-------- Original Message --------
Subject: RE: Transferring legacy collections of sheet maps to high
density storage
Date: Wed, 15 May 2013 19:56:50 +0000
From: Hallie Pritchett <[log in to unmask]>
To: Maps, Air Photo, GIS Forum - Map Librarianship <[log in to unmask]>


Here are a few more citations for articles related to map collection
storage and moving:

Armstrong, HelenJane. “Compacting Your Collection: Innovative Strategies
in Map Storage.” Special
Libraries Association. Geography and Map Division. Bulletin 167 (1992):
2-20.

Campbell, Lyn. “Transport, packing and storage of maps.” The Globe 40
(1994): 38-39.

Carlucci, April. “Physical Considerations of the Storage of Printed
Cartographic Materials in Libraries, or,
My Life in a Map Case.” Cartographic Journal 42.3 (2005): 245–54.

Pritchett, Hallie. “Introducing the New UGA Map and Government
Information Library.” Cartographic Perspectives. 72 (2012): 67-74.

Snow, Cason. “Maps for the Ages: an Overview of the Preservation of
Sheet Maps.” Journal of Map and
Geography Libraries 6.2 (2010): 112-28.

Last spring/summer, we moved our former Map Library from an off-campus
warehouse to a newly remodeled facility in the subbasement of our Main
Library; the specifics are discussed in my article listed above.  Our
collection includes approximately 400,000 maps, 240,000 air photos, and
several thousand books and atlases; everything was packed up and moved.
  Based on my experiences, here are a few suggestions for moving a
collection:

- Do as much sorting, weeding and preservation work as possible before
you move - it's much easier to move an organized collection and you
don't want to move anything you don't plan to keep.

- Make a list of everything that needs to be done before the move
happens and prioritize - start from the planned moved date and work
backwards.  Decide what absolutely has to be done before the move
itself, what should ideally be done before the move, and what can wait
if necessary.  Ideally, you'll get everything done before the move - in
reality, probably not.  Plan accordingly.

- Decide how your collection will be organized in its new space well
before you move it.  This includes whether or not you will store all
your maps flat, rolled, or folded in drawers.  Make detailed floor plans
and lists down to the drawer, box and/or shelf level.

- If you are going to store your maps flat (which is recommended), put
them in map folders - this will keep them together in the drawer and
make them easier to access.

- Decide early who is going to pack your materials and how, so you have
the necessary supplies on hand.  In our case, we were competing with our
Special Collections Libraries for staff and boxes, so we often had
relatively narrow windows of opportunity to pack and move.  My staff and
I wound up packing up all of our air photos, books, atlases and
miscellaneous office stuff; while the maps were moved in their cases, we
still had to shift the entire collection before it was moved to make
better use of our map cases.

- Clearly mark the actual items being moved (i.e. map case, folder, etc)
and where it will be moved to.  Our map cases were moved loaded, so we
marked ever single drawer and case with erasable China marker so make
sure things stayed in order.  Post-it notes with full-back adhesive also
work well - they don't fall off.

- Plan on spending time after the move doing some rearranging and
reconfiguring.  No matter how much planning and work you do in advance,
something is bound to go wrong - make sure to factor this in.

- Most importantly, make sure you are directly involved in every aspect
of the move itself.  Make sure you are part an integral part of the
planning process; most likely very few of your colleagues know anything
about the logistics of working with map collections.  Also, make sure
you supervise the move itself, particularly if you use professional
movers.  While this doesn't mean you have to be the one who physically
moves the maps, you need to be available to direct traffic and answer
questions.  We always made sure that someone was in the old location
when items were taken out as well as the new location when items were
brought in to make sure everything wound up in its proper place.

On final thought - the Library of Congress Geography and Map Division
moved a number of their maps into off-site storage several years ago.
As I recall, they store their maps in large flat boxes, but bring the
entire box back to G&M when someone requests a map.  It's easier to
retrieve an entire box than individual maps, and they make sure that
only trained staff are handling them maps themselves.  Double-check with
them that I got the details right, though.

Hope that helps!  If you have any further questions or would like more
details about our move, I would be happy to talk to you by phone.  Good
luck with your move!

Hallie Pritchett
Map and Federal Regional Depository Librarian
University of Georgia Libraries
Athens, GA 30602
[log in to unmask]
706-542-0664
706-583-0631 (FAX)
Map and Government Information Library -
http://www.libs.uga.edu/magil/

________________________________________
From: Maps, Air Photo, GIS Forum - Map Librarianship
[[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Angie Cope, American Geographical
Society Library,              UW Milwaukee [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wednesday, May 15, 2013 11:09 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Transferring legacy collections of sheet maps to high
density              storage

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: Transferring legacy collections of sheet maps to high
density              storage
Date: Wed, 15 May 2013 10:42:55 -0400 (EDT)
From: Paige G Andrew <[log in to unmask]>
To: Air Photo Maps, GIS Forum - Map Librarianship <[log in to unmask]>


