Well they have ruined the museum in William Brown Street part of the World Heritage Site, turning it into the Wacky Warehouse so why not destroy the Central Library and make it look like an Asda supermarket. It makes sense. Every little helps. It seems everything that this council, in my opinion, run by spivs, does, is a way of ruining the heritage of the city. Of homogonising it, turning it, into the same as everywhere else. Even its unique areas, its world heritage site. Its no good claiming that it is updating an existing structure, this does not look good, it looks very bad indeed. Not only have they got rid of all wagon loads of books from the library, selling off valuable first edittions to book dealers at knock down prices, they will now set about destroying the fabric of the structure, and the whole building. It will happen, with these proposals. Does no-one understand what heritage is in this city is, and how you merge old with new to create a sense of place and history.
I wrote this as a post last October. http://liverpoolpreservationtrust.blogspot.com/2009/10/liverpool-central-library-violation.html Now it transpires the Liverpool Library is to ebay 30,000 titles patiently collected for over a century. Not content with giving the library to a private company The Fib-Dems have now set all the conditions to have a Internet Cafe, in what once was the world renowned Central Library. What a disgrace. Running the sell off will be the most uncultured set of characters no doubt, who dont understand the need to keep books. The google generation, yes we all use it, but there is no greater pleasure than finding a good book with fantastic illustratios.
http://liverpoolpreservationtrust.blogspot.com/2009/11/liverpool-central-library-is-to-be.html I wrote further about the threats. The new Library in artists impression looks more like an Asda. Every little hurts.
So is Joe Anderson is now a chubby version of Warren Bradley? When will he save our culture.
Ben Scofield reports.
LIVERPOOL'S refurbished Central Library will have 30,000 fewer books than before its £50m re-fit.
The library was due to close this month for two years, during which it is going to be overhauled inside.
But, to free up space, Liverpool City Council are holding a fire sale for thousands of books, many of which are being sold for as little as £1. Any un-sold books are going to be given to a "social business", which will try to sell them online. Any it cannot sell will be given away to charity shops, schools and hospitals. The council said the 30,000 titles being ditched are rarely borrowed and are no longer significant.
It said it needs the space previously taken up by the volumes to display the library's special collections and the city's archives.
Liverpool Records Office will be expanded to provide for 20 more years’ worth of documents. The restored library is set to re-open in 2012. http://www.liverpooldailypost.co.uk/liverpool-news/regional-news/2010/06/21/liverpool-central-library-to-sell-off-books-92534-26691563/
Posts
Local researchers for scientific and technical books, papers, abstracts etc have been told that their requirements will be met "on-line". This is not always possible since the source information may not have been scanned. In any event, scanned material must be reprinted at a cost, both financial and time. This is not what a reference library is about.
ReplyDeleteThis decision to "modernise" Central Library into some sort of drop-in PC World is an insult to the name "library". Once again, Liverpool shows it's true cultural colours.
David if you have, as a city council, no culture, well you cant identify it to keep it. This is what happened with the world heritage site.
ReplyDeleteWalked in to the library to be told that the books have been on sale for 3 weeks typical Daily Ghost, cant someone put it out of our misery.
ReplyDelete