Plans for a planetarium and learning center in downtown Spartanburg moved forward another step Aug. 1 as the city’s Design Review Board approved initial plans for the project.
The planetarium learning center is being designed by McMillan Pazdan Smith and will be adjacent to the Spartanburg County Headquarters Library at the corner of Church and Broad streets. Groundbreaking is expected in early fall with completion expected in late 2024.
The 50-foot planetarium dome will be the largest in the Upstate and represents about $5 million of the project’s $14 million total cost, according to Todd Stephens, Spartanburg County librarian.
The planetarium will be the central feature of the 10,000-square-foot building and will show traditional planetarium programming or movies on a 10-degree tilting screen. The planetarium will also have a lobby and classrooms on the first floor of the expansion. The second floor will house the Spark Space, a maker’s lab, and other offices and programming spaces. The third floor will accommodate more library offices and free up space for programming in the Headquarters Library.
A prominent feature of the planetarium lobby will be a Foucault pendulum, patterned after an experiment nearly 200 years ago by French physicist Leon Foucault in which he used a pendulum to demonstrate the Earth’s rotation.
The latest design includes streetscape enhancements such as a civic center-style plaza at the intersection featuring planters, trees and seating. The plaza will also serve as a bus stop area for city, school and recreational buses aimed at providing safer and easier access to the library and the planetarium.
Refinements are being made to plans to include increased sidewalk space and a place to display public art. The project will then go back to the Design Review Board for final approval next month.
