Books yield to bricks as library doubles
Salem Church Library transitions to "Salem Express Library" to deal with expansion
by Jonas Beals
Date published: 2/5/2008
by Jonas Beals
The Salem Church branch of the Central Rappahannock Regional Library is officially a construction zone.
Expansion plans have the library reopening in early 2009 with nearly double the square footage of the current structure. Meanwhile, dust will fly, steel will rise and shelf space will disappear. This begs the question: What happens to all the books?
The answer is twofold. Most of the books will be moved to a warehouse on Lafayette Boulevard. A select few will remain at the Salem Church branch in a stripped-down "Salem Express Library" occupying what is now the lobby and large meeting room. Those areas will be sealed off from construction, providing about 2,500 square feet for the library to operate a sort of retail-style browsing area. All of the books at the Salem Church branch will remain in circulation in the CRRL system, and will be available upon request.
CRRL handled these same issues in a similar manner during 1991 renovations to the headquarters library on Caroline Street in downtown Fredericksburg.
"Our goal is to provide the best possible customer service during this transitional period," Betsy Fowler, branch services coordinator and project manager, said. "We've had great success with these mini-libraries in the past."
Work officially began on yesterday when Carney-McNihcolas, an Ohio-based company specializing in library relocation, started organizing and moving nearly a mile's worth of shelved books to the warehouse. The books must be kept in order, and will be reshelved for easy access at the warehouse. The move should take four or five days.
"When you move a library, it makes other moves seem insignificant," Fowler said.
She expects the express branch to open on Feb. 15, and the library will continue to function as normal, albeit on a much smaller scale. With limited space, it will be hard to accommodate the 1,500 patrons that come to the Salem Church branch every day, but system-wide changes will be implemented to minimize the impact of construction.
"We're going to put all the popular, high-demand books there, but we'll have to manage the space extensively," Fowler said. "We're going to treat it like a retail space in that regard, but with our customary customer service."
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Salem Church: (Original schedule) Mon.-Thurs. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Fri.-Sat. 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.; Sun. 1 to 5:30 p.m.
Snow: (Previously not open on Sunday) Sun. 1 to 5:30 p.m.
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Date published: 2/5/2008
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