COLD COMFORT
LIBRARY IN WINTER
RADIATORS INADEQUATE
A few days ago (writes "Bound About Zero") the Town Hall and Concert Chamber came in for a round of the guns over the lack of warmth on occasions of dances and , other social gatherings. But what about the Central Library? In the reference and reading rooms there are just two radiators, one at each end of the rooms, very cheerful to look at —thanks to coloured glass and 16 c.p. lighting globes behind it—but giving out just about enough heat to keep a decentsized study uncomfortably cold and miserable.. Once there wore coal fires, but we must march with tho times— and wear heavier underclothing.
A "Post" reporter spent an hour in the reading room to try out the alleged cold comfort, and found it merely cold. Tho two radiators . are altogether inadequate to bring any sort of reading comfort to the barn-like room. They are not large radiators, nor arc they always switched fully on. It is scarcely possible for a studious reader to carry out his investigations when the weather is really bad.
Tho reason for the change from open fires was. apparently that chimney troubles led to the rooms being half smothered in .'smoke under certain wind conditions,, but in any case open fires arc not a success in library buildings; they tend to encourage .readers to draw up chairs and make tilings homely. (The radiators do not—it hardly seems worth while). Some system of central or air heating would be the better, solution, but it is doubtful whether tho expenditure, which would be considerable, would' be warranted in a building which cannot serve for much longer as Wellington's main library. Moro radiators would meet the need in a more or less satisfactory way, but the rooms are So crowded that it would bo difficult to place them satisfactorily; more powerful radiators in place of those now in use, or a return to good coal fires, plus chimney repairs, would make some difference. Cold as are the reference and reading rooms, they are havens of rest and comfort compared with the 'newspaper room, where there is no heating at
all. The council, it is understood, intends to give consideration to improving the heating system of the Town Hall, Concert Chamber and Council Chamber; a special paragraph might be added to the report to be brought down with jreference to the library,
COLD COMFORT
Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 32, 6 August 1930, Page 10
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