If I could spend $50 million dollars, what would it be? A new Library!
Chris Holt said that my reply would be better read if it was a separate posting, so I have reprinted that reply to Mark’s challenge and not added a pretty picture as Chris also suggested. I have decided that I don’t want a pretty picture of some conceptual library building, I want you to imagine it after reading what I envision below.
I am going to change Mark Boscariol’s question around and being a librarian for Windsor Public Library and almost a life long resident of Windsor and one who lives in the downtown, I will give my personal view on what I would do with $50 million dollars. This isn’t something that I just thought up to answer your question but something I have seen and thought about for the last twenty years, just ask my colleagues and friends. I lived through the devastation of core when the mall was built. I have lived through recessions and depressions in this city. I lived with knee jerked developments such as the Plywood Palace, the Canderel building, developments that were suppose to save Windsor! I love this city and l love this downtown but more than anything I love the people of this city! Where else can you see the Dabke being danced on a Sunday night on the main street of a city? If you were downtown last weekend in Windsor during Summer In The City!
I have three drafts of a future blog posting sitting on my desk top right now on this very subject and they’ve been sitting there for six months or so, unsure that my idea or vision or whatever you will call it, would be right for Windsor, it is my personal view and not of the Windsor Public Library, of what I think this city really needs now and for the future in the 21st century. Something that will say to people of this city and to the world that we value an open free public space, where life long learning, education, creativity, our history and our future reside.
I would build a new much larger central library right in the core of this city, maybe in the lands to west. On Scaledown we have talked of the value of “Third Places” places other than work or home, a public library is the perfect third place for all of the community, better than the new arena which is event driven but not a community hangout, better than a community museum which is also event driven. College and university buildings although maybe in the core are primarily focused on their students and really don’t appreciate the public just walking in. You can’t hangout with the Windsor Symphony or at your local theatre or your community museum. But you can hangout for free at your public library, buy a coffee or lunch, read a newspaper, use the internet, follow your own private research and read whatever you like or meet friends and just talk while you surf for free on your laptop! No other place can or does offer this. You don’t have to buy a coffee to sit, or a book to read. And on top of that you have professional librarians on hand to answer all your questions for free. Even the Art Gallery of Windsor charges an admission fee just to hang out! So is it a real third place for the community.
But a public library built right in the middle of the mix (college and university buildings, Art Gallery of Windsor and a stones throw from the Capital and Cleary), with an attached new community museum and municipal archives, with salons for the symphony and the art gallery, open public spaces indoors and out for public performances, more computer labs and internet terminals, along with tutoring rooms for literacy, quiet places for students and people to read or to study alone or in groups, more space for Early Years training and a great children’s area. Also including the very small but unique museums of this community, the Wood Carvers museum (only one of its kind in Canada), the doll museum (both which are now housed at the Central library downtown.) The library today is opened more days and hours than all the above, this could create a synergy where anyone could come in and cross the paths of all the citizens of this community.
Today’s public libraries are the cross roads of our community, from the new refugees and landed immigrant looking for assistance and language courses, to young parents looking to give their children a head start with our Early years programs, to business people looking for current research to seniors looking to learn computers so they can email their grandchildren. Just sit for a while at the central library and you will hear more languages being spoken in one place at one time than all the other places in this city, except maybe the market or the mall. All are equal in a public library, with equal access to everything that we offer during open hours of via the internet 24/7.
Where new libraries have been built it was found that seniors, young families with children, young adults had found a safe open public environment, moved into the surrounding area. Now imagine if you have college and university students and business people thrown into the mix, all crossing each others paths in a public library all there to be seen and interact, what kind of synergy would that be …amazing! Like Hamilton, we could even have a farmer’s market attached!
Every major city in North America that has built, a new main library has seen the burst of residential and commercial development around it because libraries are seen as good, safe places to be. Build the canal but have it run through the new library.
Adriano Ciotoli suggested a cultural mall here on Scaledown, a new public library can facilitate that idea. This past Friday, Windsor Public Library, the Multicultural Society, the New Settlement program celebrated World Refugee Day at the Central library. With the three hours of celebration and cultural performances, we figured at least 500 hundred people viewed all or part of it, except for the mayor and city council whose absence was noted! A new library in the core can offer space for such civic performances, a place were students, creative types, entrepreneurs and business people can have an area to meet with the world at their finger tips, much like Spacings in Toronto.
We have built a new arena for a small private business and the jocks of Windsor but it isn’t easily accessible to all the citizens of this city and in most cases doesn’t do anything or offer anything for a lot of citizens in this city, even though it was their tax dollars also that built it. A canal that seems as though it is going to be built is being built in the great hope that some developer or many developers will rush in and develop the land.
