A construction worker climbs a ladder last week while working on artificial rocks that will be part of an exhibit at Springs Preserve, home of the new state museum. Photo by John Locher. Click image for enlargement. A construction worker holds the frame of a building as seen last week through a playground rock structure at Springs Preserve. Photo by John Locher.

With plans nearing completion and construction on the horizon, the Nevada State Museum and Historical Society soon will be headed for its new home, one where history abounds in the heart of the place where some of the area's first inhabitants lived.

The new museum -- funded by a $35 million bond measure that voters approved four years ago -- features skeleton casts of a Columbian mammoth, a Shasta sloth and fossils from a 200 million-year-old "fish lizard" that swam off an ancient Nevada coast. The exhibits will be moved less than two miles from Lorenzi Park to Springs Preserve, the public-private project on Las Vegas Valley Water District land near U.S. Highway 95 and Valley View Boulevard.

The 180-acre Springs Preserve, which will open in May, is touted by water district officials as the hands-on heritage and natural history hub of Las Vegas.

Later this month, Nevada historians and water district officials intend to announce their vision for the new state museum, which will be completed about a year after the preserve opens.

At 69,000 square feet, it will have twice as much exhibit space, said museum Director Greta Brunschwyler.

"This is a huge step forward. This will be much more visitor-friendly than what we have now," she said Thursday.

"We're going to bring a statewide perspective on natural history to the Springs Preserve and show how water has shaped our history," Brunschwyler said.

Springs Preserve Director Francis Beland said the museum will broaden visitor opportunities at the preserve.

"I think one of the most important things of the state museum is that it gives us a bigger view of history in Nevada. Now we can look at the entire perspective," he said Friday.

Beland estimates the museum will increase the size of exhibit space at Springs Preserve by 30 percent.

"They have an amazing collection. It's a historical capsule that was missing," he said.

In addition to the museum's exhibits, the $250 million Springs Preserve will feature galleries on Southern Nevada's geology and its ancient and more recent history spanning American Indian life, the railroad and Hoover Dam.

The preserve also will feature the environmentally friendly Desert Living Center, botanical gardens, amphitheaters, concert venues, a restaurant, playground and eventually an interpretative trail system that winds through the site.

One path that flares off of Ravine Walk, with rocks molded after those at Valley of Fire, will lead to the Nevada State Museum in the north-central part of the site.

The site is the city's namesake and has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1978.

Translated to English, Las Vegas means "the meadows." It specifically refers to the marshland where American Indians and eventually settlers and travelers on the Old Spanish Trail came to get water from three springs known as "Big, Middle and Little," said Springs Preserve spokesman Jesse Davis.

"Being able to show the history of the site has never been done to the degree we've created where visitors can come and have a well-rounded experience," he said.

The preserve will include a live animal exhibit of desert critters, Davis said. Among them will be native species such as snakes, bats, lizards, Gila monsters, rabbits, kit foxes and the Mojave Desert tortoise.

"The task is not to be a zoo," he said.

In one gallery, 5,000 gallons of recycled water will be dropped in an instant, creating a flash flood experience.

Besides becoming a destination for student field trips, the preserve will accommodate the concert-going crowd.

"We want to provide a fun experience for people," Davis said. "The broader the audience, the more people we can expose to our education, too."

The interpretative trails, expected to open in 2008, will wind through areas where historical structures have been preserved.

"When built out, there will be 21/2 miles of trails open to the public, free," Davis said.