Council is currently in the middle of a Request for Proposal process with five shortlisted bidders to create a new state of the art library in the heart of Glen Waverley on the Central Car Park site.
This is a project Council has been working on for more than five years and aims to deliver upon the vision set in the Glen Waverley Activity Centre Master Plan. A new library about six times bigger than the current one and community meeting spaces are a key part of this project, together with a public plaza the size of the city square in Melbourne’s CBD. These new public spaces in the heart of Kingsway opposite the Glen Waverley Train Station are key parts of Council’s plans to transform Kingsway over the coming years.
We want to create Australia’s best municipal library. A cutting edge library and community space for today as well as for the future.
It may not be the biggest library space in the country, but we want to take the best elements of the most effective public spaces created elsewhere in Australia or overseas to create the best library and community hub experience which is available anywhere in Australia. We see the building design and fit out to be a key part of achieving this. It must inspire learning, discovery, innovation, collaboration, conversation, fun and foster a sense of community.
The aim is to deliver a new library, a public plaza and car parking to replace what is currently available on the site on a cost neutral basis by incorporating some private development on the site adjacent to Springvale Road. This will lead to an overall net gain in car parking for Kingsway.
There are some people who question the need for a library and others who have expressed a preference that a new library could be constructed in its current location. However, the extensive consultation that Council has conducted over the past few years reveals that there is strong support for a new library and community hub in Glen Waverley on part of the site. Research conducted in March 2016 by Lonergan Research using a random telephone survey of residents shows there is a strong level of community support for the inclusion of a modern library on the site with 69% of respondents indicating they would be more likely to support the development of the Central Car Park site if it included ‘a new, significantly improved, state of the art library’.
Through Council’s master planning work for the Glen Waverley Activity Centre, different locations and sizes of the library were extensively examined. The clear and advice from MGS Architects, a leading design firm, and supported by our own staff, was that the location of the library was best served by relocation to the Central Car Park. The size of the library is directly related to demand and the current use of the existing library which has a number of significant size limitations. The co-location and proposed multifunctionality of the proposed hub cannot be effectively accommodated on the existing library site.
The current Glen Waverley Library was opened in 1976 and has had only one major refurbishment since then (in 1999) and it is well overdue to be redeveloped or replaced. There were around 318,000 visits to the Glen Waverley Library last financial year – that’s nearly 1,000 visits every day. However, the space is bursting at the seams – at only 1,031 square metres.
A new library space would enable a variety of activities to be offered to the community – including formal and informal workshops and training, creative spaces and meeting and working spaces for families, local communities and businesses. A library for the next 30 years will look and be very different to the current library that has served the community for the past 30 years.
Many other councils (such as Geelong, Melbourne and Maroondah) have invested in state of the art libraries which have proved incredibly popular in their communities. These spaces have transformed how people think of libraries from the traditional view of libraries being quiet places revolving around books to a more contemporary view that they are places of collaboration, sharing, noise, activity, fun, discovery and technology. These modern libraries emphasise that a library is the central hub of a local community and have all sorts of different offerings to attract a huge range of diverse residents into them.
We want a new Glen Waverley Library to be a technologically advanced space that is highly adaptable to future technological development and change. While books and physical materials are important and must be catered for, we see the emphasis being on providing accessible electronic resources and encouraging connections and sharing between people – such as in a Google or Apple Silicon Valley campus style approach.
While we want the space to have relevance to everyone in our community – we want particular attention to be placed on creating amazing specific spaces and/or attractions which will resonate with the following diverse groups:
• Toddlers and children;
• High school and university students;
• Males 30 to 65 (who are a demographic which Council struggles most to connect with, attract to Council services and engage meaningfully with); and
• Over 65s (particularly from a non-English speaking background).
By a ‘library of a future’, we are striving to create a space that does not feel like a typical library. Indeed, we want to turn the conventional concept of what a local library is on its head. While still a place to access books and other materials associated with a traditional library, we want this to be a place for people to go to connect with classmates, neighbours, workmates and to make new friends.
I want this to be THE public hub of the Monash and Glen Waverley community and to reek of energy, vibrancy, activity, noise (while also offering quiet areas), adaptability and sharing.
Recent Comments