D oes the fight for literacy take place in a Roman coliseum? It does in Vancouver, where the city's new library became an instant landmark. The building has 315 arches divided into nine floors. At certain points, the outer spiral of arches leaves the main body of the library like the spiraling arms of a hurricane. These create the wide plazas that the locals are so fond of for relaxing, reflecting, studying, debating, and more. These arms afford space for fast food restaurants and other small shops which cater to the crowds that gather in the plaza and the workers above. When the building opened, the library only filled seven of its nine stories. The remainder were leased to the provincial government as office space, giving the library room to expand without wasting space. Amazingly, not everyone is happy with the new library. Critics say it is too expensive and deride the shops serving the public as an undignified use of public property. They much prefer the old library on Burrard Street, which was something straight out of the 1950's: A squat affair featuring boring slabs of brushed concrete and all the warmth of a cheesy generic office building. Its defenders call it a "modernist classic." Moshe Safdie was correct when he called it "insignificant." The building eventually became a Virgin Megastore. It cost CAN$300,000.00 to move 600 truckloads of material from the old library to the new one. The first tome to arrive at its new home was the World Bibliography of Bibliographies.
