Spartanburg library breaks ground on $14 million planetarium learning center project
Spartanburg Mayor Jerome Rice said downtown will not look the same after work is finished on the $14 million project to build a planetarium at the library, which will come to the city alongside changes to Morgan Square and the opening of the Minor League baseball park.
The planetarium equipment and structure will cost approximately $6.7 million with the Spark Space and other elements costing an estimated $7 million. The project is being paid for by a mix of public and private funding.
The planetarium, new city-county government complex, and baseball stadium will change the look and feel of Broad Street. Rice said he thought downtown could be unrecognizable in five years.
"Of course, growing up here in Spartanburg, it's changed since I was a teenager or a young person coming through here, but it has changed within the last five years. And now look at what will happen in five years beyond this point — my kids won't recognize downtown," Rice said.
A groundbreaking for the planetarium and expanded Spark Space learning center was held on Tuesday, Dec. 19.
For County Librarian Todd Stephens, the groundbreaking was the first physical manifestation of a three-and-a-half-year journey to fulfill his vision for the headquarters library and better connect to downtown institutions, landmarks and pedestrians.
"We're bringing science to the street," Stephens said. "And bringing it to the street, where a kid can access it and interact with science, could possibly change the way they see the world. To me, that's one of the greatest things."
The three-story library expansion will include a planetarium with a 50-foot dome and surrounding classrooms, STEAM exhibits, a new home for the Spark Space with additional programming space, and new offices for the library's internal functions, which will free up space in the main library building to expand public-facing services.
The new learning center will also feature a Foucault's Pendulum, visible to those on the center's planned plaza at the corner of Church and Broad Streets or those driving by on Church Street. The plaza will face toward the future city-county governmental complex and Morgan Square and will offer bus access.
The downtown library will be the second public library in the country to have its own planetarium, according to Stephens. The name of the planetarium will be announced next year.
Construction should begin in February and is anticipated to take 13-14 months. The planetarium is set to open in spring 2025.
Andy Flynt, the library's director of the planetarium, visited 16 planetariums in the country to learn about potential programs and daily uses for the Spartanburg planetarium.
"We're going to have a lot of space programs. We'll have programs about biology and all the different sciences, and we'll have full-dome presentations, basically a movie on the 50-foot dome instead of a big screen," Flynt said. "Generally, we want to make all of the programming we have free to the public."
Samantha Swann covers city news, development and culture in Spartanburg. She is a University of South Carolina Upstate and Greenville Technical College alumna. Contact her at sswann@shj.com or on Instagram at @sam_on_spartanburg.
This article originally appeared on Herald-Journal: Spartanburg to have one of two planetariums attached to libraries
