University to move forward with Cabell Library expansion plans

Charles Couch

Library officials say they’re on the verge of choosing an architecture firm to design plans for an expansion of the James Branch Cabell Library.

The project is being called the Library and Academic Commons – an initiative stemming from student demand for more learning and workspace, university librarian John Ulmschneider said.

“The university has had a major addition to the library in its capital plans for long time now. It’s not a new project. It’s long conceived and long understood to be needed,” Ulmschneider said.

The rough plans call for the renovations of 80,000 square feet within Cabell. Then, VCU intends to construct additional 82, 000 square feet which will connect to the renovations on the library’s north side, Ulmschneider said.

The original sections of the building will house the library’s books and collections, while the addition will house growing and evolving technologies including resources for graduate research, streaming media and extensive research databases.

“[Libraries] aren’t built to hold books anymore,” Ulmschneider said.

“They are built to be centers of academic pursuit where students and faculty come together to use a wide array of information assets in the course of their studies, their research.”

Students have been vocalizing the need for more library space to university leadership for years, but the university has to be very selective about how it prioritizes funding, Ulmschneider noted.

During their last regular session, the General Assembly  agreed to allow VCU to expend monies necessary to design ad construct the expansion of Cabell, and reimburse the university after the project’scompletion.

Shortly after this decision had been reached, Jae Lee, the Student Government Association president, attended the Cabell Life Forum last semesteralong with about 35 other students and SGA members to give their input on how to expand the library.

“After that meeting they adjusted what they originally had planned and really listened to student input to try and make it actually what we wanted,” Lee said.

Sue Robinson, a public relations official with VCU Libraries, said that the students are the hands steering Cabell’s expansion.

“Students had a lot to do with making this happen, making their needs known,” Robinson said. “Just like with the 24-hour, round-the-clock services that we have now. That was a student driven initiative –  of course that we at the library were very supportive of – but it was the students that brought it forth to the provost that really helped make that happen.”

Yet the students who have been the force behind the new Library and Academic Commons project likely won’t see it until after they graduate. The building isn’t scheduled to be open to the public until September 2015, Ulmschneider said.

“I think if we don’t look in the long run, a lot of things won’t get accomplished,” said Lee, who is slated to graduate in 2013. “A lot of the long term projects won’t get accomplished and the students that keep coming into VCU won’t be able to get the best experience.”

The university’s student population has doubled since the Cabell Library was constructed in 1975, to over 31,000 undergraduate and graduate students. Since the initial construction, there have been few major modifications to the building. Recent renovations to the second floor added 14,000 square feet of academic work and collaborative space in the summer of 2010, but some say it’s still not enough considering the traffic.

“We have almost two million individual visits in this building every year,” Ulmschneider said. “That’s more than almost any academic library you’ll find anywhere.”

Design for the Library and Academic Commons begins in August and construction is scheduled to start next January.

Staff Writer