Public library turns new page as demolition begins
Frequent visitors to the Princeton Public Library will find the building demolished this week, as planners prepare for its reconstruction.Though a short walk from the University campus, until now the facility played only a small role in most University students' lives, except for the few hundred cardholders who discovered some of the library's offerings.Now that the library has been temporarily moved to Princeton Shopping Center until its reopening in December 2003, University students are feeling the loss."I'd go there to study, because I knew that no one else [from the University] would be there," Diana Rosenblum '05 said.While most students hit the books at Firestone Library, local coffee shops or Frist Campus Center to escape the claustrophobia of their rooms, students like Rosenblum found the public library conducive to working because of its distance from University life.University students account for more than 500 of the library's cardholders, library director Leslie Burger said."The number of Princeton student cards holders has bumped up from last year because of the relaxed borrowing rules," she said.After the University donated half a million dollars to the public library fund, non-resident card fees were dropped for University students.Though 500 student cards pale in comparison to the total 21,000 that the library has issued, those University students and faculty who had visited the library at the corner of Witherspoon and Wiggins streets frequently used by the facility.Caroline James '05 said she often used the library for services not offered at some University libraries.