When are we going to build something for all the people of Windsor besides boring parks. If they use it or not, it is there to welcome them when they do need it. If we build a new main library, we are saying that we value education and life long learning, we say that we value the wisdom of our past, present and future in the knowledge they have or will deposit in books, we value an open democracy with open stacks for research, we value the diverse life of our city and its history and its future, we value living in a community that is educated and free and has a place to learn and express it!
Along with building a new main library, increased funding could go to staffing and increased operating hours, so that it this new library is opened seven days a week, with more internet terminals and everything else that a library supplies. As it is now three libraries are open 64 hours a week including Saturdays, closed on Sunday during summer hours and then open on Sunday for four hours during the winters months, No other institution or arts group or the arena is open more hours in more locations than your Windsor Public Library! And it is FREE!
I have read all the grand schemes or developments that have been put forth by the city or here on Scaledown or in the Windsor Star, my idea serves the whole community now and in the future, not the developer, not the business man, not the condo or mixed use developers and their occupants, it serves every citizen in this city!
A new library could house an expanded Genealogy centre, tapping into a multi-million dollar hobby tourist industry as I outlined in this blog: Retour a la souche http://tiny.cc/drzzn
It has been studied and well documented across North America, that on average for every dollar invested in a public library returns on average five dollars to the community, so if we build a new library for $50 million dollars, the return will be $250 million dollars of direct and indirect economic value to the city. No other thing that we can build will give us such a life long return. But Windsor Public Library at this time is the lowest funded library system of any city this size in Canada!!! We’re number one at the bottom
We keep building other things in this city, in the hope that someone, anyone will come and fulfill our dreams only to be let down time and again. This time let’s build something for every citizen and future citizen in this city, something that we can use, something that we can be proud of and have our children be proud of in having the fore thought for their future and for generations to come.
Tags: Architecture, Art Gallery of Windsor, canal, clustering, core, Downtown, Downtown development, infrastructure spending, local arts culture, local economic development, museum, public library, St. Clair College, University of Windsor, western super anchor, WiFi, Windsor Ontario
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Mark,
Well said! Windsor is the fifth most ethnically diverse community in Canada and with over 25 different languages available in various multimedia formats it is wonderful place for New Canadians and born Canadians to explore the world and their own imaginations. When I read about something like the canal project or another “assessment” from Mayor Eddie it drives me bonkers knowing that professional librarians and staff members are working hard with no programming funds to run youth groups and amazing projects like the World Refugee Day Project and no one from City Hall has the courtesy to show up.
Well it figures considering all Mayor Francis does when it comes to WIndsor Public Library is cut the budget.
You stole my idea. You’ll be hearing from my lawyer.
Just two beefs.
One, libraries are, by no means of the imagination, free. They are free to use. A portion of our property taxes fund the Windsor Public Library. A slight but important distinction.
Two, to argue that a new main library is one reason for a “burst of residential and commercial development” is questionable. One would expect that a main library would be built in the downtown, where either plenty of development has occurred and/or will be occurring.
I don’t deny there are positive impacts, but you make it seem that if someone builds a new main library, that the area will be magnet for new development. The relationship is not that clear cut.
Vincent, I’ve been sitting on this idea for a very long time, I will get my lawyer.
I know very well that libraries are not free “free” Your portion of property taxes on average for the public library system in Windsor is about $50.00 per year! The libraries might as well be free at that price!
I ask, if a canal is built what would be the return on investment if no developer comes along and builds beside it!
No vision or dream is clear cut! Is the canal proposal clear cut! Is what the Univesity or the College are thinking clear gut or a crap shoot. I can talk up an idea just as well as a developer, a mayor and politician, with loose and fantastic adjectives of this and that and the glorious future, why should I ground my idea in mundane facts rows of books and how many periodicals are ciruculated.
The hyperbole of what the new mall would do for Windsor, the new Holiday Inn, the Canderel building, what the Super Bowl and the Detroit Grand Prix will all do for Windsor, is stilling ringing in my ears and on and on and on and on……
Windosr needs as much help as possible right now because of its shifting industrial and cultural structure, so an expanded central library would be great. Also I think it would be very forward thinking if we, as individual tax payers, had a voice in which interest areas our tax dolllars would be used.
I’m sure most would agree that our libraries are critical for the educational and cultural development of our city; therefore, these institutions require much better funding.
Return on investment? Quality of life! And Windsor doesn’t have much of it. As a matter of fact, developers have already talked with the city about the canal infrastructure. The reaosn they won’t build it with their own money is because it makes it exclusive to their ROI.
The way the canal is being moved forward is through multiple developers not exclusively one with different timelines; for once not a knee-jerk reaction to build it as quick as possible.
