Quote:
Originally Posted by arbeiter
But it isn't an adequate library for a metro area of our size - it's not a terrible library, but we need a major expansion or a new one altogether. It's about the size of the Capitol Hill branch library in Seattle, that's a bit pathetic. There is a middle ground between a "trophy library" and the brutalist half-pint that we call our flagship branch.
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I agree completely - the aspect of the new library that I find most disturbing is not the architecture but the location. However, the talking point that the old library was out of space can't go unchallenged - or we'll make the same mistake again in a few years when somebody doesn't like the new old library.
Turns out a building that actually used all its space for library functions rather than offices could easily support twice the books and twice the computers that the current library does; the real impetus was to get in a site that would be easier for suburbanites to park at (a plan I'd normally even be sympathetic to if it didn't also come with a drastic decline in transit accessibility - one that won't be resolved by moving bus routes to meet it).
Because so many people bought the BS about the old library being too small because of where it was, in other words, nobody seriously explored knocking it down; building underground parking; putting up a nicer building; and using it all for books and computers instead of offices. That would have led to a better-looking better-functioning library that solved the parking issue and still maintained good transit access.
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You lost a family.
they are greatly appreciated,
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