Reviews of Charles E. Beatley, Jr. Central Library (Library)

harun jawad

Nice place to study and to prepare yourself for exams. Amazing collection, clean, and nice people in the admin side. Saturday, the place gets noisy bcs of the kids activities, but I manage to study at home.

Frankie Romeo

Nice selection of books. Large building. Space for kids, studious folks, and avid readers. Computers and printing available. Friendly staff as far as I'm concerned. Events on a fairly regular basis as well. Everything you'd look for in a public library.

merhawi mengesha

Nice place good customer service thank you,

Sarah C.

Pretty large library and beautiful building. However, the main issue in this library is very dirty desks and tables. The things are sticking under the desks and chairs are disgusting and made me sick. If you want to use desks to study, You will definitely need to bring with yourself disinfecting wipe!

Ullanda Young

The library itself is really clean and nice. Great selection of books. Nice staff. The internet is faster now. The only con is actually what others already said; people talk loud at times on their cell phone or in conversation. But overall, a great library to visit.

Victoria K.

The best library near Alexandria! Nice, quite place to read even through it is usually busy.

Stephie Cruz

The noise in here is unbelievable...you would have better luck at starbucks.

Eternal Love

Very hostile place for a library! So bear with me to hear the details: We were there yesterday where I wanted to stop to look for a book, I had my child with me, and so I opened a computer for him on a kids YouTube show, while I went to look for a book, a lady that looked like homeless was sitting there on the computer next to him with another young lady (that might be her daughter) checking her Facebook and eyeing us the whole time, I did not think much of it then went to get my book, then I saw her screaming for the librarian and pointing at my child saying "hey where is this child's mother"! I was barely 50 feet away and within eye sight so I pointed to her that I'm here, she looked at me and kept shouting that I left my child and disappeared and she doesn't have to watch my child for me! At that point I came to tell her that I was there the whole time and I never asked her to watch him, she kept going on how she felt she had to watch him and that she is a woman of god... etc of all that crazy talk while her daughter was repeating same thing both were yelling very loudly, I asked them repeatedly to stop yelling when they never did I looked at the library I asked her to quiet them as I don't have any interest talking to them and the library should be a quiet place, she looked at me and said they are right you have to watch your child!!! The crazy lady kept saying thank you I knew it and kept going on, the librarian went back to her desk didn't even ask her to respect the place. This place is a very hostile towards mothers because : 1. not only once or twice but many times it happened that my child happened to raise his voice playing or laughing and a librarian would jump on me even on the first incident reminding me it's a quiet place and he should be quiet! But 2 adults (the crazy lady and her daughter) screaming for at least 10 minutes was not addressed 2. I did my search and came to a conclusion that I did nothing against the library regulations or even state laws by leaving my child on the computer and going to grab a book, I didn't leave the premises or even go out of sight! So my child was not unattended, not for a second, and there is no one more caring in this world about my child's safety than me so those cheap acts of "I'm better than you" I would've expected on the street but not in a presumably respectful library, obviously the librarians there need to be educated on staying within their job description as librarians and not start acting as counselors, and they will bring this place down, reviews are all over the internet saying the same thing.

Steven Greenberg

Great library in a beautiful building. Staff is very friendly and helpful. My only complaint is their online/mobile tools. They need a mobile app or at least a better online platform.

Courage Adabunu

Very nice library and approachable staff. How I wish the management does something about the very impolite and ill-mannered people talking so loud on the phone. When I go to library, it is usually to have a calm atmosphere to study and focus on my assignments. But with this library, I always think that people come here every day just to talk on the phone and disturb the order. How can you put a whole 30+ minutes conversation on a speaker?

Death by Debt

A spacious library but they need to get an IT team to upgrade their modem & to add some more bandwidth. The internet is too slow. Also, it gets busy & you might have to deal with rude people talking on their phones and/or playing loud music through their headphones, but you're going to run into that problem at most libraries. Edit 5/20/2013 They must have read my original review because they've updated their wifi and it's much better now!

Daniel Misgana

One of the best libraries in the area. Not only is the physical building beautiful inside and out, but their selection of books is vast and well-picked. Not to mention the incredible staff that is more than willing to help out anyone in need. It makes me wish I still lived in the area.

E. Gray

Loud with no quiet work rooms. There’s nothing like being at a library to get work done and there’s a WAILING child for 20 minutes and because of the acoustics you can hear the child EVERYWHERE. Let me repeat EVERYWHERE. The whole building seems designed to make every little sound carry.

