Stacks will replace Express during
a renovation
of the library’s
main branch.
AUBURN – The library will set up temporary digs in the Auburn Mall in June when construction on a $7 million expansion begins.
More than half of the library’s books will make the transition, said Director Rosemary Waltos.
The rest will be placed in storage until the new, bigger library opens in the fall of 2005.
“We should expect quite a few users that we wouldn’t normally,” Waltos said. “It’ll be quite a convenience, with all the parking.”
According to plans, the library will renovate the existing building and expand to include the area currently home to the Auburn City Building.
The City Building will be torn down and city offices are scheduled to move to Auburn Hall, at Court Street and Mechanics Row, later this year.
A professional library-moving service is scheduled to begin boxing and moving books out of the library around June 21.
About 40,000 volumes of the 70,000 in the library’s collection will make the move. An interim library will be set up in vacant space in the mall, about 7,500 square feet formerly used by the Express, a clothing store. The space was used by a Christmas shop last year.
The interim library is scheduled to open July 10. Waltos said she might consider making a branch in the mall permanent.
“Typically, branch libraries in malls do pretty well,” she said. “We’d consider later, if it’s affordable. But our main goal now is making sure the new library will be everything everyone expects when it opens.”
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