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Community Library Services

Carnegie Library, Fratton Road, Portsmouth, PO1 5EZ

Telephone 023 9275 1737

Fax 023 9273 9244

email community.library@portsmouthcc.gov.uk

The Community Library Services unit is run by a team of specialist staff who believe that the Library Service should be accessible to everyone.

In addition, we also have almost 200 volunteers who help with our Housebound Library Service.

We provide the following specialist services:

• The Housebound Library Service

• Services for Visually Impaired users

• Services to residential homes and sheltered housing

• Local prison library services

• Housebound Volunteers

Can't get to the library? The Housebound Library Service can come to you.

This service will visit people in their own homes if they or the person they care for is unable to visit the library because of disability, illness, frailty or mental health problems. There are 2 part-time library assistants and trained volunteers who will deliver printed and talking books your door.

If you would like to know more about this service please contact us - all the details are given at the top of this page.

If you are visually impaired, we can also help.

A wide range of services is available to anyone who is visually impaired. There are no charges to reserve items and we can also borrow books in alternative formats such as spoken word, Braille or Moon for you from other libraries in the UK.

Our specialist services include:

• Large print books

• Talking books

• Braille transcription service

• Kurzweil text to Braille translator and Braille printer

• Talking Newspaper Service (TNAUK) on CD-ROM and mp3

• Reading groups for visually impaired readers

• Two visually impaired assistants who can help and advise

• IT training for the visually impaired

If you would like to know more about this service please contact us - all the details are given at the top of this page.

Reading Groups for the visually impaired

We are launching a new book group for blind and vision impaired readers. Our current and very popular group will continue, but the new one will allow everyone to read the same book at the same time using mp3 players. The new group will begin on Thursday 30th October 2008 at 2pm, there will be 10 places.  

Calibre, the National charity providing audio books to print disabled readers are helping by allowing us to borrow their recorded books on mp3 and downloading them onto mp3 players for the group to listen to. Our partner is the Portsmouth branch of the Macular Disease Society. People can use their own mp3 device or we can loan them one of ours for a 3 month period and then offer help and advice if they wish to purchase an mp3 player of their own.  

We will also be able to offer access to national newspapers and magazines in mp3 format shortly. We have taken out a years subscription to Talking Newspapers for the Blind (TNAUK) which will allow vision impaired people to download a very wide range of daily, weekly or monthly newspapers and magazines to listen at home. We will begin to offer this service at our Thursday sessions at Carnegie Library in late October.  

For further information, please use the contact details at the top of the page.