom facilities and visit the exhibits. The center will also have a STEAM career training program for kids in grades six through 12, where students will receive mentoring and hands-on training in career fields like technology, engineering, research and manufacturing, culminating in a paid internship.

Its focus is not just on any science, technology, engineering, arts and math careers, but those specific and unique to the Lehigh Valley. For example, the “science in the making” gallery, an exhibit on the first floor, features a Mack electric truck, an Air Products sponsored corner on energy and matter, and a model Martin guitar display to teach visitors about the science behind sound.

“I think this kind of experience sets the [Allentown School District] apart, it can’t compete with any other experience at any other elementary school,” Erickson said.

The center offers more than just career training and education: The Lehigh Valley watershed exhibit — which features live otters, turtles and fish native to the area — aims to encourage visitors to be good stewards of the local environment.

“We’ve partnered for many years, but this is the most significant in terms of scope and scale,” said Christopher Kocher, president of the Wildlands Conservancy, a nonprofit nature preservation organization that partnered with Da Vinci on the watershed exhibit.

And its flagship exhibit, My Body, invites visitors to climb through a model human body fit with a beating heart, take a look at to-scale printed models of human organs and test their bodily reflexes with interactive games.

What struck Tatiana Saunders, a Da Vinci STEAM educator who was also seeing the new facility for the first time Wednesday,  was how much more the new Da Vinci is geared toward all ages. While the Cedar Crest center mostly attracted toddlers and elementary aged children, the new and improved center appeals to younger and older children as well as adults.

“It’s really become diversified with the ages,” Saunders said.

And off limits for the day — but not forever — to student visitors was “Dinos Alive!” in the City Center gallery, featuring around 30 life-sized animatronic dinosaurs. The gallery is the only part of Da Vinci that will have a rotating array of exhibits: Next up is all about sharks, expected to debut in the fall.

Reporter Lindsay Weber can be reached at Liweber@mcall.com .