Putting parking over people: could Richmond’s new main library better serve the city?

When the initial designs for the renovation of Richmond’s Main Library were released to the public earlier this summer, beyond the new reading rooms and collections spaces residents of Virginia’s capital noticed one big change in the allocation of space: a full floor of the three-story building would be converted from community areas into parking.

Although the potential plans for the $70 million dollar renovation are far from final, the elimination of one whole floor of gathering space for people in favor of 69 parking stalls set off alarm bells in a city that nominally declared a state of emergency over the climate crisis less than a year ago.

Library dilapidation

First built in 1928, the main branch of the Richmond Public Library system hasn’t seen a renovation in over half of a century when in the late 1960s the city encased the original federalist structure with a brutalist building twice as big. Today, problems abound from the HVAC to the gas boiler to the continued presence of antiquated coal chutes.

A 2009 master plan of improvements put a patch on the most pressing problems facing many of the system’s dilapidated branches including leaky roofs, rickety furniture, and an utter lack of modern information technology. Still, many issues persist.

“You can only keep maintaining things for so long until the building becomes obsolete,” explained Scott Firestone, the director of Richmond’s library system. “The city has been underresourced for decades and many of our buildings are in desperate need of repair or replacement.”

With roughly 30,000 visitors per month, the library system’s flagship location has never been in higher demand. Beyond ending the costs of chronic maintenance, the redesign of the branch is also intended to help the library better serve its users now more likely to look for information online than in an encyclopedia.

“Library users of the 21st century are very different from library users of the 20th century because back then we designed everything around books since libraries needed to be the university of the people,” said Firestone. “We as a library also need to continue to evolve.”

The cars collection

The rendering of the proposed Main Library with one-third of its space devoted to car storage is a reflection of the first round of feedback RPL received, according to Firestone.

“Parking is definitely an issue that was raised at the community meetings,” he said. “The renderings we had mocked up reflect an answer for that demand. This design was put out for residents to consider, and the feedback has been mixed. Do I like to see millions of dollars spent on warehousing cars? I personally don’t, but my job is to reflect what library users are asking for.”

However, recent studies have repeatedly called into doubt the established wisdom of deferring to in-person public forums by showing that those who most frequently turn out to such community meetings skew older, whiter, and wealthier than the average resident. Even in RPL’s own community survey over three-quarters of all library users reported walking, biking, or taking public transportation to access the main branch location.

Among the items on the library’s wishlist are a new children’s area, a more accessible collection, a focus showcasing the catalog’s Richmond roots, a large gathering space, music rooms, and a free green rooftop that any resident can access. What hasn’t landed on the list yet? Housing.

Public land for public good

Faced with a similarly decrepit library location, advocates in Chevy Chase, Maryland led a campaign to build several floors of affordable housing atop their main branch. Twenty-one organizations built a broad coalition backing the addition of housing to the renovation plans under the motto “public land for maximum public good.”

Less than a ten-minute walk from the future Purple Line light rail, including mixed-income housing above the new library is “a no-brainer,” according to Jane Lyons, an advocacy manager with the Coalition for Smarter Growth, one of the project’s backers.

“Whenever a library is being redone it should include affordable housing,” Lyons said. “Being able to use that airspace above the library is an ideal way to lower the development costs, lower the rents, and make it even easier to provide affordable housing. We can’t just be putting income-restricted housing in underresourced areas. This is a racial equity and justice issue as well.”

Stephen Wade of the Richmond-based Partnership for Smarter Growth sees the issue similarly: “Public land which includes libraries, fire stations, and schools are incredibly valuable assets for our city to provide housing for people who need it most, those at the lowest income levels below 30% average median income”—$15,426 in annual earnings for households or $8,537 for individuals.

Amid an ever-increasing housing crisis and in an era in which city officials are persistently pushing forward with the demolition of all public housing, the need for alternative plans to provide deeply affordable apartments has never been greater. Whether potential housing over the main library would be a public-private partnership, all affordable, mixed income, or workforce housing for city workers, not building any and leaving the airspace empty would be “a huge mistake,” according to Wade.

“From Richmond 300 to RVA Green 2050, all of our plans support more housing in our most transit rich locations like downtown,” Wade said. “Over 25% of city households are transit dependent, so to use a city resource to house cars instead of people would be really missing the mark given this prime location. The city owns the land, so local leaders have 100% control over what gets built there and what the rents could go for.”

Although the city’s Urban Design Committee approved the main library’s initial renderings—including one full floor of parking, specifically—last Thursday, the preliminary plans are far from final.

“This is just a conceptual design,” said Firestone. “The purpose of this planning process is to figure out what residents want to see in their new library and how much that may cost. We still have a lot of community feedback and data to gather. We need to think about this library in a new way, but change is sometimes uncomfortable.”