Books to rural users: public library provision for remote communities

Discusses alternative methods of providing a public library service to one‐house stop clients of south Lincolnshire’s mobile libraries. A literature review revealed a lack of up‐to‐date cost information for alternative methods of service provision. Four methods were selected for further investigation: books by mail; village shop libraries; extending the housebound service; and transporting clients to the library. Annual cost and cost per issue were calculated and compared to the cost of the mobile library. Staff and users were also surveyed for their opinions of the current service and the alternative methods proposed. The results of the costing exercises showed that transporting users to the library was the most cost effective method but this was not popular with the current users of the service. Services considering replacing the one‐house stop mobile service will also need to consider issues including social inclusion, best value and the public library standards.