If you’re a library geek like me (libraries might actually beat out buses on my list of favorite things), you surely already know about the Seattle Public Library’s passport program. For everyone else:

The library is issuing passports with a page for every library in the SPL system. The goal is for patrons to bring their passports to each branch to have them stamped, and in the process, to check out our new and improved community resources.

An SPL passport

The Douglass-Truth page and stamp

Cool idea, no? It gets better. Every entry in the passport includes a list of Metro routes that stop at that branch.

Routes 2 & 3 serve Sally Goldmark

This might seem like a small thing, but to this bus chick, it is huge. Every effort to challenge the assumption that one must drive to get around this town is worth recognizing. And since Chicklet and I are participating , the passports can serve as our travel cheat sheet.

So far, we’ve hit up Douglass-Truth (no bus ride necessary), Sally Goldmark (3), West Seattle (55), and Greenlake (48).* Montlake (48) is next on the list, followed by all of the other branches that are served by Metro’s heavyweight.** After that–who knows? I’ve never been to the ID branch, or Ballard, or South Park…

My plan is to coordinate our visits with individual branch story times–to make it worth Chicklet’s while. Then again, she hardly needs encouragement to visit a library. Twenty minutes in the children’s section reading books about farm animals and/or big vehicles, and she’s good.

Participants in the challenge have until January 2nd to turn in their completed passports. And, “…there will be a prize drawing on January 7th for booklover’s baskets full of goodies and lunch with the new city librarian.”

Shoot. That almost rivals partying with Busfather.

* Note that the Greenlake branch is currently closed due to a mold problem.
** Six total: Rainier Beach, Columbia, Douglass-Truth, Montlake, Greenlake, Greenwood