I have in my hands a document produced by TDC and KCC entitled "Towards Shared Service Delivery".

In it is the usual excess of wordiness but also some very telling diagrams.

The upper level is very hard to read in these plans but the plans do show the following "features":

• Existing Reading Desks Maintained
• "Open Planned Zones" one of which will contain "teenager books"
• Toilets
• Unisex Baby Changing Area
• Art Tower
• Art/Display Window

I see a truely (un)impressive feature called "the wall" (I kid you not grab a copy of this document if you can).

The "Art/Display Window" will be part of the "childrens gallery and community space" (whatever that might prove to be).

The grand sounding "Art Tower" appears to be an area of wall starting on the ground floor and progressing to the cealing of the upper floor. However two things remain unclear: what exactly this tower will be like and what exactly they will use it for.

In point of fact the "Art Tower" is just a decorated stairwell containg the fire escape. Genius double use but hardly a "dedicated art feature" more of a picture covered disguise.

In event of fire will people be able to find the escape?

There is a definite danger here that a subtal dumbing down of art space could occour and an equal danger that the lobby and TDC waiting area could spill out into the reading area next to it.

I can picture in my mind a shocking place not unlike the hell that was Queens House (may it be purged from the landscape forever) with destitute and desperate people (along with the towns drug using population and scroungers) cursing and shouting to each other while showing off thier latest tinny ring tones while ashen faced singles mothers try to sit still while thier children scream at the indignation of being forced to sit in such a vile and noisy place.

I fail to see any provision for this in the plans and I fail to see how this could enhance a library.

In short how does KCC plan to handel the increase in ambient noise?

They don't it seems.

They banter about the magic buzz words of "Intergration of Services" and co-operation. They talk of pooling of property uses in North East Kent and they talk endlessly about the 2003 agreement for co-locating services and providing these one-stop-shops.

What they are not talking to use about is that housing benifit and the enrichment of the mind are extrodenery bedfellows. They have about as much in common as Racing and Pottery, ICT and fishing or TDC and honesty.

They have made it abundently clear that the number of people they deal with is far greater than the ability of the benifits desk to cope (especially since they reduced it's size in last refit).

Based on figures from TDC if you assume they work every holiday including Christmas and Easter they must see a new person every three minuets of every weekday in every year.

Two things spring to mind here

1 - TDC spend far longer than that per person and so might be (if not outright lieing) misledding us about the figures
2 - TDC are desperate for the space the library has the luxury of.

A truer estimate based on TDCs own figures are likely to be something like one person every two minuets per room per day the building is open. That's over 900 people entering the library each day without any intention of using it's services.

That great 900 people whoes life is richer. Except they are here to file a claim for money not read a book or enjoy art.

At 9am the dorrs open and four people enter. at 9:02 four more people enter... oh sorry we are forgetting the ones who were not on time.

at 9:12 24 people will be in the library for the "one-stop-shops" 4 will be in interviews but the rest will likely still be waiting. These are the wise ones who got there early or made appointments early.

By 9:24 48 people in the library 4 to 8 have been processed (optimistic I know) and 40 people are hanging about.

Hang on 40 people?

No don't be silly that will be 40 claims, plus children and boyfriends and mates and so forth.

How many mobile phones will that be going off next to the reading area? How many children?

Even queens house had a play area. But the "childrens area" is on the far side of the building and is definitly not marked as a manned creche.

Don't get me wrong now. I know how vital housing benifit and council tax benifit are in keeping ones self housed and fed and I have needed the benifits in the past and indeed still require some now.

I am intimitly familure with the process and know that if DESK #3 at the current TDC office were avble to silently take documents and provide a recipt the waiting list there would decrease significantly.

I also know that the people who would be using these benifits interview rooms would be the same ones who come to DESK #1 and spend an afternoon in an airless and inhumane waiting area insteed of using a phone to call the people who the people at the desk will simply go and talk to any way.

In internet website terms we sometimes talk about QoT - Quality of Traffic. When quality is high blogs gget commetns and adverts get clicked and sales get made. When qaulity is low these things do nothing and the throughput just burns up bandwidth for no good reason.

The QoT here is likely to be 0.000125 or less which for a building is not worth a hill of beans.

(This estimate translates at just over one in every thousand people partaking in library services).

Further more how will the toilets both unisex and segrigated cope with that turnover? What size of staff will be available to clean the loos and what is the vandalism repair budget.

Margate has a massive drugs problem so how will the area be kept clean of dirty needles?

TDC and KCC clearly expect lots of children as they have provided a unisex baby changing area in the new library designs. To get to this area from the childrens gallery and community area (the most likely location of children after the TDC waiting area) these mums must pass though the TDC waiting area which is already likely to be crowded or detor through the reading area, arround the service island and past the entrence.

How does KCC plan to keep the reading area viable for reading?

Where will KCC display 3D art such as pottery and sculpture? The "Art Tower" is hardly suitable.

How often will the bins in the baby changing area be changed?

With the estimated 900 people reduced to 500 and just half of those having one or more children (expirence shows it is nearer to three quaters) that is still 250 plus children. Can the changing area cope?