Mount has smiley face roundabout vandalised
Council contractors swiftly repainted the road marking after it was defaced
Asmiley face painted on a Mount Maunganui roundabout and embraced by the community has been defaced and painted again.
Drivers sometimes don’t treat the small, painted roundabout at Adams Ave and Maunganui Rd — outside Mount Hot Pools — as a roundabout and drive straight through.
Late last year, it was painted bright yellow — with the unusual addition of a cheeky smiling face with the tongue poking out.
Tauranga City Council head of transport Nic Johansson told the Bay of Plenty Times his team had not received any complaints about the cheerful road marking.
Rather, the council had been inundated with positive feedback.
“When the smiley face originally appeared we knew there was a lot of community interest in the roundabout, so we ran a poll on our website to see if people ‘love it or loathe it’.”
He said 983 people voted, with 939 saying they “love the cheeky addition, which made the decision to keep the smile a no-brainer”.
Johansson said it made “a lot of people happy, it works, and it doesn’t compromise safety or functionality so it’s here to stay”.
Earlier last week, the roundabout’s face was painted over with reddish features, ruining the original effect.
“We were disappointed for the community when we found out [on Thursday] . . . that someone vandalised the roundabout on Wednesday night,” Johansson said.
“We were already due to freshen up the paint, so we repainted the roundabout [on Thursday night] . . . , with the smile now facing Mauao [the Mount] and minus the tongue.”
The council posted about the refreshed roundabout face on its Facebook page on Friday.
While the first poster had a dig at the traffic and “dirty” streets, others applauded the decision to keep the smile, with one saying: “Love it, need a bit more fun ideas”.