As the ribbon is cut on the first central city library pop-up, there remains no clear plan in place to re-house the 350,000 items in the decommissioned earthquake-prone Central Library.
On Tuesday at 9am the new library pop-up, Arapaki Manners St Library, will officially open at 12 Manners St. It will also have service centre facilities.
Wellington Mayor Justin Lester said it could be "several years" before the Central Library was restored or replaced and Arapaki, along with additional pop-up services to come, was a "medium-term" fix.
"Arapaki is just the first of our CBD network to open. Our partnership space with the National Library will open in a few months, and I expect another pop-up location to be open by the end of the year. I will provide further details about that in the coming weeks."
However, two months on from the Central Library's closure on March 19, the Wellington City Council (WCC) was still not able to clarify where or when the 350,000 items housed in the earthquake-prone building would be moved.
Lester said the best place for the items was at the Central Library as it was a "safe storage space".
"The current Central Library is a life hazard but it's not a physical hazard. We don't expect it's going to fall down any time soon unless we had a significant shake.
"We need to keep them in a safe place where [the items] won't be damaged. It has to have the right climate conditions as well."
If Wellington had a big earthquake and the items were lost, "that's what insurance is for", he said. He said there were currently no priceless items in the Central Library building.
A council spokesperson confirmed the entire Wellington City Libraries collection was last valued in 2017 at nearly $15 million, but the value of stock at any one site had not been quantified.
Lester said a permanent solution was a "matter of months" away.
He confirmed a second central-city pop-up location would take the form of a "co-operative space" at the National Library in Thorndon.
On Monday Internal Affairs Minister Tracey Martin said the National Library was looking to collaborate with the council to "deliver complementary services".
"Both share the goal of making sure people have access to knowledge."
The National Library and WCC had been discussing the partnership since the library had closed, she said.
Following the closure in March, Wellington branch libraries saw a 21 per cent rise in demand, prompting an extension of opening hours.
E book borrowing had increased 15 per cent in the first month since the library had closed, from 36,686 to 42,019 electronic check-outs.
In early May demolition was on the table for the Central Library and the Mayor had said the library had a NBS rating of between 15 and 20 per cent.
Lester said he had a preferred option which he wouldn't disclose, but that a decision would come after a councillors' workshop in a fortnight.
ARAPAKI MANNERS ST LIBRARY AND SERVICE CENTRE
* Dual library and service centre
* 7500 shelved items, 11,000 total items
* Mixture of popular children's, fiction, non-fiction and audio-visual items
* 15 library staff, 5 service centre staff
* Internet access
* Casual seating
* Rate paying, parking fine and dog registrations
* Library open Monday-Friday 8 am-7 pm, Saturday-Sunday 9.30pm-5pm
* Service centre hours Monday-Friday 8 am-5pm.