I like the idea of a new library including a museum as well. Too bad Windsor pays little heed to the impacts libraries have on community. We spend squat (compared to other cities) and yet the WPL stretches their $$ to the maximum. The same can’t be said about any other department at city hall.
The only way to deal with your idea Mark is to make it better and add to it. Imagine combining your library vision with a new science center???? Why that building is anywhere but downtown is lost on me.
Whats odd is normally the argument is that we can’t afford these things. However, the gov’t has proven that the money is there, why can’t we build the things we want to build
I would suggest to Chris Holt that not only should your post have been suggested as a separate blog post but it should be put on a new “campaign issues that Scaledown supports” section of our website. Tick Tock for 2010.
Lets see,
Library,
Geneology Center
Athe very small but unique museums of this community, the Wood Carvers museum (only one of its kind in Canada), the doll museum (both which are now housed at the Central library downtown.
I was thinking of the Science Centre, with the canal running through it also. A part of the canal that runs through the library/community museum could have or could be a replica of the Detroit River with vingettes through history of its settlement and development! Model lakers and boats plying the waters of the canal..Hey then we can have a maritime museum focusing on Windsor. We don’t tell the history of the river which sustains us!
Is there anyone doing maritime history in Windsor in this area..that is one thing that is lacking about this area, now that I think of it! I just might have found a retirement project besides family genealogy!
Hey Mark, some great ideas up there. Just wanted to point out a cool PBS special I saw earlier this month on the Traverwood Branch Library in Ann Arbor MI that readers of this blog would probably enjoy. It was titled “Up From Ashes”. Unfortunately, it is not scheduled to air again on PBS anytime soon, but there is a public showing at the actual library on July 21 2009. Briefly, its a documentary on the design and building of a SUSTAINABLE library and the role of the devastating effects of the Emerald Ash Borer on the design and construction of the library. It was a pleasant surprise to see Windsor ON featured in the documentary as one of the people involved in the design/building process was from Windsor. This is the type of thinking and award-winning design we need to have to incorporate into new public developments!
For Info:
http://www.aadl.org/node/18956
Let me throw my pro-transit 2 cents into the mix, in this central library/museum/canal/science center downtown people-place, my dream would be a light rail station built-in to the facility, connecting to a LRT line to the university and other centers of interest. =P
… and to add to Mark Boscariol’s list, it would be nice to see some other things other than just tourism venues as well. One such idea could be a High-Tech and Bio-Tech Private Business Incubator that provides shared infrastructure for start-up companies. Located in a downtown setting, (ie. near a canal, or the riverfront) would help to attract entrepreneurs, and would bring MANY high-paid and educated jobs to the core. With ties to University of Windsor, St. Clair, and even Wayne State or UM, this location has many advantages. If you want to see examples of these places you don’t have to look far: TechTown in Detroit (affiliated with Wayne State), The Stiller Center in London ON, etc etc. They even have one in an adapted reuse warehouse building in Halifax NS, on the Harborfront walking trail (BioScience Enterprise Centre), just steps from the largest tourist attractions, high-end condos, and financial districts with lots of shopping and eateries. Windsor should really look over to what Halifax has done with their downtown in the past 20 years (during and after the fall of the fishing industry).
Some links:
http://techtownwsu.org/
http://www.stillercentre.com/
http://innovacorp.ca/what-we-do/incubation/bioscience-enterprise-centre
Love the Halifax example! To tie it all together and put feet on the ground, an office district of sorts might be warranted, if we could convince employers like Green Shield (insurance), Next Dimension (IT systems), Sutherland (call center), Siemons (the office thats currently off of the expressway, not the factory), and a bunch of the other office buildings currently littered along the expressway to come downtown it would be ideal. From there, these types of incubator facilities could be ideally positioned in such a district tied-in the this all-encompassing cultural center.
JP, I’ve thought of that as a future possibility for the canal. I believe, that there are plans to relocate the rail yard at Janette Ave in the future. This would be a great location for a business park connected to the canal thru a trail along the rail cut.
All these wonderful ideas are examples of leveraging what I call the “virtuous trinity” (transportation; the university and college; and downtown and community)of this area.
Bigger and better central library has so many benefits. Best anchor idea yet.
Mark, do you know of any examples of shared libraries between a college and/or university and a city?
A new mega central library shared by the city, university, college, and community groups in the city’s new cultural district connected to the university and college by rapid transit works on so many levels.
Sorry Edwin I don’t. There is a lot of differences between academic libraries and public libraries and that may be harder to integrate. but with a LRT between downtown and the U, it would only be a matter of minutes for the University studentst to get to their library, besides with free Wifi in the public library, they can access a lot of stuff from there.
