Canberra’s newest public library opened last month, it is only today that I first got to visit it. I had in fact tried to visit earlier, but that was on a Wednesday which with Sunday is a closed day.
The new library is a ‘shopfront model’ in that it mimics a shop, and is in a traditional shop space rented at commercial rates like any other commercial business.
The library as the photos show contains two rows of shelves running along the sides. One side is devoted to popular fiction, the other contains, the non-fiction, reserve shelves, and children’s and manga collections. In the centre at the back is a relatively inappropriate Xbox station (inappropriate as sits in an access aisle between the two sides, leading to no privacy and if playing one would be interrupted by people passing past the TV screen at which the games are viewed. Further down the central aisle is some shelving displaying oversize books, periodicals, the cd and DVD collection, a table for newspaper reading (seating uncomfortably maybe 6), Internet terminals and the check out desk which includes a self checker.
The first thing to note is that apart from the table there is no other general seating (aside from a small sofa type seat in the children’s area, but one so small that no child and adult could read together and even if they could their feet would be in the way of passing users), there is also no reference collection (aside from that available online) no quiet study area and there is no community room or any space for activities that would normally be provided such as storytimes, reading groups etc.
The collections consist of a largish but somewhat slim range of popular fiction, a very large amount of manga (that didn’t look at all well used), and a woefully inadequate non-fiction section. Being pretentious I checked for philosophy and poetry (Dewy ranges 100s and 800s) and found nothing at all. Within the 100s there were some self help books, and in the 800s a few basic lit crit texts. The only non-fiction areas of any use (albeit small) were health, cookery and travel guides.
This library therefore is not what one could conceivably call an information point. There is no sense either that reference queries would be handled in an appropriate way. In traditional libraries there is at least a desk where a librarian may be consulted, privately if required; here you would not feel free to do so. Set up as it is as a shopfront, the feel of the library is that of a shop, and consequently just as one would not ask a normal shop assistant for help beyond information on wares for sale, here one would feel awkward asking queries also beyond what is in stock. Having worked in public libraries, I know the range of queries that can come a librarians way from embarrassing (to the user) medical questions, to answers to tricky crossword clues as well as the general chats about reference or reading advice. I can’t imagine here with no comfort or privacy at all that people would feel at ease asking for help. Of course if they did ask, whether they would be talking to a librarian or not is debatable, as the only recognisable staff member is the library assistant who sits at the only staff chair in front of the issues desk. The actual librarians if there are any in the library, do not have a seat or any visibility, so finding one for starters would be hard.
This library seems to fulfil a very narrow definition of a library; there is no sense of library space, no community access points or gathering areas, no personalisation and no area for possible public input. It is a library, in so much as it provides some fiction items to borrow, beyond that it does not function.
Interestingly at the checkout they were giving away badges (below).
The words on the badge fascinate me as does the library for they appear to be implying that libraries are directly in competition with bookshops. I think this is a terrible idea, libraries and bookshops should be complementary, and both should be about providing a range of different services. Of course I value libraries far above bookshops and believe that what the badge says is true, but I don't think it is helpful, particularly seeing as this library is situated nearby 2 nice independent bookstores, which cannot be said of any other small shopping area in Canberra. Obviously borrowing books instead of buying them is cheaper and better for the environment, but attacking bookshops on price, when you are a public funded body is mistaken.
Bookshops, in particular the larger chains, have become more like traditional libraries, in that they have moved beyond just providing shelves of books and now have comfortable seating, coffee bars, readings/signings and often some small form of community participation and helpful customer/staff interaction. This library has conceded on all fronts those options and dispenses with any idea that a library should be about more than lending current popular fiction, and thus in a stroke is a return to the days of the badly run public and subscription libraries in Australia examined in the Munn-Pitt report of 1935. In those libraries of the past (and it really only since the 1960s that things improved) there was most often just a meagre collection of popular fiction titles and no works to edify and educate and few or no actual trained librarians. In this library which is over half given over to new copies of paperback fiction, there is the current range of ‘popular penguins’ surrounded by a mass of paperback crime novels. This meagre collection does not a modern library make.
In saying all this I recognise that library items may be ordered in from other libraries, and that the library system has many online services to assist users, but as the newest library and the public face of the library system in the area I think this library needs a major rethink. Putting libraries in the way of shoppers is a good move, but it does not necessarily mean that the library must function as a shop; a library can and should be so much more.
On a better note, a very new library member was made.
