For many residents, the Chapel Hill Public Library acts as a second home—one that will soon be needing a change of address.
To move forward with a planned 18-month renovation at its permanent location, the library will temporarily move to University Mall.
Assistant Library Director Mark Bayles said they have already taken more than 2,000 books off the shelves, but the three-week moving process will officially start Nov. 29.
He said between 70 and 80 percent of the more than 180,000 books will be available at the temporary location.
Bayles said the University Mall location will provide a central location with ample parking while the renovations are under way.
“We are doing everything we can to preserve the quality of service that people have come to expect here,” he said.
The more than 1,000 residents who frequent the library daily made it the busiest per capita in the state with more than one million books checked out in the last year.
And though library staff said many users are content with the central temporary location, not everyone is satisfied with the upcoming changes.
Rebecca Greenberg, a two-year Chapel Hill resident and mother of seven-year-old twin boys, said she likes coming to the library because it has a great children’s section.
But Greenberg said she thinks the move to a shopping mall will have a negative impact on the small-town atmosphere she enjoys so much.
“I’ll probably choose to go to the Carrboro Library,” she said.
