Lower-Level Doors At Lamont Library Will Stay Closed

The closing of Lamont library's first-level west entrance and the redirection of library users to the main entrance of the Pusey library entrance are part of an experiment to improve security in the two libraries, Louis E. Martin, Harvard's chief librarian, said last week.

"The amount of security a guard stationed at the west entrance could provide was minimal. To increase it, we decided to put him at the entrance of Pusey," Martin said.

But the experiment may also have inconvenienced numerous students and employees who must walk an additional 100 yards to the main entrance.

Martin said, however, the decision to close the west entrance was based on staff estimates that a "relatively small" number of people had been using that entrance.

"I think it's stupid," Jeffrey Scott '77 said, commenting on the change. Scott added that the library should have an entrance to the micro text room, which is directly under the west entrance and is open to the public.

Bim Agunloye, who works in the micro text room, called the locked doors "very, very inconvenient. Instead of walking straight down, I have to go all the way around."

Other library users reacted less unfavorably to the detour. "I'm slightly irritated," Ilaria Caputi, a graduate student in Romance Languages and Literature said. "It adds to the many things that normally bother one in everyday life."