The recent renovations to St. Augustine Hall has received praise from St. John’s students since its official unveiling two weeks ago.

Some students have wasted little time in taking advantage of the library’s new features.

“I’ve been here every day since it reopened,” sophomore Patrick Brewer said.

Some of the improvements include additional computers, study spaces and new furniture and decor.

Renovations to the library’s basement, third and fourth floors began towards the end of May and continued throughout the summer.

The improvements were originally supposed to be completed in time for the beginning of the fall semester. However, flooding caused by pipes responsible for air conditioning delayed the conclusion of the project for nearly two months and left students with access to only one of the building’s four floors for the first half of the semester.

“It was worth the wait,” said sophomore Gaurav Lala. “It’s not as compressed, there are computers everywhere, and there are
different styles of tables.”

“The general layout and the fresh paint make it a brighter place,” junior Steve Pak said.

On the other hand, junior Maaria Siddiqi said she thinks the best new part of the library is that in encourages more group study.

“There’s a lot of space for studying and more computers to print from,” she said.

Leah Normativa, a graduate student, said that although she finds the library to be more “comfortable and very pretty,” she still feels some more improvement could be made.

“I would have liked more cubicles, since the tables are for more group mediated activities,” she said.

Overall, Pak said that he’s glad to have a fully functional library again.

“When it comes down to it, the library is a necessity,” he said. “Whether it’s crummy or not, students are still going to come.”

Revamps to the entire second floor and elevators are among further changes planned to be made to the building and finished for the start of the fall 2009 semester, library officials said.