It's a weekday afternoon and the main floor of the Toronto Reference Library is hopping. Knots of people mill around the lobby coffee shop. There is a lineup for the 92 Internet-equipped computers. People read or talk at large tables. There is a din, but no one shushes the crowd.
And perhaps the biggest sign that this isn't yesterday's library is the shortage of books in this part of the building, a deliberate attempt to make it more appealing and user-friendly.
"This is public space. We're not building it for the librarians or for the board, we're building all of our space for the public to come in and use and to feel welcome," said Josephine Bryant, city librarian for the Toronto Public Library.
Long the subject of warnings that the Internet would spell their demise, public libraries are booming through new branches, more resources and more computers.
And in addition to their regular schedule of children's programs and author readings, many have reinvented themselves as multipurpose gathering places that happen to house millions of books. Some officials actively court new patrons with everything from coffee shops and comfortable chairs to rock concerts and teen nights.
In November, two Toronto branches presided over free concerts featuring emerging local bands to launch the library's new local music collection. The evenings featured mostly indie rockers -- some of whom loudly sang coarse lyrics -- and attracted fans from across Southern Ontario. Next month, another branch is the site of an anime costume party.
At the Edmonton Public Library's main building, patrons are allowed to snuggle up with a book, food and drink in hand, in the library's plush chairs. The building also has a space for teens, complete with graphic novels, beanbag chairs and lava lamps. And for the past two years, inner-city branches have held teen nights featuring computer games, karaoke, pizza and Dance Dance Revolution, a popular interactive music-video game. The events were so popular people lined up around the block to get in.
In addition, many cities have spent millions to renovate or build new libraries. Calgary officials are planning a new central facility. And Montreal has the nearly two-year-old Grande Bibliothèque, which is attracting more patrons than officials had dared dream: an average of 8,000 visitors a day, nearly double estimates.
"I think we can say it's clear that the need was there," said Hélène Roussel, director of library services for the Grande Bibliothèque.
Indeed, many Canadian libraries are reporting increased patrons and higher lending figures. While there are no national statistics, the Canadian Urban Libraries Council, which represents public libraries in cities with more than 100,000 people, says circulation increased more than 25 per cent between 1996 and 2005. Visits also went up by more than 20 per cent in the same period. (There are no statistics for rural libraries, which are often cash-starved and focused more on maintaining service than widening their mandates.) As she marked a pile of essays at the Toronto Reference Library, high-school history teacher Lesley McLean said she is always surprised at how busy the facility is.
"I think they've done an interesting job here in changing the library to [meet] the needs of what people want," she said, noting the computers and newspapers from different countries.
Urban libraries' renaissance in the Internet age is partly because of a more service-oriented culture, argued Linda Cook, director of the Edmonton Public Library and president of the Canadian Library Association. In contrast to the days of stern, shushing librarians, most of those who work in public libraries today are trained in customer service, making libraries resemble "a retail operation," she said.
