Pics From The North Texas Vintage Bicycle Swap Meet – Garland
Yesterday, we drove out to Garland, Texas to check out the North Texas Vintage Bicycle Swap Meet – sponsored by Don Johle’s Bike World and Rat Rod Bikes. I love bike swap meets because they’re clearing houses for bike hoarders – my kind of people. Fortunately, my wife always comes along and brings me back to reality. Otherwise, we would have a garage full of bikes and no money to pay the mortgage.
Instead, I satisfy my vintage bike addiction with my hoards of photographs. Here are a few (click here to see the set).
We did discover a great new (to us) bike shop. While at the swap meet, we popped into Don Johle’s Bike World to check it out. It was a small, run-down, mom & pop type establishment with an odd mix of road bikes, BMX bikes, mountain bikes, and cruisers – as well as a few cool vintage restorations (mostly BMX). What won us over was the really friendly staff, who you could tell, really loves bikes.
We also ran into couple of BFR friends: Jonathan Braddick from Bike Friendly Oak Cliff as well as Jonathan Guzman from the bike blog: A Bicycle’s Point Of View. Here is a great write up that Jonathan Guzman did for the Swap Meet.
Slow Down!
A few weeks ago, I made an observation about the new guard rails, along Arapaho Road in Garland. Through not very attractive, it was agreed that their functionality was much more important than their aesthetics. The rails were built to serve as a safety barrier for the adjacent homes, from the speeding traffic. This morning, I made a discovery that illustrates the importance of that functionality.
If you look closely at the top left of this shot, you can see that new guard rail. Unfortunately for this sign, that guard rail falls a bit short. Also, even though I had no way of gauging their speed, those cars were speeding by as I took this shot.
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Garland Neighborhood Guard Rails
New Garland Neighborhood Guard Rail
Living on the east side of Richardson, we find ourselves traveling into Garland quite a bit. Like with my neighborhood, the houses are older, middle-class homes that have been warn by the years, but still hold their own. The neighborhoods are quiet and feel quite safe.
What I find interesting is the difference in what each city puts into it’s infrastructure. Over the past couple of years, it appears that both cities had the goal of putting up structures to protect their neighborhood’s outside alleyways from the main thoroughfare traffic of Arapaho Road.
The city of Richardson built and updated beautiful, brick retaining walls that enhance the beauty of their aging neighborhoods. In contrast, Garland just recently put up an unattractive guard rail. Not to compare one city to the next – Garland is a nice town with nice people – but, it’s really nice knowing that the city that we’ve decided to settled in, is investing in maintaining street appeal and property value.
Richardson Neighborhood Brick Wall
Edit: It’s occurred to me that in my efforts to praise Richardson, this post may have come off a little negative towards our neighbor Garland. That was not the intent. Although these guard rails are not best display of aesthetics, they are functional at keeping the neighborhoods safe. Also, in contrast to Richardson, Garland has had great success in reviving their downtown infrastructure. You can read a little about it here.
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Bike Friendly Richardson 
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