Library bus ready to roll again after fatal crash

ALL SET FOR ACTION: Tauranga's mobile library is only days away from re-entering service after October's crash on Welcome Bay Rd. PHOTO/ANDREW WARNER

Tauranga's beloved mobile library is out of the panelbeaters and ready to resume service next Thursday.

The bus has been off the road since October 22 undergoing repairs from the fatal collision with a car on Welcome Bay Road.

However it will be a short-lived reappearance, with the library taking advantage of the quiet time during the summer holidays to give the bus its first paint job since it entered service in 1999.

Tauranga libraries manager Jill Best said the repaint would take about a week from mid-January. The job had been booked well before the accident happened.

Ms Best said the paint was getting chalky and the real-life kids who featured on the paint job had now all grown up. The repaint had been postponed three times because councils had not been sure whether they wanted to keep the service.

"It is well and truly due for a repaint."

Karanbir Singh, 19, died after the car in which he was a passenger and the bus crashed on Welcome Bay Rd.