Look how freakin’ festive the 49-Van Ness bus will look for the holidays, with snowflakes, mittens, wrapped gifts, and more. But is that… a Christmas coyote near the front left wheel?
It was admittedly something of a cute cult-hit thing this summer when the SF Municipal Transit Agency (SFMTA) decided to roll out Grateful Dead/Summer of Love-themed Muni buses to get people all stoked for the Dead & Company shows in Golden Gate Park. They were like wraparound advertising, except they didn’t really advertise anything other than Muni itself.
Now as we head into the holiday season, the SFMTA is back at it with a more holly, jolly flair. Today the agency announced that buses on the 49-Van Ness route would have a wraparound decorative holiday design, as seen below.
“Starting today, one Merry Days of Muni bus will be picking up riders on the 49 Van Ness / Mission route,” the SFMTA says in their announcement. One of these holiday buses is seen above. But wait a minute… is that a coyote near that bus’ front left wheel? I bet some coyote haters in certain neighborhoods are going to be pissed off by that.
The “Merry Days of Muni bus” (that is what they are calling it) was designed by in-house SFMTA artist Anton Belov, the designer of the Muni ugly holiday sweater, which they prefer you call a “holiday pullover.”
“The patchwork idea came from thinking about how Muni connects different neighborhoods, people, communities – how it stitches the city together,” Belov said in an SFMTA press release. “I wanted people to get excited and surprised when they expected to see a regular bus in gray and red and then, all of a sudden, this bright wrap comes their way and makes them feel even happier going to work and school.”
Again, the SFMTA claims that these went into circulation today, though apparently only one bus on the 49-Van Ness line each day will be the holiday decorated bus. The agency’s announcement says these will remain in circulation “through the end of the year.”
Related: Muni Is Truckin’ Grateful Dead-Themed Buses for Next Weekend’s Big Dead & Co. Concerts [SFist]
Image: SFMTA
