Montgomery County to Close Kensington Park Library for Almost Five Months

Branch will be renovated as part of system's refresh program

September 15, 2015 12:47 p.m.

Updated at 4:05 p.m. – The Kensington Park Library will soon close for four-and-a-half months to undergo a renovation.

The library will close for the project Oct. 10 after it closes for the day at 6 p.m.

Crews will install a full-service elevator to provide access to the library’s lower-level meeting rooms and restrooms, put in two new conference rooms and set up new circulation and information desks, according to Montgomery County Public Libraries (MCPL).

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Some interior spaces will be rearranged. More shelf space will be added for picture books and reading materials for young children. The interior walls will be painted to go along with new carpeting.

The library, at 4201 Knowles Ave., will be the county’s second to temporarily close for a refresh project. The county’s library system is hoping to refresh two or three branches a year, with the goal of providing some building improvements to all 21 county libraries every seven years—instead of the 20- to 30-year renovation cycle it used previously.

The Twinbrook Library in Rockville was the first to close—in late July—for a refresh project. The Kensington Park project will cost a total of $781,600, with $259,000 of that funding coming from a state grant, according to MCPL Public Services Administrator Rita Gale.

Gale said MCPL got a late start on the Twinbrook and Kensington Park projects, which were originally supposed to happen in the fiscal year that ended in July. The Aspen Hill, Davis and Little Falls branches are set to close for refurbishment projects in the spring of 2016.

“We’ll complete a focused set of improvements with a shorter closing period that will result in updated buildings, programs and services,” MCPL Director Parker Hamilton said in a press release about the closing.

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The Kensington branch will reopen in early 2016. Until then, patrons must use other county libraries. The closest branches include the Wheaton, Davis and Chevy Chase libraries.

Beginning Wednesday, the Kensington Park Library will no longer be available as a pick-up location for books placed on hold in the system’s online catalog.

Staff will contact customers whose holds have not been picked up by Oct. 10 and those materials will be sent to another branch to be picked up. The library’s book drop will remain open for returns through Oct. 21.

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