COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

MEETING OF TALLAGHT AREA COMMITTEE

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

QUESTION NO. 11

QUESTION: Councillor C. O'Connor

"To ask the Chief Executive to confirm plans for the new recently acquired Mobile Library and in reporting will he detail efforts to publicise the availability of the service throughout the Tallaght area?"

REPLY:

South Dublin Libraries offer a Mobile Library Service to communities in South Dublin who find it difficult to access our static service points. 

The Mobile Libraries serve in excess of 60 scheduled public stops throughout the County.  These include:

• 49 public stop locations   -   mostly every week.
• 19 primary schools visited from September to June:
• Book deliveries to Crèches, Community Centres and a Nursing Home. 

All our vehicles now use mobile broadband technologies, giving full access to Internet for the staff and our customers.  

The Mobile Library is now a regular feature at Rathfarnham Village Festival and at Tallafest.  These events afford us an opportunity to showcase the services of the Mobile Library and to engage with future potential partners in the community.  The Summer Reading Buzz, Summer Activities, Lego Workshops and a number of visits to Department of Education run Summer Camps in Deis schools all help to publicise the service. Our staff deliver Children’s Book Festival, Red Line Book Festival, and Science Festival events via schools in the South Dublin county area. 

We hope to expand the work we undertake with our schools to support literacy initiatives.  In addition we are supporting Early Start literacy initiatives through service to crèches and Early Start Units in Deis schools.

As part of our Age Friendly strategy we will continue to deliver a mobile library service to the homebound and to nursing homes.  Summer 2015 saw the introduction of a scheduled service to Bloomfield Health Care facility.  Staff from South Dublin Mobile Service worked in partnership with the Occupational Therapy staff in Bloomfield on a pilot scheme which involved regular visits to the facility during the summer months. 

South Dublin Mobile Library service operates with 3 full sized mobile libraries on a daily basis. The service can be seen on our county roads morning, afternoons and evenings until after 8pm. The oldest vehicle is 20 years old and and although kept in perfect mechanical condition it has almost reached the end of its working life. 

This vehicle will be replaced with the newly acquired Mobile Library. The new Mobile Library will serve as a replacement vehicle, not as an additional vehicle. 

The new vehicle has to date been publicised on social media, featuring on a vine for #ourcouncilday; It will enter service once stocking, fitting and H&S checks have been completed. There will therefore be no increase in service levels because of the new library, however we feel that the new van will attract an increased usership.  The library will be stocked with entirely new stock and will, of course, offer Wi-Fi and free internet access.   Once ready the mobile van will be launched officially. The staff of the Mobile Library Service hope that the citizens of South Dublin County will enjoy many years of excellent service.  We look forward to seeing it on the road!