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Grad Center for Planning & the Environment

What if the Pratt Libraries don't have what you need?

Finding Material Outside Pratt

Thankfully, you still have options!

If you can wait to see the item, you can also use ILL (Inter-Library Loan) to request articles, chapters and books, but which can take 1-2 weeks for books, less for scans of articles.

Or you can suggest that the library purchase the item you need. However if purchased, it generally takes a month for the item to become available.

If you're in a hurry, you can find the item at another NYC area library.

Use Worldcat, a catalogue that combines the catalogues of hundreds of libraries, to see where else in NYC the material might be located.

Pratt Libraries is part of ALB Consortium (Academic Libraries of Booklyn), so you can get an ALB card and check out 2 books from participating institutions.

A Librarian can write you a METRO PASS to visit a library you don't have access to. You won't be able to check out the item, but you can copy or scan what you need.

ALB Cards and METRO Pass information are available at the Reference Desk on the first floor of the Brooklyn Library.

Using WorldCat

WorldCat is the world's library catalog. It allows you to search thousands of libraries all at once to see where an item is held.

When browsing titles, you'll be able to see whether we hold a title or not by looking to see if Pratt shows up under Libraries that own this item.

When you click on a title in the Pratt version of Worldcat, you'll be able to see if we have copies available as well as which nearby libraries have the item.

If we do not have the title, use the Request Item through Interlibrary Loan button in pratt.worldcat.org to place an interlibrary loan request for that item.

NYC Area Libraries


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