I was told late this morning that the Business Plan submitted by Facilities Management for the changes to the Engineering Library was approved by SMT at a meeting yesterday. The next step in the process is for the Business Plan to be submitted to Coucil at its meeting on the 30th September.

Last Friday (18th) Dawn and I had a very long meeting with Nick Courtney, Courtney Architects, (hence no proposed merger news posted on CounterCulture last week)to discuss the furniture layout and design, plus the colour scheme. It is proposed that there will be a neutral background with the major colour accents in green tones. Other colours will also be used to highlight certain areas, however these have yet to be decided. We all agreed that the red colour used in Dawn’s office, which we believe is called pohutakawa, is very striking and is a strong candidtate for inclusion in the colour scheme. The carpet tiles that will be used are the darker grey ones known as “kilobyte”, these tiles have already been used in some flooring areas in the Enginering and Central Libraries.

Heather

A focus group meeting with students was arranged for Wednesday 9th September. 15 students turned up to hear Dawn, Gail and I talked about the proposed merger, what was happening with the bookstock and the draft floor plans. The students came well prepared with questions and there was a good discussion ranging over issues of space, allocation of budgets for subjects, what was happening over the Summer Semester, and which Library would be open when. The summer hours for the Library, including Physical Sciences and Engineering, are now up on the web page.

The team involved with moving the bookstock and journals has now completed their tasks. Well done to everybody concerned particularly to Theresa who masterminded the entire operation, which went incredibly smoothly.

The Project Control Group meeting this week was well attended. The Architect (Nick) displayed a number of drawing sshowing many of the details that will be incorporated into the Engineering Library. There will be additional fire egress stairs added to the outside of the building by the lift at Level 2. Nick explained that much of the interior work would be pre-manufactured offsite and this will help to keep the project within the tight timeframe. We were told that the colour of items manufactured out of plywood would be “Victorian Ash”, our first hint of the colour palette that is being considered. We are still waiting for floor plans that can be put on display.
ICTS are still looking for an appropriate area to relocate “The Cave” in and are hopefull that they are close to a solution.

Heather

The Law Basement (the part given over for the Physical Sciences and Engineering journals) is now full. Well done team. Photos of the shelves being emptied have been taken and will be made available for viewing soon.

The Project Control Group meeting this week focussed on the electrical side of things, with Warren from Cosgroves attending the meeting to talk through various procedures that will need to be carried out to ensure that the lighting plan is not compromised. A new topic was addressed and that was the roof. Access to the roof is required at various stages of this project and concerns have been raised about the condition of the roof. Facilities Management are to set up a separate project to see if a separate contract can be drawn up to refresh the roof of the Engineering Library. The 200 power and data outlets have been agreed to. An additional meeting to discuss the compactus shelving was arranged for Friday.

Dawn, Theresa, and I meet with Lindsay Hampton, plus Nick and Donavon from Courtney Architects on Friday morning to discuss in detail the requirements for the compactus shelving. It was agreed that 392 bays would be required. There is still an outstanding height issue to be solved, however it is possible that recessed sprinkler heads maybe the solution, watch this space next week. The area between the rails, on which the compactus runs, was also thee subject of debate and further research is to be carried out to see if ramps or in filled flooring will be used.

Heather

This is a combined report for last week and this week.
Dawn was able to offer the book moving positions to the successful candidates and we welcome the following people who will be working with staff from Physical Sciences, Engineering moving journals to storage. They are:
Hugh Joughin
Bruce McNeil
Josiah Simmonds
Jeremy Fridd
Michael Browning

The movement of journal to the Law Basement begins on Monday 24th August. Even on Tuesday 25th when Gail and I popped up to Level 2 in the Engineering Library it was very evident that many volumes had already been moved. Both the Monday meetings focussed mainly on behind the scenes organisation being undertaken to ensure that journal move will take place smoothly. Theresa and all the staff working with her are have work incredibly hard.

I was unable to attend the Project Control Group meeting last week, however I understand that discussion mainly focussed on the number of data and power points that should be installed. This was a continuing theme for the meeting this week as well. The date that the Library will be handed back the refurbished Engineering and Physical Sciences Library will be the 8th February, cleanup and moving of the Physical Sciences Library into the newly merged Library will then begin.

