Here's a Crazy Idea for Memorial Coliseum

A reader just wrote us a response to the story we ran this week about Major League Soccer. He offered an unusual use for Memorial Coliseum: make it the new library.

"Our beautiful Central Library is an embarassment," writes Bruce Silverman. " It's too small for the thousands who use it every day. In fact, it's the smallest main library of any community our size in North America. . .Portland, this so-called City of Readers, is going to have to build a new library before long."

Silverman goes on to say that "at the Coliseum, we have the land, the foundation and the structurally sound shell, the parking and freeway access, Fareless Square, and windows for natural light. . . .Will library patrons go to events at the Rose Quarter, and will sports fans go to the library? Probably not. But the library will bring thousands of people of all stripes through that empty plaza all day, every day."