Resumption of Library Services in the Central Area of the Library and Temporary Closure of the Main Building

February 14, 2018

 

To Library users:

General Library, The University of Tokyo

 

Resumption of Library Services in the Central Area of the Library and Temporary Closure of the Main Building

Renovation work has been steadily underway in the central area of the General Library’s Main  Building, and we are pleased to announce that the main entrance (facing the fountain) will become usable again for us to resume services in the central area of the Library earlier than the schedule announced in the Notice of Library Improvement Works and Temporary Service Changes in MAY 2017 (Fourth Report) dated March 10, 2017, in which it is stated, “These substitute services are expected to be provided until around August 2018.”

After completion of the current renovation work, renovation of the stack area of the Main Building will be started. Accordingly, in addition to making preparations for the resumption of services in the central area of the Main Building, we need to remove a great number of books and bookshelves from the stack area so that items stored there will be available to Library users even during the stack area renovation period. In order to meet this requirement, we will temporarily close the Main Building for three to four weeks from late April before resuming services in the central area.

We need to temporarily close the Main Building for the maximum use of the renovated spaces and thereby avoid inconvenience to users as much as possible, and ask for your understanding and cooperation.

 

1. Outline of the schedule

From Feb. 21

Transfer part of the materials from the stack area to the automatic stack*1*2

Late Apr. to late May

Close the Main Building for the relocation of the bookshelves, reading desks and materials from the stack area

In and after late May

Resume services in the central area of the Main Building

Start renovation of the stack area of the Main Building (To be  continued until the end of the academic year)

*We will inform you of the specific dates as soon as they are determined.

 

2. Use of materials

 During the temporary closure period, you cannot read materials in or borrow them from the Library. Please therefore borrow the materials that you will need before the temporary closure. After the resumption of services, all materials will become available again, even while the stack area is under renovation.

Type

Availability while the stack area is under renovation

Open shelf collections

Available as usual(For some materials, however, their locations will be changed.)

Materials in the stack

These materials will be transferred to another area in the Main Building and to the automatic stack*1*2. Materials transferred to the automatic stack as well as part of the materials transferred and shelved in the Main Building will be available to users via staff of the Library.

 

  *1 Automatic stack refers to the system to automatically take out a material from the basement stack, where materials are stored in an efficient manner, upon request from a user. The requested material will be handed over to the user at the counter in the Main Building.

*2 We will transfer materials in the stack area to the automatic stack during the period from February 2018 to the resumption of library services. Please note that all these materials will be unavailable for about a week each due to this relocation work. If you have any questions, please contact our staff at the counter.

For details about how to use the automatic stack system, we will inform you later.

The following shows the layout of bookshelves to be adopted during the stack renovation period that follows the resumption of services. 

 

The stack areas on the basement, fourth and fifth floors are all areas accessible only to the staff of the library.

3. Reading and study spaces

We will resume the use of the reading rooms on the north side of the second and third floors, where the total number of seats will be increased from 130 to at least 580 (including the ECCS terminals in the Media Plaza).

The provision of study spaces in the Yasuda Auditorium, and Faculty of Medicine Bldg.1 will be sequentially discontinued accordingly.

For the Library Plaza in the General Library Annex, which was originally established as a space for group study and research exchange, where you can hold conversations, we have been using it as a silent study space to compensate for a decrease in the number of reading seats due to the renovation work. After library services are resumed in the central area of the Main Building, we will start using the Plaza for its original purpose possibly by the fall of 2018.

Schedule for the Resumption of Services in the Central Area of the Main Building (Planned)

We will inform you of related details from time to time. If you have any questions, please contact us by using the form for the renovation work-related comments available on the following webpage:  Comments and Suggestions

After the renovation of the stack area is completed, another renovation work will be started at the east side of the Main Building (Sanshiro Pond side). We are sorry for the inconvenience caused to users and ask for your understanding and cooperation.