Here’s a photo I snapped today around noon, at the famous Third Street “Original” Farmers Market–the one whose coattails the Grove rode on to get started years ago.
The Farmers Market, unlike the Grove, invites lingering in its warren of communal alleys and microplazas, where tables and chairs are shared among the dozens of eateries; you can even walk right through stores to get across, and no one minds. It’s the closest thing to a Middle Eastern souk I’ve seen in LA, and the kind of place we can use more of.
And they’ve had a bike corral for years, installed to supplement the old-school “wheelbender” racks on the north side of the market.
As you can see in the photo, it’s far easier to get yourself to the Market on a bike than in a car–even though the parking lots consume over double the acreage of the Market itself (which was downsized a decade or two back to make room for…more parking).
And people do bike there. If there’s ever been a local example of “Build it, and they will come,” it’s this bike corral, which is always in use, even on cold rainy days, and nearly full on sweet sunny ones such as today.
I wonder whether the drivers slouching towards the distant dream of a parking space even notice the cyclists slipping past their lurching behemoths and locking up to the simple green racks, as Gina and I had done moments before I snapped the shutter. It’s pretty hard to notice anything from inside a car–which is one reason our automobile-dominated cities are allowed to become so ugly.
But more to the point, I wonder whether the merchants inside realize how many of their customers pedal their way to the cash register.
At the Market, cashiers always ask if you need a parking validation. We tell them, No, we rode our bikes today. But maybe we should make it a practice to do so even where there isn’t validated parking.
Maybe a non-aggressive way to do it would be to wear a T-shirt saying something like, “I rode my bike today, and I shop.”
What do you think? I could make them, Josef could stock them at the Pigeon. Would you buy one?
Let us know in the comments…about that, or anything else the photo brings to mind.
2 Comments
How about a t-shirt that says, “Yes I rode my bike here.”
The Farmer’s Market has several bike corrals and they’re frequently packed. Say what you like about The Grove (it’s got pleny of good, bad and ugly to spare) but they’ve been bike friendly since day one. The Grove corral is located in the garage right next to security and it’s always been a reliable place to lock up the bike for me. The spot is so popular that it was soon doubled in size after The Grove opened for business. I don’t know the actual numbers but I suspect that the ratio of bike riders to drivers who frequent The Grove and Farmers Market in the course of the week betters the ratio of bike riders to drivers of Los Angeles in general. Build it and they will come indeed.