Hi Rudolf,

You've got a LOT of questions and good/valid concerns here. I might be
able to help a tad by pointing you to a couple of articles on the topic
of effectively moving major map collections to a different location,
though not necessarily high-density storage. I think the information
will be valuable no matter where or what the remote location would be. I
might add also that when we decided, for storage-stress reasons, to move
the majority of our map sets/series off-site about 3 years ago Marcy
immediately and insightfully noted that we must maintain access to these
at the sheet level for our patrons, and we set up and tackled not only
creating bib. records for the titles needing them but also the more
tedious task of itemizing each sheet involved and its paid off already.
LOTS of part-time student assistance as well as the time of four
catalogers in our department but we completed that project in something
like 14-16 months. Anyway, here's a citation to get you started and I kn!
   ow others have written on this topic in the past (and probably the
first person I know of who moved a major map collection into "condensed"
storage on-site, yet a different scenario, is HelenJane Armstrong,
retired Curator of the Maps Collection at the Univ. of Florida, who I'm
positive had an article published in something like the WAML IB or maybe
the SLA G&M Division Bulletin):

March, Gregory H. "Using AutoCAD to Help Relocate a Map Collection: The
University of Tennessee Libraries' Experience". Journal of Map &
Geography Libraries, vol. 5, no. 2 (2009), pp. 157-173.

Paige

----- Original Message -----
From: "Angie Cope, American Geographical Society Library, UW Milwaukee"
<[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Tuesday, May 14, 2013 2:27:33 PM
Subject: Transferring legacy collections of sheet maps to high density
              storage

------- Original Message --------
Subject: Transferring legacy collections of sheet maps to high density
storage
Date: Tue, 14 May 2013 11:22:14 -0700
From: Rudi Traichel <[log in to unmask]>
Organization: The University of British Columbia Library
To: <[log in to unmask]>


Good day everyone:

I am looking for advice on a challenge that seems to becoming more and
more common these days for libraries.

I understand that the issue of moving legacy sheet map collections from
a campus library (either in public or easily accessible storage areas)
to on and off site High Density storage facilities has come up before on
this list-serv, but I would like to bring this issue forward again.

UBC Library in Vancouver, B.C. needs to move many 1000s of superseded
national topographic series (Canadian, etc.) and low use thematic map
sheets (folded, rolled, flat) maps into a high density storage facility
that should be built on our campus by late 2014 or early 2015. This
leaves us a little over 18 months to do this job, partially or fully.
Most of these maps are post 1900 (earlier maps are generally housed in
our Rare Books and Special Collections Library). Many of these sheets
are not in folders, rather in map drawers. Some are folded and in
standard sized envelopes in file cabinets. Others are rolled and in map
tubes. Some require stabilization due to condition issues. Some of the
maps will have to be reorganized in the existing map drawers. Some will
require the creation or upgrading of bibliographic records, many will
need detailed holdings, many more will need detailed items.

I would just like to make sure that our patrons/researchers/broader
library community will continue to be able to identify and retrieve the
superseded and lower use portion of our map resources once they are
removed from direct public/staff access to HD storage.

Does anyone know of any documentation that outlines best practices and
strategies for the successful and timely completion of similar legacy
map inventorying projects that were completed at other institutions for
HD or similar storage facilities?

Or would anyone be willing to share their strategies for taking on
similar map/storage projects? What types of challenges did you encounter
that we should keep in mind for while doing this work?

As well, how many staff were required to complete the project? What type
of skills and training did they require to ensure that the work was done
well and effectively?

What would you consider to be the minimal/basic standard for
inventorying maps finding their way into an HD facility?

As well, in light of moving collections to an HD or similar storage
facility, did your institution make tough decisions on weeding your map
collections? Generally what criteria did you use to help you decide what
you absolutely must or should or maybe or perhaps not keep (that is,
what was core to your patron/research community)? What criteria did you
use to decide what could be found elsewhere (for instance, Are they
available at other libraries or accessible digitally)? What role did
local, regional, etc. 'last copy' guidelines play in these decisions.

Are there other important questions that I should consider and carefully
ponder before embarking on this sizable map processing project?

I know that I have loaded this e-mail with a rather large number of
weighty and perhaps difficult to answer questions, but any advice,
referrals, or assistance would be most welcome and much appreciated.

In the end all of this will come down to good planning, hard work,
sticktoitiveness, and attention to detail.

Best regards,

Rudolf Traichel

--
Rudolf Traichel
Cataloguing & Technical Services (CTS) Librarian
Rare Cartographic Materials Cataloguer (RBSC)
University of British Columbia
Library Tech. Services – Cataloguing Division
Floor 3 – Woodward Library
2198 Health Sciences Mall
Vancouver BC V6T 1Z3 CANADA

CTS Tel:(604) 822-3083 : RBSC Tel: 604-822-8208 ; Fax: (604) 822-3201


(@ RBSC: Wed. A.M. ; Fri. PM / @ CTS Mon. & Tues. all day ; Wed. P.M. ;
Fri. A.M.)