urban bicycle journeys

It is sixty miles and a one hour drive from our Chapel Hill apartment to the Reidsville exit off US 29,  twenty-five miles north of Greensboro.  North Carolina passed a law back in 1988 that raised the gas tax but the proceeds could only be used to building freeway outer loops around the largest cities in North Carolina.   These outer loops are still being built in 2020.  I find this insane.  The newly named I-785 for ten or fifteen miles northeast of Greensboro had no traffic on this Sunday morning during a pandemic but I doubt there is ever much traffic on this road.  This photo was taken from the car while driving.

I parked our car south of Reidsville in the lot of a Southern States Cooperative which was closed on Sunday.

I pulled the Bike Friday out.  This is during a pandemic.  My non-negotiable personal plan was that I would not stop at any establishments and not go near any other people, and at those goals I succeeded.   I started biking.  Reidsville was ten miles north.

 

 

 

This facility was in the parking lot of a mini-mart on the southern outskirts of Reidsville.

 

I did not know much about Reidsville (population 15,000) other than my good friend Nancy lived there a while as child.

I noodled around town on the bicycle.  This 1920’s looking house seemed unique, one does not see Spanish Colonial Revival much in North Carolina.

I continued to cycle around Reidsville.

 

 

Downtown on a Sunday morning during a pandemic was like a neutron bomb had gone off.

 

Reidsville’s huge cigarette factory (with its Lucky Strike smokestack) is right next to downtown and seemed very much in operation but online I read reports that it is in the process of being shut down, with a loss of 110 jobs.   Production is being moved to the larger cigarette factory in Greensboro.

 

 

During this pandemic restaurants are closed for seating but many people in North Carolina I suspect would rather to stay in their cars anyway.    The drive-throughs were busy at locally owned restaurants.

I ate my peanut butter sandwich at a public park in Reidsville.

I like to look for mid-century modernist commercial buildings.   Here is Reidsville there likely not as much economic pressure to tear these down.

 

On the way back to my car I biked for a short period on the US29 Bypass and discovered my now favorite building in Reidsville, the Holy Infant Catholic Church.

Near where my car was parked was this graveside funeral.   No one was social distancing although a few people were wearing masks.