The Taizhou City Library (in Chinese: 台州市图书馆), also known as Taizhou Library (台州图书馆), abbreviated as Tai Tu (台图), is a municipal-level public library located in Taizhou, Zhejiang, People's Republic of China. It is supervised by the Taizhou Municipal Bureau of Culture, Radio, Television, Tourism, and Sports, and is an affiliated unit of the latter. The library building is situated at 168 Hexie Road, Jiaojiang (Taizhou). As of 2019, the total collection of documents in the library reached 876,774 volumes, making it a nationally recognized first-grade library evaluated by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism. The public library collection and reading rooms in Taizhou can be traced back to the Republican era. However, prior to the establishment of the Taizhou Library, Taizhou lacked a larger public library bearing the name "Taizhou City". The construction of the Taizhou City Library began in December 2006, and it opened to the public in December 2010. In 2019, the Taizhou City Library welcomed a total of 1.85 million visitors.
History
Background The history of public library collections in Taizhou can be traced back to the Republican era. In 1912 (the first year of the Republic of China), based on the establishment of the Mingshan Ge Bookstore in 1873, the Huangyan County Library (now the Huangyan District Library) was established, with a collection of over 100,000 volumes, most of which were ancient thread-bound books. Between 1918 and 1936, the Linhai County Library (now the Linhai City Library), the Wenling County Popular Library (now the Wenling City Library), and the Xianju County Public Library (formally established as the Xianju County Library in 1978) were established. The Tiantai County Library was also established during this period. The Yuhuan County Library (now the Yuhuan City Library) and the Sanmen County Library were founded in 1978 and 1979 respectively, both of which were originally local people's education centers. After 1983, libraries in various districts of Taizhou were successively built or expanded, accelerating the development of public library services. However, at this time, Taizhou and even the later established Taizhou city lacked a municipal-level public library.
Establishment and development To counter that situation, in 2001, the preliminary plan for the construction of the Taizhou City Library was proposed. The plan aimed to establish a "composite library", which would integrate traditional and digital collections, with a tendency towards a digital-oriented library. Subsequently, experts drafted the "Feasibility Study Report on the New Building Project of the Taizhou City Library", and the design phase took place from April 2003 to May 2004. Construction of the Taizhou City Library commenced in December 2006, along with the initiation of the collection of library materials. The investment in this new library amounted to 130 million yuan, with a planned total construction area of over 20,000 square meters. Donations of books had already begun at the onset of construction, with over a hundred types of books donated by the Municipal Bureau of Culture, Radio, Television, News, and Publishing of Taizhou. On December 27, 2010, the Taizhou City Library was opened to the public. In February 2013, the northeast corner of the Taizhou City Library was completed and opened as the Hehe Book Bar (a 24-hour self-service library), the first of its kind in Taizhou and the first large-scale self-service library integrating borrowing and collection in Zhejiang. On November 2, 2013, it was designated as a national first-grade library by the Ministry of Culture of the People's Republic of China. On December 30, it initiated a shared borrowing and returning service with three district libraries: Jiaojiang District Library, Huangyan District Library, and Luqiao District Library. On April 23, 2016, the Jinglong Mansion Hehe Book Bar was put into operation, becoming the first self-service library in China to adopt compatible RFID dual-frequency technology. In April, it became the Director Unit of the Professional Committee for Collection and Reading Promotion of the Chinese Library Association. On the morning of December 30, the Board of Directors of the Taizhou City Library was established.
Library
The Taizhou City Library is located at 168 Hexie Road, Jiaojiang District, situated on the west side of the municipal administrative building and the east side of the Civic Square. The total construction area is 21,000 square meters, with the main building exterior in gray, consisting of five above-ground floors and one underground floor, designed to accommodate 600,000 volumes. The design of the library was led by Professor Guan Zhaoye from the Chinese Academy of Engineering and the School of Architecture at Tsinghua University. The design team advocates for integrating the library with the Taizhou City Cultural and Art Center, Taizhou Museum, Taizhou Science and Technology Museum, and Taizhou Grand Theater, enclosing them into a whole, "harmoniously blending into the environment" to achieve visual balance, while adapting to the climate of the southern region, and emphasizing a "people-oriented" approach. In terms of design, the style of each reading room is matched with the types of documents stored. The children's reading room is located by the staircase in the atrium on the first floor, with a slightly playful style. The parent-child library is the most distinctive reading room in the library, predominantly decorated in warm colors and designed with humanization in mind, featuring lovely patterns and low steps leading to the outdoors, where children can play on the lawn in the library's backyard. The ordinary literature reading room on the second floor is divided into Room One and Room Two, with Room One offering better sunlight and views. The local literature reading room on the fourth floor exudes classical charm.
Library affairs
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