As a regular user of the public library, I was happy for the upgrading that’s taken so long to finish, until I saw the outside plaza. What were they thinking? Not one bench or place to sit down and take part in civic engagement, read a book, meet someone new, or contemplate our beautiful city.
This is to prevent the homeless from occupying the space, I was told. Yeah, I’ve heard that before. This is the unfortunate way we “deal with the homeless problem” by making our cities more unfriendly. So what we get is a sterile, unwelcoming space. Who will use it on a daily basis, other than someone wanting to loiter?
One finds similar sterile environments in other cities where they’ve removed seating. For the money spent, the city could have left the previous space as it was. At least there were kumquat trees to pick!