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By Jonas Beals - The Free Lance-Star - The Salem Church branch of the Central Rappahannock Regional Library is officially a construction zone. Expansion plans have the library reopening in early 2009 with nearly double the square footage of the current structure. Meanwhile, dust will fly, steel will rise and shelf space will disappear. This begs the question: What happens to all the books? The answer is twofold. Most of the books will be moved to a warehouse on Lafayette Boulevard. A select few will remain at the Salem Church branch in a stripped-down "Salem Express Library" occupying what is now the lobby and large meeting room. Those areas will be sealed off from construction, providing about 2,500 square feet for the library to operate a sort of retail-style browsing area. All of the books at the Salem Church branch will remain in circulation in the CRRL system, and will be available upon request. CRRL handled these same issues in a similar manner during 1991 renovations to the headquarters library on Caroline Street in downtown Fredericksburg. "Our goal is to provide the best possible customer service during this transitional period," Betsy Fowler, branch services coordinator and project manager, said. "We've had great success with these mini-libraries in the past." Work officially began on yesterday when Carney-McNihcolas, an Ohio-based company specializing in library relocation, started organizing and moving nearly a mile's worth of shelved books to the warehouse. The books must be kept in order, and will be reshelved for easy access at the warehouse. The move should take four or five days. "When you move a library, it makes other moves seem insignificant," Fowler said. She expects the express branch to open on Feb. 15, and the library will continue to function as normal, albeit on a much smaller scale. With limited space, it will be hard to accommodate the 1,500 patrons that come to the Salem Church branch every day, but system-wide changes will be implemented to minimize the impact of construction."We're going to put all the popular, high-demand books there, but we'll have to manage the space extensively," Fowler said. "We're going to treat it like a retail space in that regard, but with our customary customer service." The regional nature of the CRRL system means that on any given day, 1,000 books are being transferred from branch to branch. Fowler and her staff will make every effort to keep that river of books flowing. Patrons can still avail themselves of the system's full holdings by requesting books in person or online at librarypoint.org. In addition to the computer access and info desk resources, the express branch will add a drive-up book drop and a temporary trailer so the children's programs have room to continue. The C. Melvin Snow Library in the Marshall Center at Spotsylvania Courthouse has been tapped to handle overflow from Salem Church, and will expand its hours to operate on the normal Salem Church schedule until the new building is ready. People who need to pick up holds during the move and construction process can still do so at Salem Church Library during regular hours, and the special election scheduled for Feb. 12 will still be at the Salem Church location. "It's the old 'best of times, worst of times,'" Fowler said. "It's fun problem-solving and dealing with all the challenges. Fortunately, we have a great staff. They're very flexible and willing to work a lot of overtime." To reach Jonas Beals: 540/368-5036
Email: jbeals@freelancestar.com Republished By Permission. Copyright 2008, The Free Lance-Star Publishing Co. of Fredericksburg, Virginia, USA 
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