"Literature vs. Traffic" art installation by Luzinterruptus, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Spanish design collective luzinterruptus transformed a major street into a river of 11,000 books, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, home to the University of Michigan, which sponsored the project as part of the "Humanities and Environments" theme semester organized by the Institute for the Humanities in the College of Literature, Sciences, and the Arts (LSA).

-- "A glowing river of books creates a traffic-free haven in Ann Arbor," Inhabitat

This happened last October. From the article:

The university organized a book donation drive to collect the 11,000 books used in the installation and also helped to temporarily close the major intersection of State Street and Liberty Street for 24 hours. A team of 90 volunteers also pitched in to help prepare and embed the books with tiny lights. On October 23, a glowing river of books was laid out for a few hours until nightfall, when visitors were invited to enter the ‘river’ and take the books home. All the books disappeared in less than two hours, leaving the street clean and empty by midnight.

It happens that over this past weekend, Saturday was Independent Bookstore Day.

Ironically, Borders Books flagship store--the company is now defunct--used to anchor this stretch of street.

But the firm started with one store off the beaten track, eventually moving to State Street in Ann Arbor in the business district next to the campus, and later took over a department store (it first moved to Briarwood Mall and then went out of business too) a block away on Liberty Street.

-- "Borders No. 1, where it all began in Ann Arbor," Michigan Radio
-- "The death and life of a great American bookstore," CNN

Having known the company when it was just one store, it was hard for me to get worked up when people would call it a chain, although it became one, sure.