The Enoch Pratt Free Library unveiled its brand spanking new Mobile Library Monday outside St. Ambrose School in Park Heights. The bright red van is a new addition to the library's Bookmobile fleet.
This 28-foot state-of-the-art bookmobile is quite literally a mobile library, offering Baltimore residents many of the services they'd find at a brick-and-mortar branch. Visitors will be able to surf the Web using the public access computer and, of course, check out audio visual materials, periodicals, large print materials, and current bestsellers. The bookmobile will also include a number of books available in Russian and Spanish.
The new Mobile Library will visit areas of Baltimore that are not geographically close to a library. It will also regularly service senior centers, schools, Latino Relocation Centers, municipal buildings and the communities along Edmondson Avenue and Reisterstown Road where Pratt branches are closed for renovation.
"The Pratt Library is at the heart of every community in Baltimore and this new Mobile Library will bring valuable resources to our patrons," says Carla Hayden, Pratt Library CEO. "The Mobile Library is a modern and dynamic information center for the 21st century. Our bookmobile service serves people of all backgrounds, providing access almost every service that patrons find in Pratt branches."
The Enoch Pratt Free Library's bookmobile fleet has a long history of serving and providing free library materials and programming to the citizens of Baltimore. In 1943, the Pratt's horse drawn "Book Cart Service was established to serve areas of the city that were not within walking distance of a Pratt Branch. It was later replaced in 1949 when the first Bookmobile began services to Baltimore City neighborhoods.
The Mobile Services provided by the Pratt Bookmobile are as popular and vital today as it was in its inception. According to a recently released report, nearly one-third of Americans, about 77 million people, used a public library computer or wireless network to access the internet in the past year.
The report, Opportunity for All: How the American Public Benefits from Internet Access at U.S. Libraries, is based on the first, large-scale study examining who uses public computers and Internet access in public libraries, the way library patrons use this free technology service, why they use it, and how it affects their lives. The Enoch Pratt Free Library was part of this national study and Pratt patrons were even interviewed in-person for the report, which was conducted by the University of Washington Information School and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
"We discovered that 30 percent of people in Baltimorehave no access to the Internet. So they rely on the library system and we take that responsibility seriously. The mobile library is like an extension of the library system and now it's evolving like the main library has itself," says Roswell Encino, Enoch Pratt Library spokesperson.
The Mobile Library was funded by contributions of The Rouse Company Foundation and The Jean and Sidney Silber Foundation.
Source: Roswell Encino, Enoch Pratt Free Library
Writer: Walaika Haskins