Repair tab on old downtown Calgary library soars to $53M (Canada)

Six years after city council committed $40 million toward a new downtown library - a project that has been put on "indefinite hold," according to a report going to a municipal committee this week - the city is facing a $53-million repair tab for the current facility. While a lack of extra funding shutters plans for a new Central Library, the 50-year-old building has fallen into a serious state of disrepair. "We're either at a fork in the road or sitting on a cleaved stick. Either way, it's an uncomfortable spot," said Gerry Meek, chief executive of the Calgary Public Library. Meek said urgent repairs to the city's flagship Central Library, across from City Hall between 6th and 7th avenues S.E., have been put off for some time in anticipation of the construction of a new building. But now the new building is on hold and the state of the existing one is getting worse