Click here for the full story and a 24-picture slideshow

As reported by KENS, San Antonio’s news leader, the restored mural at the abandoned Mission Drive-In Theatre recently passed its lighting test. The city expects to officially switch on the lights at the end of February.

As discussed earlier, San Antonio is restoring the old drive-in site to include a community library with space for more facilities, and it’s restoring the original solidly built theater screen/mural. Gary Edenburn, special projects manager for the San Antonio Development Office, said he expects to see outdoor movies there this summer.

Not only did the old drive-in have this beautiful mural, the mural’s figures were outlined in neon. For the 21st century, San Antonio officials chose to use LED lighting instead as a faux-neon for the same outlines. I’d be curious to see how that compares.

According to the story, “Locals are already flocking to the Mission Public Library that sits on the same property. (The adjacent) Mission San Jose is poised as a historic backdrop for those who gather in the library’s cozy sunlit reading nooks.” Ah, I love new libraries almost as much as new drive-ins.

I really wish KENS had included a piece of video to go with the story so I could have embedded it here, but their 24-picture slideshow of the mural and library are the next best thing. (There’s a year-old video that includes helicopter shots of the site, but that story is about local artists complaining that the old mural contained stereotypical images. The city agreed not to include those parts of the mural in the restoration, but KENS’s story continues with more complaining.) And if you want to read about Carload’s special relationship with the Mission, go read this earlier post.