Statistics New Zealand will be running a series of free seminars nationwide from late-August to mid-October to coincide with the launch of their new website.
The Web Stats! seminar series has been developed to show people how to navigate their new website, and how to use their online tools to easily access their information.

Covered in each seminar will be:
How to navigate the new website
How to use the two online tools – Infoshare and Table Builder
What localised key statistical information is available
Examples of how to use the information for businesses, communities and research purposes

For more details about the seminars along with location/venue details where people can register, please visit www.stats.govt.nz/webstats.

Stephen Hickson has agreed to act as a UC academic liaison person with Stats New Zealand. If there are any academics who have questions about the Stats products or the seminars please refer them to either Stephen or to me.

Heather Jenks

This week plans have been slowly falling into place. At the regular Monday meeting the focus of the discussions was on the plans for the stock moves which will start on Monday 24th August. Dawn has had a number of applications for the positions that have been advertised and will be interviewing during the week. The book sale has been successful with over $100 taken in sales already.

Prior to the Project Control Group meeting this week, Dawn and Theresa meet with the Programmer, the Architect and Facilities Management staff to discuss a number of issues regarding the timeline for the project. The Project Control Group meeting also focussed on these issues and tried to find various solutions so that the timeline for the project finishing date did not run into the first semester of 2010. Theresa, Dawn and Heather attended a further meeting on Thursday to discuss the proposed solutions in more detail. By the end of this meeting there was more “confidence” that the project would be able to end on time. The Programmer is re-entering a number of tasks and the new timeline will be available for discussion at the next Project Control Group meeting on Tuesday 18th August.

The Monday meeting this week concentrated on the project work to move book stock that will take place in the three weeks starting from the 24th August. Theresa is busy organising the leasing of additional crates and obtaining a rental truck and Dawn has contacted Student Job Search to place an advertisement for five students to assist with moving stock in this time period.

Dawn has been communicating with academic staff in Engineering and Physical Sciences to ensure that they are up to date with the proposal. The weeding programme in the Engineering collections is continuing and a book sale of items withdrawn, mostly duplicate copies, from the these collection started this week.

The first stock moves for the project took place on Tuesday and Wednesday this week. Dave Lane, Anne Milligan and Jenny Fitzgerald formed a team to move the S-T journal backrun from Central Library to storage in the Law Basement. As well Engineering materials from Central Library were moved to the Engineering Library. Congratulations to this team for a job well done.

On Thursday prior to the Project Control Group meeting Dawn, Theresa and I met with the University Architect and the Programmer. The purpose of this meeting was to ensure that the Programmer was aware of the many different activities that need to go on for this project to be successful. There are a number of stock moves and stack moves that need to take place, plus moving furniture out of areas to allow space for the workers to be able to carry out their tasks. All the information about infilling ceiling tiles, replacing the lighting, removing the convector heaters and replacing them, providing mechanical ventilation etc., for Phase 1 of this project is to be fed into a computer programme and this will then generate the workflows for the project. We will then know what the timeline is for the project, and if it is feasible. It was also noted at this meeting that Phase 2 of the project will be undertaken in 18 months.

The Project Control Group meeting this week looked at some items in detail, e.g. the convector heaters are now being removed and replaced in Phase 1 of the project, not in Phase 2 as per the original plans. With the increase in the number of study spaces and therefore an increase in the number of people in the Library, a sustainable model for ventilation has to be re looked at. The Architect will redraft the plans this week and the plans will then be resubmitted to the Quantity Surveyor, and the cashflow options will be looked at again. The ICTS representatives at the meeting discussed the options that have been made available for a teaching space/s after the closing of the Cave. They also asked that the Cave be closed ad relocated during the second semester break. One option that ICTS is looking at using the room on Level 4 of the Central Library to house some computers.

