Library must be more than fount of knowledge
By Randall Denley, The Ottawa Citizen, June 16, 2009 8:56 AM
OTTAWA — City councillors were quick to recommend the acquisition of a site for a new downtown library Monday. It's difficult to say whether the "yes" on buying the $26-million site reflects well-thought-out enthusiasm for a new library or a stumble ahead without thinking.
The site is a great one, given that it will be located at the new rail transit line's west downtown station and requires little demolition before building. Still, there is no point in owning it unless the city actually intends to build a new library.
Councillors should ultimately support an improved downtown library, but not before asking a lot of questions about the proposal the library board is championing. Library fans support the idea of a new building downtown with cult-like enthusiasm. One would think that a new library was a portal to heaven or, at the very least, something that would change everyone's life.
Library staff say the building will boost daily attendance at the downtown library from the current 3,500 to 10,000. That's good, but it's still just a little more than one per cent of the population, and many of those visitors will be frequent fliers.
The new central library will do little or nothing for library users who rely on the extensive branch system. A central library is critical to the functioning of the branches, but the library board's tentative plan is for a building four times as large as the existing building.
At 350,000 square feet and an estimated cost of $181 million, the proposal is the library's version of a dream home. Library board vice-chair Pamela Sweet acknowledges that this is the "nice to have" plan. Councillors have to determine what Ottawa really needs.
It's a curious paradox of the information age that monumental downtown libraries are all the rage when it has never been easier to acquire information in your own home. That's not to say the library doesn't add value through the knowledge of its staff and the ability to acquire expensive and obscure texts, but the modern library is about much more than books and staff knowledge. Libraries have expanded their services to teach computer skills, languages and résumé writing and offer support for small businesses. Teens are invited in to play video games on library computers.
A skeptic would say that the public library has expanded away from its core businesses in an effort to keep attendance and budgets up. When one's services are perceived to be free, it's not difficult to generate demand. When the library asks for far more space to carry on its diverse services, it is perhaps time for difficult questions about what the library really should be doing.
Don't expect many, though. If the past is a guide, most people in Ottawa have little enthusiasm for critical thinking about the role of a library in the 21st century.
One of the things councillors should ask is whether the plan maximizes the expensive site the city will likely soon acquire. The new library takes up almost all the ground-level space on the site, and is likely to rise in towers of four and eight storeys.
The plan does include about 18,000 square feet for a "heritage gateway," which is city-bureaucrat-speak for a museum. Hallelujah. This city is long overdue for a reasonable public space to tell its interesting story. There are city museums that tell bits and pieces of it, here and there, but the history of our city has never gotten its due.
With its base of public support and its own board and budget, the library is best positioned to fight to the head of the line, but it is not the only cultural need Ottawa has. It looks as if plans to build a concert hall across from City Hall will fall through because the condo building it was part of has not gone ahead. That doesn't take away the need for a mid-sized hall for community groups. The city also needs an art gallery worthy of its impressive municipal collection.
There have been preliminary talks about accommodating the concert hall as part of the library, although the consultant the library has retained isn't convinced it is practical. The building would have broader appeal and better value if it accommodated one or both of those other uses. Councillors should consider paring back the library part of the plan to make this more of a cultural complex.
The library is an expensive project, although it will prove affordable if put in the context of long-term capital spending. Let's just make sure we get maximum value from the plan. Knowledge is a wonderful thing, but that doesn't mean we need an expensive monument to it.
Contact Randall Denley at 613-596-3756 or by e-mail,
[email protected]
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