Liu Minxia mllmx@msn.com AMID a live concert featuring famed Chinese and Western gentle melodies performed by the Shenzhen Symphony Orchestra in front of stacks of books in the reading hall on its first floor, Shenzhen Library’s north venue fully opened Thursday after three months of trial operations. It is another state-of-the-art cultural landmark that has become operational after the Shenzhen Art Museum (new venue) officially opened last month as the first of the 10 new cultural landmarks the city decided to build in 2008. Conveniently located within walking distance of Hongshan Metro Station on Lines 4 and 6, the Shenzhen Library North and the Shenzhen Art Museum nestle side by side in the Shenzhen North Railway Station central business district in Longhua District. With a total construction area of 72,000 square meters, the library is designed as a comprehensive and smart public library that can also function as the city’s literature archive, as well as the document collection and editing center, network data center, and the literature dispatching center of Shenzhen as a “City of Libraries,” according to Liu Zhe, deputy head of the project’s preparation office. With tech features in almost all its dimensions, the library provides a total of 2,500 reading seats and houses an extensive collection of 8 million books, with other functions complementary to the main Shenzhen Library site in Futian District. In addition to six floors above ground, the library also highlights a three-floor-deep underground repository with an automatic and intelligent book sorting system. The underground section, 21.55 meters deep, covering a total area of nearly 3,000 square meters and with a capacity of housing 4 million books, renders it as the largest and first ultra-deep three-dimensional library in China. Through the automatic sorting and positioning system, readers can complete rapid borrowing in 10 minutes. Once a reader submits a book request, the books are retrieved by an automated carriage, which can travel from the underground floors to the top floors for readers to immediately pick up. Concurrently with the official opening, a series of celebrative events are ongoing, including 10 exhibitions with themes ranging from the history of the Shenzhen Library to precious ancient books and award-winning contemporary books. Readers can also have a chance to visit the underground repository and watch first-hand the automatic sorting system work. To view the sorting system, a reservation is required, and is open to 20 people daily. Aiming to integrate literature collection, reading, social education, idea exchange, cultural inheritance, and creative activities under one roof, the library boasts various themed reading areas, exhibition halls, lecture halls, and other functional areas. Reservations are needed for admission and the library is open to a total of 8,000 readers per day, including 2,000 for the children’s area daily. Readers who plan to drive there can submit their parking reservations one day in advance via the Shenzhen Library’s public WeChat account “szlibrary.” | 