A place without bookstores

[mariness]

This month, the local Barnes and Noble - a place that, in the winter, I could reach via my electric trike - closed down. According to the employees, this particular Barnes and Noble was doing well - better, they said proudly, than the Barnes and Noble up in Altamonte Springs (which is still open). And presumably less well than the Barnes and Noble

Comments

[dewline]

One of their stores is moving into my nearest Major Classic-Style Shopping Mall as well, but we haven't lost any booksellers to that. Lenscrafters has had to move, and there were a couple of other retailers who had to move to other, empty spots.

I mentioned booksellers. There's a Chapters/Indigo/Coles store and a comics/sports memorabilia shop. The latter I frequent weekly and the former...?

Well, I prefer indy bookstores. And I'm willing to take an hour's bus-riding time to get to any of them. But at least I live in a city that has a semi-decent transit network.

All of that aside...yeah, there is a pain upon reading this news. And yet, the online shops do have one virtue to them, in that they remind us that many of our neighbours near and far still find a positive value in reading.

[mariness]

We don't have too many independent bookstores in the Orlando area - there's an LDS store which sells books, and a New Age store in Orlando which sells books, and a couple of used bookstores, which I've heard good things about, but which are hard for me to reach.

But the specific issue for me is that the store needs to be REALLY close to a bus station - max two blocks - since I have to manual wheelchair. (And get strapped into the bus, which I hate, but that's a separate rant/post.) That isn't true for pretty much any of the places I've mentioned, alas.

[dewline]

There's a thing I think you'd like about OC Transpo and STO(the Gatineau, Quebec-based transit service, directly across the river from Ottawa). Despite the parallel existence of ParaTranspo, the main transit services both replaced their entire fleets with "accessible" - low-floors with unfoldable ramps at the front end - buses. It took about five years to get that done, but it is done now.

Also, the bus routes will get you just that close for self-powered wheeling to the two indy stores I'm thinking of. At most, two blocks from the stop to the store.

[mariness]

That does sound awesome.

Orange County's very limited bus system does have the accessible buses that sink down that you can roll into. That isn't my issue. My issue is that once I roll in, the bus driver has to stop and strap me into the bus, and then, once I want to get out, I have to be unstrapped. I HATE THIS. Even more now that I've been to other municipalities that don't do this.

We also have Lynx Access which...well, Lynx Access does its best, but it's very underfunded. And out here in west Orange the little Neighbor Lynx vans which I also have to get strapped into, serving a very limited area - and no bookstores. I ended up not being able to use either for a recent doctor's visit to the next town over.

[jcbemis]

I live in the next town west of Mariness, as she knows, and will also miss that bookstore

[mariness]

Barnes and Noble staff said the people most upset about the bookstore closing were Clermont and Groveland residents, which makes sense. If I drove, the Dr. Philips location wouldn't be TOO far, and it can be combined with some other things in that area.

[malterre]

I keep hope "here be Dragons" might resurge!

[mariness]

Me too. One of the other downtown stores is closing and I couldn't help but cross my fingers that Here Be Dragons will take its place....

[fbhjr]

That's awful!
We need a bookstore boosting program!

[mariness]

To a certain degree some people are trying, and it's worked to the benefit of some independent bookstores in some areas. Orlando just doesn't really have an independent bookstore presence to boost.