Work needed before library reopens
The Bata Library at Trent University is still not open after an $18-million renovation that has lasted a little longer than a year.
University librarian Robert Clarke said it’s unclear exactly when the library might reopen, but he thinks it will be later in September or sometime in October.
Finishing touches on the renovation are still taking place, he said, and the books have been largely returned to the stacks – yet on Friday it was still officially a construction site.
Students still have access to library material, though: Clarke said they request material at a kiosk in the student centre, and a librarian goes inside Bata with a hard hat to retrieve it.
When the library opens, Clarke said, users will notice fresher air with better climate control, for example, more study space and new lighting.
There will also be new labs where students can access technology such as 3-D printers or sound and video-editing equipment.
Clarke also said the original modernist furniture in the 50year-old library has been restored and new furniture has been added.
“It (the library) looks the same and different, all at once,” he said.
Meanwhile there will be a lot more space in Bata since half the books aren’t being returned to the stacks.
Bata Library was designed to hold 300,000 books, Clarke said, yet by the time the renovation began it had 500,000.
Librarians took a year to evaluate each book to decide which would be returned and which would not, Clarke said, to reduce the collection by half.
Books that made the cut were rare or unique to Trent.
Very few rejected books were put in recycling bins, Clarke said – most were given to Internet Archive, a San Francisco-based digital library.
They accept books, digitize them to be posted online, and then keep the hard copy in a warehouse for the sake of preserving at least one original.
Clarke said the reduction of the book collection leaves more space in the library: shelves are no longer squeezed in wherever they will fit.
It means bookshelves can be wider apart for better accessibility, Clarke said, and views of the Otonabee River aren’t obscured by shelving.
Meanwhile the two temporary locations for library materials are being packed up in anticipation of Bata’s reopening.
The former Shoppers Drug
Mart at Aylmer and Charlotte streets downtown has housed the printed government documents and maps for a year.
It is currently open to students by appointment only, since it’s being packed up.
There was also a warehouse on Whittington Dr. in Cavan Monaghan Township, just northwest of Fleming College, where the circulating books were kept for a year that is now empty.
During construction, students were able to borrow those books by ordering them from computer terminals at the main Symons campus. A shuttle vehicle would then deliver the books to campus.
Trent received $8.1 million in federal and provincial funding, along with donations, for the $18-million transformation of the Bata Library.
The library was originally designed by Canadian architect Ron Thom. The architectural firm Perkins + Will designed the renovation.