Barbara Migliore

Lots of books great for kids

Gifty Sika

Very quite when I have been there.. they use to have a play group for kids , amazing

Hamid R

Big and quiet library. After you done reading in the library you can have a walk in the park.

rahel kebede

i loved studying her but lately i had to stay home because it was too cold . the temperature needs to be adjusted according to the weather it is hard to concentrate when you are freezing.

Theo Ab

I love this library, but lot of cell phone usage.

God is my shapered

I like to come study in this library but in the winter time it's really cold in side most of us ( who use the library) we do not take off our coat. Sometimes I couldn't resist the coolness, so I have to go home. The people who work there they are fantastic , the site of the library motivate me to stay focus & study long hour. Is been 3/4 weeks since I start using this library it was good except room temperature! Edited 1/19/2016 I think they turn dawn the temperatures on purpose cos, after they get a complement they don't even try to fix! It's 18 degree out side temperature & I don't think inside temperature is more than that! Please do something who ever responsible for this!

samuel crawford

One of the best libraries around!!! Must see and experience for yourself!!!

Billy

Comfortable, good stuff and much more service time availability from others.

My Hanitizer

What a lovely space... Ms. Amy is a rock star along with the many amazing staff. Our kids love this space and we love that they enjoy it. Also we get to vote there.

Alie Butterfield

Nice play area for children and decent collection. Unfriendly and rude librarians. Won't send late fee reminders before sending to collection after 2 months. Fairfax Libraries are much better, friendly and a better collection! Don't waste your time here.

Roberto Bee

A very beautiful representation for a central library. Very welcoming.

Alem Tesfaye

Has very organized & clean environment together with helpful staff. Please keep the good work!

Dave Wegahta

Nice place to read!

Chris Jaldin

Great library. They have all sorts of activities for kids all year around.

Selina Yahoo

It's good except you need a Library card for the computers

Ava Lebens

I went to the library and had great service at the start, but when I went to check out I forgot my library card so this person to it upon her self to be very rude to a kid/pre-teen. I really hope you see this and realize that even though we are younger we should still be treated with respect.

Ayodeji Onipede

Excellent is the only word to qualify the mode of operation in this library. Good job

Fardows Salim

i studied at many libraries, but this one is the cleanest.. love the place but FREEZING..

Joseph Friers

Excellent place to study. And I like it cool so that is a plus!

Karen Johnson

Great place to study...usually very quiet.

Natasha Brooks

Very nice library with lots of activities for kids. I brought my niece last week for the first time and now she wants to go there all the times. She never really enjoyed at the other library we used to go to out of state but this seems to be a really cool place, with the park outside, can take walks on break

Aziz Ahmed

I love this place, Administration is very friendly and they have a good collections

Abdullah Popalzai

I found it very useful and efficient and I have been doing all my studies there.

Zubayd3a Mohamat

I am very like this library

HeyUSee

Besides of being a huge Library you also can take advantage of these location to get your USA passport instead of going to DC where you surely find a lot of traffic .

Aschalew Assefa

The location of the library is nice, however, I don't think the library has rule regarding phone usage. People in the library regularly use phone conversation talking very loudly as they are at market place or area that does not need any attention.

Senait Kibret

I checked the working hours before leaving my home. It says the library will be open till 6:00pm. Guess what happened when I arrived at the door step of the library! A post about not opening b/s of the inauguration. Is it that hard to update your website?

Marwand Helal

A place to study and focus, having pofessional and supportive staffs.

Corry Robb

One of the best libraries I've ever been to. Huge selection, amazingly helpful staff, tons of parking and easy to get to via public transportation. Our home owners association usually has our meetings here as they have plenty of available rooms. Don't have the book you are looking for? They can probably get it to you from one of Alexandria's other branches in just a few days!

Cherry Workman

I enjoy going to this Library, I have the space I need to study. There are books and other material to help with my research paper.

isaac coffey

Beatly is one of those places that makes you wish you were a kid in the library again. Great selection, great building, inside and (beautiful) outside reading areas, work desks for students in quiet places, an entire section of the building for kids. Always people there of all types, and the staff is pretty good too.

Naqib Naderi

It is good but the wireless internet is very slow

Nicholas Chase

Excellent selection of books and a nice children's area.

Angela Tate

Half of the staff are nice while the other half are rude. Woman employee with 2 different hair colors (white and brownish) who was working in the children's section glares at the kids playing in the kids corner and tells them to be quite because they are being distruptive when the kids weren't being that loud.

Alissa Ferguson

Very clean and quiet. Knowledgeable staff and well organized.