Pilot project puts books on busses
Public transit rides are going to get a lot less boring this week.
On Wednesday, the Medicine Hat Public Library and city will be launching a Books on the Bus program, which will see a small bin of 20-25 books placed on five different busses.
“I have a friend at the Red Deer Public Library and their program wrapped up recently and it gave me the idea to do something like it,” said chief librarian Shelley Ross. “Uwe Krickhahn was recently looking for something to help celebrate the local Rotary Club’s 100th anniversary, and he got very excited about this when I brought it up. He worked with the city to make it happen.”
Ross said the library will be using a lot of donated material to place on the busses, and is hoping to get a wide-range of material for people to read.
“We’re looking to put high quality, award winning, bestselling books on to busses and into peoples’ hands,” she said. “We want to put some really good stuff on the busses so that people who may not be really big readers, or maybe their phone is dead, maybe a really good book is exactly what they need. A book of high quality can really speak to people, and maybe remind them how great it is to read.”
The official launch of the program will be held Wednesday at 2 p.m. at the public library, where people will be able to take a ride on a bus and take part in other activities. Ross said the program is all about getting people of all ages into reading.
“It’s really about literacy, to just get people reading,” she said. “When parents or grandparents are on the bus with their children or grandchildren, reading is a great way to keep them entertained and also to maybe teach them something — we just hope it gets more people reading and excited about reading.”
Though there is always the possibility for something to go wrong, Ross said part of the program will be about people taking books to share with others.
“The idea is that people take a book to start. Then, when they finish it, they can put it back on the bus or drop it off at the library,” she said. “We don’t even mind if they keep it, or pass it along to a friend that will read it.”
Though the program will launch as a pilot, Ross said there is no definitive end date set.
“We really want to see how many books we can get to people, as well as what it will be like replenishing the buses,” she said.
For more information visit www.mhpl.shortgrass.ca