Or we could save money and library patrons could use the existing bus service on University Avenue.
I’m not sure if you meant that university students would be lured to WPL because of free wifi. If you did, I should point out that the university has campus-wide wifi accessible through their student accounts. I remember being able to pick up the signal from my house on Askin, even.
Not lured JP, I know the U has its own Wifi but my comment was in response to the question of combining two libraries into one with the intention that doesn’t necessarily have to be true, the whole area above would become a hotspot for anybody to use accessing both libraries or anything else their hearts and minds desire!
Okay, gotcha. That makes sense then.
I think the reality of city-wide (free) wifi may be closer than a lot of people are willing to admit/dream. More venues with more hotspots is always a step in the right direction.
I’m truly loving this thread!
Yay! And why are you loving it? What about the idea? You always have comments coming from inside of the ‘library!”
Some great ideas have been added on here, to the point of creating a larger area or centre for creativity, innovation and community involvement than I imagined but that can also happen and should happen!
A centre for creativity is exactly what downtown needs to revitalize people visiting. When you have people visting for weekends they want something to do in between events, a place to go for fun. Companies can rent an auditorium for workshops. Teens and children need a place besides the mall.
Like the Royal Alexandria Library?
Could the WPL the U and the College combine on a comprehensive collection of books (and other media) as a resource of great renown?
Perhaps another piece of the Wildeman/Strasser puzzle?
Are people starting to think alike in cities?
Why not have a walkable arts cluster? We do, sort of
Downtown offers a lot, but people will still wonder, ‘What if …’
http://tiny.cc/MHbe5
By Kristen Peterson (contact)
Wed, Jun 24, 2009 (2 a.m.)
When word spread a few months ago that the Pinball Hall of Fame would be moving to a spot across the street from the Liberace Museum, the responses were similar:
“How perfect. Two American pop culture venues within a reasonable proximity of each other.”
“The Star Trek Experience should move over there.”
“Revive the Elvis museum, plop it down. Clustered together, we’d have synergy, a place where unique local attractions aren’t 20 strip malls apart.”
Why stop there?
Wouldn’t it be something if the city’s contemporary galleries, artist studios and boutique stores were clustered in one area? Add a coffee shop, a book store, maybe a restaurant and, wow, imagine the possibilities. All the elements are there. Just put them in one place and call it an arts district. The city could invest a little money and designate the area, create lamp post banners, invite business and gallery owners into the storefront spaces and work with them on permits.
There’s the Aerial Gallery that runs along Las Vegas Boulevard downtown. Why not move it to Charleston between Main Street and Las Vegas Boulevard?
That would say so much. People would realize that life is stirring within those seemingly dilapidated buildings, that something is going on. Marketing is everything, you know.
But would it work? Hard to say.
Vegas has an arts district, but it is shabby and fragmented. Within its 18 blocks, the district has a cluster of antique shops, a vintage furniture store (Retro Vegas) full of midcentury modern goodies culled mostly from Las Vegas homes, a Mexican restaurant, the Contemporary Arts Center, Trifecta Gallery, a yoga studio, low-rent artist studios and art and design businesses. Paymon’s Mediterranean Bistro opened this week in the Arts Factory, where Valentino’s Zootsuit Connection, which sells glamour vintage clothing, will relocate. Up the street from the Arts Factory is the Fremont Entertainment District, home to Beauty Bar, the Downtown Cocktail Room and the Don’t Tell Mama piano bar. Around the corner from there is Henri & Odette, a gallery and coffee shop, next to a neighborhood grocery store.
On paper, downtown Las Vegas is rich with culture. Galleries open and close, and that will continue. So will the conversations on how to build and keep momentum in the arts, and the battles with the city on permits and codes. There is the endless sputtering of “if only.”
“If only there were a bar in the arts district …”
“If only there were a coffee shop …”
“If only people would leave their homes and not just on the closing night of a gallery or to go to the downtown First Friday festival …”
Unfortunately we lost some great galleries and boutiques in the area. But Paymon’s and Valentino’s should draw some foot traffic.
How perfect.
If only the Onyx Theatre, home to alternative, original and absurdist plays and dance events, could move into the arts district, then things would take off — especially with the Samuel Beckett Festival happening each year in the Mission Building behind the Arts Factory.
If only people knew they could eat lunch on a Saturday at Paymon’s or Casa Don Juan, then walk across the street to Retro Vegas, then to Gypsy Caravan antiques, then walk up Colorado Avenue to the Arts Factory and look at exhibits at Trifecta Gallery and the Contemporary Arts Center. Wouldn’t that be great?
After that they could get in their cars (because that’s what we do best) and drive over to Henri & Odette for coffee or any one of the new local taverns for a drink.
How perfect.