From October 14 to October 27, the Doveton Street library will be closed to the public, as City of Ballarat updates library shelving and changes the collection's layout.

The Sebastopol Library, Wendouree Library and library outreach services will remain open to cater to the space's usual patrons.

"We haven't allocated more outreach services as Ballarat staff are needed to help with the shelving of the central library resources," City of Ballarat executive manager of learning and community hubs Jenny Fink said,

City of Ballarat's acting director of community development Pete Appleton said in a press release that the new non-fiction layout "will be in subject areas, with lots of face-out display that encourages greater browsing and discovery of library resources," similar to bookshop.

The central library is the most popular library in the City of Ballarat. At its peak in 2018 before parking was reduced as part of GovHub construction works, more than 1,000 people visited the building each day.

A press release by City of Ballarat said the changes are just the beginning of many improvements for the Ballarat Library over the next two years, with $1.9 million in capital works allocated in annual budgets for this project over two years.

Across the council's five year Libraries of the Future plan, which has not yet been released to the public, there is a push to improve services at the central library and create more floor space, by changing the layout design, and opening up more of the second level for the public by moving council offices.

Neville Ivey, council's director of community development, told The Courier in April this year that "as our population evolves and changes, you've got more people living in the CBD, more student-type activity".

"So the functionality of the central library becomes less about doing everything for everyone, and you actually have more of those early years programs out in Sebastopol and out in to the west where the families are moving to," he said.