Welcome to the British Library Supporters' Forum

Collection Moves Programme 2009

I am writing to give you notice of temporary changes concerning access to low-use collection items during 2009.

From January 2009, the British Library will be starting a collection moves programme for low-use items. This is the largest programme of moves we have undertaken since the opening of St Pancras in 1998. It aims to improve access to our collections for current Readers and preserve them for future generations. Reader access to high-use material at St Pancras will not be affected.

During the first phase of moves, some low-use collections (consulted less than three times per year) will be moving to a new storage facility at Boston Spa and will be unavailable to Readers. The embargo period will be for a minimum of nine months, starting from January 2009.

The period of restricted access will not affect St Pancras’ high use material, for example manuscripts, rare books, standard use monographs, maps, sound archive and music scores.

The Library needs to vacate current leasehold storage buildings, as they fail to provide adequate environmental conditions. The resulting moves will allow us to rationalise our collection storage and provide future growth space.

We are constructing a new storage building at our Boston Spa site in West Yorkshire. This will be one of the largest and most technologically advanced library repositories in the world, providing us with high-standard environmental storage conditions.

The new facility at Boston Spa is a complex and unique building in terms of its space and systems. We need to ensure that we get the initial placement of material right and that we minimise risks to the collection. This includes testing the operating systems, as well as training staff.

You can find further information on the moves at www.bl/uk/collectionmoves

Yours sincerely

Lynne Brindley
Chief Executive
The British Library
96 Euston Road
London NW1 2DB