Creative/Planning wondering

[Averalorax]

Hi all. I have been giving myself a headache. My husband laughs that I like to "organize my organizing" and while this may not be the same thing, it may be along the same lines. In my franchise, my Africa zoo was going to be all African animals - now I have decided otherwise. I want to add a building to house a number of non-African animals. While I am not great at building (still a novice actually) my question is more on the logistical side.

Any suggestions on HOW to figure out how big I actually need the building to be?

I do have plenty of space. I have a list of 9(?) species that I am considering adding and how many of each may be included. I even have an idea of how I am going to incorporate the staff facilities. It is just getting my building "set" that I am having issues with. Or would I be smarter/wiser doing numerous connected buildings? Alll suggestions or thoughts are welcome. I am even considering just dumping this idea and keeping my zoo pure after all.

 

[Lea_G]

I always use this app for the minimum habitat size: http://planetzoopedia.com/habitat-builder/. I always make it somewhat bigger, because we "lose" traversable area with the rocks and items inside the habitat. I have also created a square blueprint which covers 100 m2, so that I can estimate the area I need for the habitat before I start building it. This helps me to sketch larger areas at once. I can add a picture later

Edit: Here is an example how I use my blueprint to plan habitat sizes and just add paths and barriers etc. around them: