by KRISTIAN GRAVENOR

One old urban riddle asks what would happen if everybody decided to go to the same restaurant at the same time. Mass chaos would undoubtedly ensue. Thankfully, due to some unwritten existential rule, that never happens.

But our new $140-million Grande Bibliothèque seems to be an exception. Library officials confess that sudden and unpredictable mass rushes are leading to long line-ups and cheek-to-jowl conditions.

“The thing we want to improve is the crowding,” says Patrice Juneau, media rep for the Grande Bibliothèque. “It varies from week to week. We could have a big Wednesday with 12,000 [visitors] in the afternoon, but the next Wednesday, everybody might come in the morning. It’s hard to predict.”

Since May, the library has welcomed over two million visitors through its turnstiles, far beyond what it had anticipated.

“Everybody said that it would be like the Olympic Stadium, that it would be the next example of the White Elephant Syndrome,” says Juneau. “They said nobody would go, and now those critics are the same ones touting our merits. Since it’s opened, the library has created a rise in crowding in other libraries. The more we talk about it, the more people are going to local libraries in general.”

Library planners based their user projections on the experiences of the Vancouver and Seattle libraries, which led Quebec to expect 5,000 to 7,000 turnstile-pushers daily. They were way off. So far, Montreal’s new library is averaging 10,000 to 12,000, and long queues are affecting service.

Initially, those seeking to use the 200 Internet-equipped computers were allowed to stumble in and surf, but since October, users first have to sign up on a waiting list. Juneau says no user has had to wait more than 17 minutes to get on a computer. Seattle’s library, however, offers twice the number of Internet-ready computers, and a librarian there tells the Mirror that there’s no lining up to get them.

Other unanswered questions raised about the new library concern the complex ritual required to print on the newfangled microfilm machines. Also worrisome is the tendency for windows to fly down onto the sidewalk below. Six of the 6,200 decorative panels fell last summer, and a barrier has been set up to keep people from danger until the problem is diagnosed.

“The glass panels are made of the same material as a car windshield, so it doesn’t explode in big shards of glass,” says Juneau. “And the area is cordoned off, so it’s not so dangerous.”

In spite of the wrinkles, the library has swayed even its critics, including McGill library studies Prof Diane Mittermeyer, who long argued that the plan to contain a public and a provincial library in one place was problematic.

“When the project was being talked through, I criticized it heavily, but since then I’ve had the opportunity to visit the library a couple of times and I am impressed,” she says.

Mittermeyer believes the biggest threat to the wildly popular library lies in entrenched bureaucratic habits to neglect libraries. “In this province we’ve been known to let such things down,” she says. “My one concern is how long will this nice dream last?”