After several months of preparation (weekly project meetings, visits to other libraries, visits to furniture showrooms), the latest phase of University Library refurbishment is under way.
ICS, the main contractor, took over responsibility for level 5 of the library early in the morning of Saturday 11th June. Universal Removals team quickly moved in to begin dismantling the furniture and packing the books from the shelves on to crates.
Photographs to follow!
The removals team were keen to make hay while the sun shone - or at least while the refectory lift was freely available - and had managed to pack over half the books on level 5 into crates by Monday morning.
A quick spot check of several crates gave a reassuring outcome. The removals team have been instructed to pack the books into 60 demarcated runs spread across 10 zones with a numbered label given to each shelf. I had a peek into quite a few crates and found the shelfmarks I expected to see inside each one!
In total, over 3300 crates will be required to package the books from level 5 off to the storage facility located in Greenford, West London. About 200 crates can be accommodated in one lorry trip.
Our library users certainly seemed to get the message about the impending closure - the number of items borrowed in the week leading up to the closure increased by about 300% on the corresponding week last year.
A lot of hard work also went into relocating key textbooks from level 5 to level 6 to keep these available for borrowing or reference during the refurbishment period.
I'm pleased that people were getting the message; it's good to know that our emails really do get read!
ReplyDeleteLove these photos but can you edit the white space down a bti?!
ReplyDeleteReally important that our users see thes pics to - can we tweet them/have pics in library etc? Daren;t ask about adding them to the website, but it woudl underline what a massive job this is and that unfortunately we can't just move all level 5 stock to somewhere else in the building.
Just the sort of thing a library blog could update our users on!
Rowena 23 Things Team