Pardon us while we geek out a little. Have you heard or read about the new collections centre for McGill University in Quebec? Before we detail the astounding size of this facility, these are the services the centre offers: book retrieval, scanning, distance borrowing, and deliveries to faculty members. This sounds straightforward and simple, so what is the big deal? This facility exists simply to hold and retrieve requested items for its users. Is that not to be expected?
Ask anyone who works in a library what they need more of, and one of their answers will always include, "more space!" It is possible the librarians for this academic library may be the exception. This university collections centre is a whopping 45,000 square feet, roughly two-thirds the size of a football field (Canadian football, of course).
There are more fun facts about this place in the university's news article. Did we mention it has robots? Six robots are tasked with retrieving and shelving. According to this recent article, the facility holds over 3.9 million physical items, and over 10.2 million physical and electronic items combined!
Follow this link for their complete article and more interesting facts!