They’re definitely not the best but I have to make do!

It could be that the zoo entrance is too expensive for the amount of money you start with in franchise mode. If you go into the settings and go to the franchise tab you can adjust the amount of money you start with to give you enough to place the zoo entrance. Or it could be that the zoo entrance uses items that are part of DLC that you may not have, if that’s the case when/if it allows you to place it, the game may delete bits and pieces that are of DLC your game doesn’t have. I would try to adjust the amount of money you start with in franchise mode first and see if that fixes the issue! If you have any more questions please let me know! I am more than happy to help! I do want to let you know that this is only an entrance not a full zoo, if you want habitats, we have those in our steam workshop as well! Please feel free to use them!

I usually just build things where I feel like building them, or where I think they will look good on the map. On smaller zoos I will create a map on paper and copy it to the game but I usually still move things around inc so get into a few builds or so. For inspo I do a lot of Pinterest and google searching. Usually I will find a few buildings or something I like the look of and combine different aspects of them to make what I think I will enjoy building! Most pieces I use come from the African pack, and the conservation pack. But I do have all packs for the game. As for speed builds, I’m not sure if you know, but you can change the speed of the video if you pause the video and go to the little settings gear usually on the right of the screen and you can go to the speed and slow down the video!