After decades of planning, the new Central Library in downtown San Diego will be completed in mid-2013. Designed by San Diego architect Rob Quigley, along with Tucker Sadler Architects, San Diego, the nine-story building is being built by Turner Construction Co., San Diego.
Serving as the heart of the city’s 35-branch library system, the state-of-the-art library will be a new regional center for learning and literacy. Its multiple community gathering spaces will be used for events such as book readings, art displays and music performances. The 497,652-square-foot library broke ground in 2010, and will have twice the space of the former library, including a threestory domed reading room, 10,244-square-foot children’s library, six meeting rooms, 407 computer stations and two levels of underground parking. It will also include an outdoor plaza and café, 350-seat auditorium, 400-seat multipurpose room and teen center. Additionally, a charter high school, serving approximately 400 students, will take up two of the library’s floors, totaling 76,000 square feet.
Located at the top of the library is the reading room, housed in a 140-foot-tall steel-and-glass dome. Nestled in a three-story glass enclosure and covered by an iconic sun-screening protective dome, visitors will be able to enjoy panoramic views of the San Diego Bay and city skyline while reading and relaxing. SME Steel Contractors, West Jordan, Utah, fabricated the structural steel for the dome, which is comprised of eight 13-ton steel sails with thousands of steel connection points to support the perforated aluminum panels. To allow for additional light to enter the building, each perforated panel is spaced with gaps on either side. Each sail is comprised of multiple 
curved members, and the largest measures 123 feet high and 53 feet wide.
Gerdau Long Steel North America, Tampa, Fla., fabricated and installed 6,650 tons of reinforcing steel, of which 85 to 99 percent came from recycled materials, such as old cars, worn-out appliances, and other pieces of scrap metal that were melted and transformed into high-quality rebar. The rebar was fabricated Gerdau’s San Bernardino Reinforcing Steel facility, approximately 110 miles away.
“Many people do not realize that steel is the most recycled material on the planet, more than paper, aluminum, plastic and glass combined,” says David Perkins, vice president of Gerdau Reinforcing Steel West. “It is an amazing product because its metallurgical properties allow it to be recycled again and again without degradation in performance.”
Expected to receive LEED Silver certification, the library will utilize on-site solar power for some of its energy needs.
New Central Library, San Diego
Owner: City of San Diego
Architects: Rob Wellington Quigley, FAIA, San Diego, and Tucker Sadler Architects, San Diego
Construction manager at risk: Turner Construction Co., San Diego
Structural consultant: Martin Libby Engineers, San Diego
Structural engineer: EndreStudio, Emeryville, Calif.
Dome fabricator/erector: SME Steel Contractors, West Jordan, Utah, www.smesteel.com
Rebar fabricator/installer: Gerdau Long Steel North America, Tampa, Fla., www.gerdau.com/longsteel