The local HyperMart changed hands this year, and while the previous managers were bike-friendly, the new guys couldn’t care less. They’re more concerned about shopping carts. In fact, they built covered “cart corrals” in several places on the acres of freshly paved parking lot. But where there was once plenty of room to lock bikes to the steel pillars that support the store’s covered walkway, well out of the way of both foot and auto traffic, this space is now filled with surplus-to-requirements carts and propane-tank lockers. What about covered corrals for bikes in one or two places on the vast expanse of empty asphalt? You’re joking, right? Money talks, and nobody walks. Or bikes. Plus, it would spoil the view…

The upshot? Cyclist-shoppers—of which there were formerly quite a few, as it happens—are left to compete for a single accessible pillar. Better yet, that solitary pillar is right in the shopping-cart flight path, should an energetic employee feel like adding to the already long lines of unused carts. So the question of the day is, “Are your feeling lucky?”

And my answer? Not really. I mostly shop elsewhere now. Even Walmart does more for cyclists than this crowd.

No doubt about it. Under New Management! doesn’t translate into Cyclists Welcome! Not here, at any rate. But at least shoppers now have cup holders on their carts. That’s progress, ain’t it?

We love our bikes, right? And we never tire of looking at them. At least I don’t, and if I’m to judge from what others tell me, I’m not alone. So each Sunday I’ll publish a bike-related picture. Most of the time it will be a photo, but don’t be surprised if a few drawings and paintings get added to the mix from time to time. I might even include a sculpture or two. (OK. A photo of a sculpture.) Anything, in short, that evokes the world on two wheels. And don’t be shy. If you have a picture you’d like to share, just email it to me. I’ll do the rest.

 
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