New Linwood Library and Service Centre at Eastgate to open

26 April 2013

Mayor Bob Parker will officially open Christchurch City Council’s temporary new Linwood Library and Service Centre at Eastgate Shopping Centre next week.

The 1200 square metre facility, on the first floor of the shopping centre, will officially open at 11am on Tuesday 30 April.

The new Linwood Library and Service Centre at Eastgate replaces Linwood Mini Library in Smith Street, which opened in April 2011 after the closure of the earthquake-damaged Linwood Library in Cranley Street. With the opening of the new facility, a temporary service centre that has been operating from a portable building on the former Linwood Service Centre site in Smith Street will also close.

For the first time since the February 2011 earthquake, customers visiting Linwood Library and Service Centre at Eastgate will have the opportunity to borrow items from the 50,000-strong collection that was held at the Linwood Library in Cranley Street before its closure.

The library collection will include books for all ages, a range of magazines, world language material, CDs, DVDs, talking books and the Ngā Pounamu Māori collection. There will also be 14 computers offering free internet access.

Carolyn Robertson, Unit Manager Libraries and Information, says library and service centre staff cannot wait to open the doors to their loyal customers, but also to welcome new customers.

While the much smaller Linwood Mini Library in Smith Street was welcomed by the local community when it opened just a few months after the February earthquake, its compact size meant it could only house 5000 of the 50,000-item collection that was previously held at the closed Linwood Library in Cranley Street.

We’re hoping customers will enjoy having access to the entire collection again as much as staff have enjoyed unpacking and seeing it again over the past few weeks.

Mayor Parker says he is looking forward to opening Linwood’s first combined library and service centre. This is wonderful news for a community that has so lost so much due to the earthquakes. We’ve learnt that ensuring residents have places to gather is more important than ever post-earthquake.

Libraries certainly provide a hub for communities to learn, relax and meet and, with its light and airy atmosphere, I’m sure this new facility will be a firm favourite with residents. Residents will also benefit from being able to access a number of services in one place for the first time in the suburb.

Eastgate Shopping Centre Manager Joanna Hollander says, We’re very pleased to welcome the Linwood Library and Service Centre to Eastgate. We're anticipating the library will bring in an additional 20,000 people to the centre per month which is not only good news for the library, but also for our tenants and shoppers. We're pleased to be able to play a part in the rejuvenation of east Christchurch.

The new library will open from Monday to Friday from 9am to 6pm and on Saturdays from 10am to 4pm. The new temporary customer service centre will open from 9am to 5pm on weekdays.

With four libraries closed as a result of the earthquakes, Linwood Library and Service Centre at Eastgate will be the third temporary library currently operating in the city.

The others are Central Library Tuam at 121 Tuam Street and Central Library Peterborough, 87-91 Peterborough Street.

For more information visit www.futurechristchurch.co.nz or christchurchcitylibraries.com