WASHINGTON The grand, brand-new and not-a-little controversial Capitol Visitor Center, which will handle all visitors to the U.S. Capitol, opens Dec. 2.

The center is the largest addition to the Capitol in its 215-year history and the biggest since completion of the massive dome in the 1860s.

The complex is where visitors will assemble, out of the weather, for tours of the Capitol, or to experience the centers exhibitions and other amenities without taking a Capitol tour.

It features a 530-seat restaurant, two posh orientation theaters and two gift shops. There also are 26 restrooms.

No tickets are required for entrance to the center. Free tickets, which can be obtained in person, online or over the phone, are required for the theaters and tours of the Capitol, which will start in the center.

The centers main entrance is at First and East Capitol streets, across from the Supreme Court. Barring late changes, tour buses probably can get no closer than two or three blocks from the entrance, meaning passengers face a hike.

The center is expected to more than double the number of visitors to the Capitol each year to about three million, making it one of the most-visited buildings in the world.

The center has been controversial because of its cost - boosted mainly by security concerns and congressional add-ons - and delays. Many security worries stemmed from the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and from a 1998 incident in which a deranged man burst into the Capitol with a revolver and killed two Capitol Police officers.

The center ended up costing $621 million, nearly triple its original estimated price tag. What U.S. taxpayers got for all of that money is a 580,000-square-foot complex, dug three levels underground beside the east front of the Capitol. The facility is all polished sandstone, bronze and wood paneling.

The centers maroon-and-white floors shine under the halls 18 chandeliers and two 30-by-70-foot skylights, through which the sky and the Capitol dome can be seen looming above.

The dimly lit exhibition hall features displays of famous - and seldom-seen - artifacts of U.S. history. The most haunting is the black-shrouded pine catafalque, or platform, on which once lay the body of Abraham Lincoln and the bodies of other famous Americans, including President Gerald Ford after his death in 2006. It sits behind a sliding bronze grate because it will probably be used again.

There are other objects: President John Quincy Adams metal-tipped ivory walking stick. The tiny ceremonial trowel George Washington used to set the Capitol cornerstone in 1793. The crude penciled radar plot that traced the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.

There are images of some of Americas great historical figures: the titanic congressional foes, South Carolinas John Calhoun and Massachusettss Daniel Webster.

And there are famous words: Franklin D. Roosevelts typed "Day of Infamy" speech, in which he noted "always will we remember the character of the onslaught against us."

George Washingtons signed letter to Congress reporting the British defeat at Yorktown, ending the Revolutionary War: "I have the honor to inform Congress, that a reduction of the British army under the command of Lord Cornwallis, is most happily effected."

At the center of the centers great Emancipation Hall is the 19-foot statue of Freedom, her hand resting on the hilt of her sword, and her hair falling in ringlets from beneath her eagles head helmet. The 1856 statue was the model for the one on the Capitol dome.

More information about the center can be found on its website, www.visitthecapitol.gov.