I made a 2-stop ride today that included a little Christmas shopping. Round trip: 8.3 miles over varied roads — from the Springfield bicycle route to residential streets to 4-lane suburban main arteries. My farthest stop from home was the Primrose Marketplace at the corner of Primrose and Glenstone. This is a large strip center with stores such as Best Buy, Marshalls, and Borders Books.
This is a challenging destination for beginner utility cyclists. I’ve ridden here many times on weekends (about once per month), and I have never seen another cyclist. Could the lack of convenient bicycle parking also have something to do with that?
There is a wide promenade (to call it a “sidewalk” doesn’t do justice to its width) along the front of the stores. The only thing to lock to is a Stop sign. My Redline R530 looks awfully lonely out there on the edge of the curb. There are plenty of places along the entire stretch to place a few U- or wave racks.
There’s a break in the shopping action about halfway long the length of the strip center — a little courtyard area with park benches. There is plenty of room on either side of the sitting area for tasteful bicycle racks.
Today I decided to go looking along the entire length of the center — a big place — to see if maybe someone had put a bicycle rack somewhere convenient. All the way at the end — in front of Borders Books — in the last possible spot before the sidewalk trailed off into the end of the parking lot, I found two lollipop racks. But look at the placement. These two racks should hold four bicycles. But they are too close together and the one to the right of my bicycle (difficult to see in the deep shadow) is too close to the pillar.
I really appreciate the gesture. But did no one care to ask?
Disclaimer: If I’ve missed any racks in front of the strip center, please let me know. I did not ride all the way around the complex, so I do not know if there are other racks out back. The backs of these places, however, are no places to park bicycles. And I have never seen any in the parking lot. I always park at the Stop sign. Now that I’ve discovered these lollipops (all the way at the end), I might use them instead. Might.
Comments 2
As you’ve noticed, cycle parking needs to be ample and convenient. It needs to be obviously right outside your destination too. In this case you have a destination which is cycle hostile, and people who might cycle are put off from cycling there.
Some effort is involved in making sure that there is always somewhere to park your bike next to shops here. In fact, some considerable effort is gone to in order to ensure that there is parking for your bike while new cycle parks are being built. You can see an example of a temporary cycle park here (it may well upset you in the circumstances): http://hembrow.blogspot.com/2008/12/temporary-cycle-parking.html
Once you’ve got people cycling, it’s really important not to put them off by overlooking details like this. As you’ve noticed, very few people cycle to this destination because it is cycle hostile.
It’s also, of course, hopeless to have destinations which are “challenging” for other reasons. People are generally not interested in a challenge when they go about their everyday business. If cycling is challenging and driving is easier, they’ll drive. It’s what the infrastructure is telling them to do.
Posted 08 Dec 2008 at 12:45 am ¶David… Yes. Parking is really not the issue at Primrose. It’s that there’s no way to get to it except by roads that most beginners would avoid.
Downtown Springfield continues to add bicycle parking. Mostly that means developers are sticking whatever racks they happen to buy in whatever spots that happen to be open. The city requires all new development to accommodate bicycles. The problem is: No one bothers to ask cyclists about rack style and placement.
I have begun talking up those racks you showed me. We’ll see
Posted 08 Dec 2008 at 3:39 pm ¶