Beneath New York Public Library, Shelving Its Past for High-Tech Research Stacks By TOM MASHBERGNOV. 15, 2015

he New York Public Library is creating a vast underground space for its research collection, after abandoning plans to move much of it to New Jersey. CreditJames Estrin/The New York Times

As they skate or snack in Bryant Park, visitors might dismiss the statelyNew York Public Library next door as a dog-eared relic in an age of digital information.

But unbeknown to most of them, 17 feet below ground, in a concrete bunker worthy of the White House, the library is expanding and updating one of the most sophisticated book storage systems in the world.

Since March, after abandoning a much-criticized plan to move the bulk of its research collection to New Jersey, the library has been working instead to create a high-tech space underground for the 2.5 million research works long held in its original stacks.

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