To book, or not to book…

If you’ve visited the Library over the past year or so, you’ll have no doubt become quite familiar with our Space Booking system.

This is still playing an important role for our libraries, ensuring that users can have the opportunity to book in advance and ensure they have any resources they need, such as a PC or an individual study room. However, since Welcome and Orientation Week at the end of September, we have also been offering study spaces in Bill Bryson Library that don’t require a booking. For the more spontaneous users, I’m sure this will be good news. It means you don’t need a booking to just browse the shelves, pop in for a coffee, or come in to use the printers.

We know it’s been a solid 18 months of many adjustments, so we wanted to make the transition to the new booking model as smooth as possible. Firstly, we’ve created space booking ‘zones’. The non-bookable study zones in Bill Bryson Library are now adorned with these lovely green posters indicating that you can sit anywhere you want – sweet freedom!

And the orange zones represent our bookable areas where you can book a desk, room, or PC online – sweet pre-planning!

The orange ‘bookable’ spaces are for flexible booking slots that can last between one and four hours. We also have a designated bookable area for postgraduates (introducing the newly named ‘Room 404’!) and also an area specifically for Research Postgraduates in the Kepier Room. Other Study Rooms are available to all students for fixed booking slots of individual study, and our Disability Support Rooms are available to any students registered with Disability Support.In addition to this, we have some brand-new Online Lecture Study Spaces on Level 2 in the South wing opposite the Help & Information desk. In these booths, you can book a flexible time slot to participate in online lectures – just remember to bring some headphones as these spaces are not soundproof!

Everyone – unless exempt – should wear a face covering in all areas of the library when moving around or having a conversation with someone (so do make sure you bring your face covering to the Library!) There are also areas of Bill Bryson Library where we ask you to wear a face covering when seated. We want to acknowledge that some users might feel more comfortable choosing this option, so if you want to sit in a designated face-covered area, you can sit in:

• Level 1 North
• Level 1 South
• Level 1 East
• Level 2 East
• Level 3 East
• Level 4 East
• Room 404

Keep an eye out for these posters dotted around; they’ll keep you right and let you know which area is which.

We wanted to offer a way that would suit the majority of our users, so we diversified our offering so you could chose the way that suits you best on any given day. We want to make the Library as accessible as possible – so if you want to rock up and spontaneously swing by the green zone – you do you! Or if it helps you to be a bit more strategic about your day, jump on to our booking system and book your place in our orange bookable zones. As always, we’re here to help if you have any questions – just pop by the Help & Information desk or get in touch online via Ask DULib.