The DC library system is rolling out its Xtreme Mobile library as a stopgap measure while they get new library facilities opened in places in the District with no library service. It’s a neat idea, but is providing a little bit of a library going to slow up plans to get a real library to those areas?
Saccocio [head of the Friends of Tenley Library Association] believes a 32-foot bus can never replace everything that a library building provides.
“This bus, it’s just sort of insignificant. It’s very little service here that’s being offered to a neighborhood. It’s very insufficient,” she said.
Saccocio and other library volunteers worry that the continued stopgaps — the bus and the temporary storefront libraries — will delay the reconstruction of libraries that closed a year ago in Anacostia, Shaw, Benning and Tenleytown.
The bookmobile goes to five locations once a week for a maximum visit of 4 1/4 hours and a minimum of 1 3/4 hours at a time. So, in the least-visited area, that’s only seven hours of library services a month. You can see what the hours are at the rest of the DC Public system here. [thanks dsdlc]