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Now is the time to build the long overdue new Central Library. The Central Library is the heart of the City’s 35-branch Library system and the current 57-year old facility no longer adequately supports the branches. San Diego can provide a healthy new heart for the system and create a vibrant cultural, literacy, education and civic center for the region without issuing bonds or requiring additional General Fund spending for at least the first five years of operation. More than $157 million is already earmarked for this project from the State Library, Centre City Development, the City Schools and private donors. San Diego should capitalize on this opportunity to build this long-needed new civic asset that will benefit all of San Diego for decades to come. A landmark building meeting San Diego' s needs The new Central Library will meet many civic objectives. First and foremost, the Library serves the community’s needs for literacy, information and knowledge in the 21st century. Plus, the building will be a new landmark—a civic icon that embodies San Diego's commitment to the future. The building's design reflects the input of hundreds of people who participated in a series of public workshops. Based on this input, the joint venture team of Rob Wellington Quigley, FAIA and Tucker Sadler Architects implemented a breath-taking design. The Library is a 9-story building of flexible spaces with diverse and accessible public amenities. Bay view terraces, roof gardens and a public “reading room” reflect and celebrate San Diego's natural beauty and temperate climate. All of the Library's spaces are designed to open, inviting patrons to explore or relax with a new-found book. Special features include a 400-seat flexible multipurpose room on the eighth floor, a cafe and a unique reading room under the lattice dome—creating a unique and extraordinary facility. The design allows the Central Library to fulfill its crucial role as the heart of the 35-branch system--with space to provide literacy, children's and adult programs, disabled access, technology and web-based services, and answers to reference questions from throughout the region. For more information on the need for the new Central Library, visit here. Garden Courtyard celebrates San Diego's climate Patrons enter the library from an arcade inspired by Balboa Park into a glass enclosed three-story lobby with access to the circulation desk, popular library and children's library. At the ground level, large folding glass doors open to the southern Garden Courtyard. Across the Garden Courtyard is a 350-seat, sloped floor auditorium. During good weather, the entire facade between the auditorium and Courtyard opens up to increase capacity and share activities. This outdoor room, shaded by large trees, will serve as San Diego's town square--a large adaptable space that can host large brown-bag concerts, author talks and civic events or more intimate gatherings. "People's Penthouse" The top floors of the new Central Library will serve as a cultural penthouse. A great, airy, three-story crystalline reading room anchors this penthouse and is shaded by the dome latticework overhead. A series of open terraces look down into the reading room and out to the city and bay beyond. A flexible, 400-seat multi-purpose room looks to the west. An art gallery with a vaulted ceiling faces the Park to the north. Completing the complex is a smaller public meeting room. This inviting Public Penthouse to the Library not only celebrates the central civic role of the modern library but intrinsically links this primary cultural and educational resource to one of our greatest physical amenities: San Diego Bay. Unique among civic architecture in the United States, the library's inside/outside latticework dome protects the public rooms and terraces from both the summer sun and cool bay breezes. Visually, it differentiates the Library from the commercial high-rises and hotels around it. Symbolically, it ties this building of our time to the regional architectural traditions of our past. Greater resources The library will offer far greater collections, parking, computers, amenities and public areas than the existing facility. For a floor-by-floor cross-section of the new library visit here.
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