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Guess what people want to see in their libraries?
• CAMDEN'S residents forcibly suggested that a little bit of peace and quiet should be maintained in the borough’s libraries (Internet café model is no good for a public library, Letters September 25).
They were completely underwhelmed by the proposal to allow the use of mobile phones in them.
Many of Camden’s library users carry mobile phones and they usually are quite happy to take incoming calls outside the library. To imply that they create a great fuss about this is to simply distort the truth and to insult these considerate people.
The New Journal letters make it quite obvious that this proposal is considered to be pandering to anti-social behaviour by a tiny minority.
To imply that a relaxation of the ban would result in a large influx of new users into Camden’s libraries is also stretching the facts to fit some weird theory. The recent user survey carried out by the library service certainly did not identify a great need to remove the mobile phone ban.
It did give a very good reason for putting some effort into improving the book stock, however.
It found that 82.8 per cent of respondents used Camden’s libraries to borrow a book/video/DVD, usually a book. The next most popular reason for a library visit was to gather information and this was only 38.2 per cent of the total – less than half of the major use.
So, the public has very clearly made its preferences known – no mobile phones, more books.
Is there anyone taking bets on what we will get?
ALAN TEMPLTON
Chair, Camden Public Library Users Group, Honeybourne Road, NW6
Opening hours
• I WANT to reassure everyone who has expressed concerns about possible changes to libraries (Letters, September 25) that no plans have been agreed, or even drawn up, to allow visitors to use their mobile phones or bring in their own snacks and drinks.
Quite rightly, we are always open to new ideas that will encourage more people to use our libraries and, if we felt they would improve our service, we would consult library users and residents first.
One proposal we have consulted on is increasing library opening hours.
More than 3,000 library members and non-members responded and we hope to be able to increase opening times in the very near future.
Another idea is to introduce wi-fi at Swiss Cottage library, and plans for a trial are underway. Our library service is one of the few in the country with increasing visitor numbers and book borrowing.
We do need to move with the times to encourage more people to enjoy them but we want to take all library users with us.
CLLR FLICK REA
Executive Member for Culture
Valued silence
• MAY I add my support to the many others who have voiced their opposition to Mike Clarke’s proposal to allow food and drink and noise into Camden’s libraries (‘We need new libraries worth shouting about’, September 11).
If he intends to attract younger people to libraries so that they can eat, drink and talk, he is bringing them to libraries for the wrong reasons. People need to be educated as to the benefits of quiet reading, study and reflection that libraries afford, rather than changing a library to encourage noisy conversation!
As expressed in other letters, in a city like London, libraries are one of the few places where silence is available, and valued, by many people who do not have access to it in their daily lives.
Instead of wasting valuable resources on this sort of shallow improvement, why not spend money on increasing stocks of interesting books, and providing courses on using the library for study and learning?
It seems that we do not need new libraries but a new head of libraries.
NICK MILLER
Kentish Town, NW5
Oasis of calm
• Mike Clarke’s suggestion library users could use their mobile phones in libraries is totally inappropriate.
I have used Queen’s Crescent library for the past 33 years. It is an oasis of calm in the area and recognised as such by schoolchildren who use it as a place to study.
There was a brief period when disruptive teenagers created mayhem in the library. This was resolved by enforcing strict boundaries to ensure library users’ behaviour did not make the library an area of chaos which deterred people using it.
Name and address supplied
Peace and quiet must come first
• YES we do need libraries to shout about but once inside we should be very, very quiet (‘We need new libraries worth shouting about’, September 11).
What is all this nonsense about “carrying on normal conversations and life” in libraries? Libraries are for selecting, choosing and reading books. Not for listening to computer games and mobile phone chatting. What next, pop music to make younger users feel welcomed and relaxed?
Mike Clarke is concerned that migrants and teenagers find libraries forbidding places. I can think of quite a few places I find forbidding, so I don’t go there. Flick Rea thinks that people who make complaints about libraries are basing it on an older view of libraries.
I don’t think so; wanting peace and quiet in a library has nothing to do with old or new views but rather with a view of what a library is for, see above.
If libraries can provide separate rooms for “other formats” than books, fine, let them do so, but let those who come to find and read books of their choice have the peace and quiet to do so.
TONNY GREY
Brecknock Road
N19
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