Allen Public Library

One of my favorite town/​small city municipal libraries in the south. This library is very well-​resourced with year-​round youth activities and adult programming, a teen reading room, large kids library, theater and civic auditorium. Plenty of study space ans the café is a real gem as well.

Disclaimer: This review is based solely on my experience at the Civic Auditorium inside of the Allen Public Library, and my concert experience therein.
The library was hosting a Folk Music Festival, and one of my favorite local bands, Jiggernaut, was playing. Opening for them was Ryan Galloway, a one man band (and I do mean «band»; he uses technology to make himself into an ensemble), and he played some thoroughly enjoyable folk tunes, both bespoke and covers.
Jiggernaut, ordinarily featuring Celtic rock music, cranked out some excellent folk tunes as well, and sounded fantastic.
Overall, the space is expansive and the seating is comfortable. Lighting and temperature were just right, and the acoustics are great. Parking is available in the library parking lot, and the area is fully accessible for those who are impaired.
It’s definitely a great venue for small shows such as this, and I’ll be sure to keep an eye out for other events there.

Wifi is filtered and some outbound ports are blocked. If you’re a business user needing to connect to your office and use nonstandard ports, beware, you may not be able to connect. Frustrating!
Library location and environment good though. Too bad the wifi was useless for me.

I took my 2 girls here to check out a couple books. What a decent place to find everything that I want to read here. The staffs were very helpful. I got lots of info on variety of events in town.

Very modern and up to date. Great blue ray and DVD section. Near perfect online system. Half of the workers are really rude and the other half are overly nice. :)

Really nice, clean library. My 2 year old loves using the self check out that is perfectly set up for his height. Wonderful viewing room near the kids corner. Love it!

Allen storytime is a joy! There are a ton of kids who participate. The Librarian’s are typically joyus and friendly! The library is very clean. I love the café inside.

Great selection, great front office people.5 stars
Lousy handicapped or infirm usability. The parking is a considerable distance away from the actual stacks.
Unless you are a child or teenager there is no seated access to the catalog on the ground floor. This is a change that strips 4 stars from this review. I have repeatedly complained about the much reduced seating and adult access to the catalog and have received no response despite requesting one. Access to the upstairs machines require a fair walk from the lift, less so from the stairs.
A new ‘feature’ of their catalog unlike many other libraries is that if a book is available you cannot place a hold on it but take your chances that it is still there when you get there. Hmm wonder how much paid labour is saved?
Free wi-​fi, a nice selection of movies including current releases, ebook access, audio books, a slowly increasing fair selection of large print books and generally the current book releases. There is also a large selection of magazines and newspapers as well as free internet access upstairs. There are also rooms available for various uses.
The drive through book return requires you to have elastic arms or to get out of your vehicle.
Used to love the place, now I just sit outside in the car while my family goes in.