Gainesville, Montclair to get new libraries

A new Gainesville library is in the books for the western side of Prince William County. Although the expected completion date isn’t for a few years now, the plan is at least official and off the proverbial ground.

Dick Murphy, who has been library system director for 26 years, said the Prince William Board of County Supervisors approved the plan to build a new Gainesville library in April. Once the approval was in place, the official paperwork started.

The county’s public works department is in the process of preparing a request for proposal for both the planned Gainesville library and a new library in the Montclair area, Murphy said. One architectural firm will create plans for both libraries, however Murphy expects the designs to be much different from each other because of the land on which each will be built. He is hopeful an architect will be chose in the next few months.

Since the services in the libraries will be the same, Murphy said using one architect will save the county money.

The new Gainesville library, which will be at the corner of U.S. 15 and Lightner Road, will sit on about four acres of relatively flat property. The Montclair land parcel is long and narrow, Murphy explained. For now, Murphy and others from the library are meeting monthly with the public works professionals and others involved in the planning process, such as the county executive’s office and financial professionals, to keep the project on track.

There is “lots and lots of very detailed work” to do to get ready to build a building, Murphy explained. Plus, the Montclair library project is expected to start before the Gainesville library project.

Read the full story in the Oct. 14 issue of the Bull Run Observer.