Vienna's Patrick Henry Library Sets Closing Date Ahead Of New Library Construction

VIENNA, VA — The time for Vienna's Patrick Henry Library to close for its construction project is here.

Fairfax County Public Library said the last day for the Patrick Henry Library will be Friday. That's ahead of construction of the new, renamed Vienna-Carter Library starting in June.

There will be a three to six-week transition time when the old library and temporary location will be unavailable. Once books, furniture and shelves are moved and installed at the temporary location, it could open in June at the Cedar Park Shopping Center (262 Cedar Lane).

The temporary location will have a small browsing section, holds pickups and book returns, public Wi-Fi, Chromebooks for on-site use, and limited programming like story times. Other full-service library locations nearby are the Oakton Library, City of Fairfax Regional Library and Tysons-Pimmit Regional Library.

The new Vienna-Carter Library will be a larger 19,000-square-foot one-story library on the existing site at 101 Maple Avenue E. The county's library system the new library will provide a layout to meet the library's needs, as well as replace building systems and infrastructure that are well beyond their life cycles.

Features will include an outdoor reading and gathering space, flexible community space for library hours and after hours, and a parking garage with 125 spaces for library users. Another 84 parking spaces are reserved for commuter parking and public parking through the Town of Vienna.

The new building is aiming for LEED Gold certification and will use methods like a photovoltaic panel system and geothermal heating and cooling to produce net-zero energy.

Patrick Henry Library dates back to September 1971 and was last renovated in 1995. The county government says Patrick Henry Library is one of its busiest community libraries and runs at the level of a smaller regional library. Fairfax County is funding the library renovation through a bond referendum approved by Fairfax County voters in 2020. It is sharing the cost of the parking garage with the Town of Vienna.

The new library is expected to be ready in early or mid-2027. It will open with a new name after the Fairfax County Public Library's Board of Trustees voted to rename Patrick Henry Library to the Vienna-Carter Library. The name honors the Carter family, a multiracial family with roots in Vienna and Fairfax County history. One member of the family, William McKinley Carter, was a charter member of the Fairfax County NAACP and helped establish an integrated county library branch in the Town of Vienna in 1962. The book "Desegregation in Northern Virginia Libraries" written by Fairfax County Public Library Virginia Room staff members Chris Barbuschak and Suzanne LaPierre mentions the Carter family's contributions to libraries in Vienna and Fairfax County.