At this weeks Monday meeting the main areas of discussion were –
Dawn has had a meeting with the ENSOC President; the Library will establish a user group with students from Engineering and Physical Sciences
A stock check of the PSL book collection has been completed and there are (only) 80 books missing from the collection
The University Architect has promised revised sketches will be available for the Project Control Group meeting on Tuesday
Clarification was sought from the Architect re the non-operation of the Engineering Library over the summer period, the Architect thought staff may be able to stay in the building, this still require further investigation
Dawn and Theresa have calculated that the Library will need three weeks in January to complete all the stock movements
A booksale of duplicated books from the Engineering collection is being organised
A planned message to the students was withdrawn when it was realised that there are a number of issues all coming to fruition at the same time, later this week at a meeting with Ian Town it was agreed that the University should send out a message to the students which included references to the proposed PSL relocation, the closure of the Cave, and the student levy.

The Project Control Group meeting this week focussed solely on the revised plans. The Architect has managed to create 556 formal study spaces and those of us at the meeting spent the time closely working through the seating options. Dawn was able to get a changes made to the plans including one of the Level 2 stack areas as staff feedback had agreed that leaving this area as a seating area would give this greater functionality.

Theresa is gearing up to start a team moving parts of both monograph and serials collections either to storage, from Engineering, Physical Sciences or Central Library or some items that are tagged to go to the Central Library. These moves will take place in the second semester break.

Heather

At the Library proposed relocation meeting on Monday the main points of discussion were the book stock and communications with the students. Dawn is working on communications that will appear in the Chemistry, Mathematics and Physics newsletters as well as contacting ENSOC. Heather and Gail are working with the UCSA representatives on the Library Committee.

Weeding is underway in the “T” classification. 88 bays of older runs of some chemistry journal titles have been identified as low use items and are candidates for storage.

This weeks Project Control Group meeting focussed on two areas this week. One was the amount of stock and therefore the amount of stacks required and the other issue was the area known as “The Cave”.

The Architect produced a first cut at lowering the height of the stacks, in some areas this is required to comply with the sprinkler system within the Engineering Library. A further meeting with the Architect, Dawn MacMillan, Theresa Graham and Heather Jenks was held on Friday afternoon to decide on the placement of stacks and study areas on Levels 2 and 3. Dawn was able to feed through input from Engineering and PSL staff on this issue.

Two representatives from ICTS were invited to the Project COntrol Group meeting to discuss ideas about the relocation of the teaching space and the computers in the cave. The Architect and FM staff will hold a further meeting with ICTS to resolve this issue.

Heather

On Monday Gail Pattie, Heather Jenks, Theresa Graham and Dawn McMillan met to discuss progress of the project. The focus for this week has been on the book stock and working out what resources will fit where. THe completion of the relocation of older print journal runs, prior to 1990, from Engineering and move will free up shelving space, these back runs will then be moved into storage in the Law Basement. To help this process, additional crates have been purchased.

At the Project Control Group meeting held on Tuesday it was confirmed that Facilities and the University Architect (Nick Courtney)have looked at all aspects of the building project and agree that the work can be done in the time available. Working backwards from the date of enrolment for 2010, the project team expect that three weeks prior to this date book stock will be able to be relocated to the refurbished Engineering Library.

It was agreed that the work nominated in Phase 1 of the existing plans for the refurbishment of the Engineering Library (updated in 2007) would be completed for the 2010 deadline. This includes redoing the ceilings and lighting, providing more power, working on the radiators, recarpeting the Library, building new toilet facilities on both Level 1 and 2 and moving some of the stack. Originally Stage 1 also included a new lift installation and the building of the fire egress; these aspects have already been completed.

For this work to be completed on time, the building crew will require access to the eastern end of the ground floor, Level 1, in September to undertake preparation work. Further discussions needs to take place to work out how access to study spaces and book stock will be achieved over this period. It was agreed that there could not be any construction or deconstruction noise taking place in either Library over the exam period.

The final meeting for the week for this project was held on Thursday afternoon with the Union. Library representatives from TEU present were Helen Kissell, Caroline Syddall, and Tim O’Sullivan plus Gail Pattie, Dawn McMillan, Chantel Inch (HR) and Heather Jenks met together to discuss the project. Current documentation for the project was tabled and discussed and a verbal update on progress to date.

The current project floor plans, as of April 2007, can be viewed here

Heather Jenks