NCSU Libraries Focus Online

Volume 26 number 3 - Spring 2006

A Segway to Speedy Delivery

By Anna Dahlstein, External Relations

Tripsaver is now the NCSU Libraries' name for a family of services that deliver needed information to its users. Students, faculty, and staff can request materials unavailable in the NCSU Libraries simply by filling in an online form. This interlibrary service literally saves them the trip to another library whenever a particular item is checked out, missing from the bookstacks, or is not a part of the Libraries' collection. Librarians locate the item, arrange to obtain it (either physically or via the Internet in the case of articles), and notify the requestor when it has arrived, whether from UNC-Chapel Hill or the London School of Economics. There is no charge for interlibrary loans.

Tripsaver also facilitates book and article delivery between the main and branch libraries and from the Satellite Shelving Facility. As of fall 2005, library staff also use the Segway Human Transporter to make urgent deliveries of library materials to office and building locations around campus.

The Segway's inventor, DEKA Research and Development Corporation President Dean Kamen, received an honorary Doctor of Sciences degree from NC State during the fall 2005 commencement. An advocate for science and technology, Kamen holds more than 150 U.S. and foreign patents, many of them for innovative medical devices.

These days, many library users prefer desktop delivery of electronic documents over physical delivery of paper articles. Whereas the Segway can move at up to twelve miles per hour, the Internet offers instantaneous delivery to any location in the world. The Libraries also offers the service of scanning and delivering articles, book chapters, and similar materials from its collection via the Web. Such items can also be faxed or mailed, if that is preferred. A cost-recovery charge applies to this service. For details, got to the Web at http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/tripsaver.