Primary Research Group has published Redesigning the Public Library Building, ISBN 978-1-57440-228-5.

The study looks closely at how public libraries in the United States and Canada are redesigning their buildings and altering their philosophy on the use of space. The report gives trend data on overall capital spending by public libraries and their plans for altering seating capacity, for workstation development, for viewing and listening rooms and facilities, for classroom and other group-related spaces, for children's or teen areas, for storage and exhibit space, for library cafes, for technology centers, as well as for parking, public grounds, energy consumption concerns and other areas of potential renovation for public libraries

Just a few of the many findings of this 170+ page report are that:

• Improving handicapped or elderly access is considered very important to the next library redesign by 42.65% of survey participants, including 65.22% of participants in libraries with an annual budget of less than $250,000
• In 23.53% of libraries in the sample, the use of digitization technologies has led to a reduction in the space used to house print collections
• Over the past three years, the cleaning, maintenance, and scotch-guarding of carpeting has cost libraries in the sample a mean of $11,146
• Less than 6% of libraries in the United States have decreased audio-visual collection space over the past three years
• Patron seating space will increase in 52.94% of libraries in the sample over the next three years, with a third of these libraries increasing space by 10% or more
• In order to reduce energy consumption, 37.7% of libraries in the sample have altered the target in-building temperature

The data in the study is based on a sample of 70+ public libraries in the United States and Canada and data is broken out by size of library service area, by library budget, for single building and library systems, and for the USA and Canada. The report is available in print and PDF format for $59.00. Site licenses cost $199.00. To view a table of contents, list of participants, and sample data, or to order a copy of the report, please visit our website at www.PrimaryResearch.com.