Editor’s notebook: A two-wheeled Bloomington intro for IU students, townies alike

Listen, IU students, you start classes on Monday (Aug. 24). So here is my advice for the following day: Get on a bicycle and let an expert tell you about the secret parts of Bloomington.

The secret parts include red-tailed hawks. That’s why this column includes photos of hawks instead of bicycles.

Here’s the boring, fact-filled part from an official government source: The city of Bloomington and IU office of sustainability are holding a Welcome Week community guided bike tour starting at 5 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 25, at Showalter Fountain. The ride is free, slow-paced and supposed to run until 6:30 p.m.

The organizers say it is for all skill levels. So if you arrived at IU with plans to ride in the Little 500, chasing down a “Breaking Away” dream, there will be time enough later to fall in love, ride double with the object of your affection, and get into turf fights with townies. Tuesday’s ride has a different purpose.

I would describe it as a way to get your Bloomington bearings on a bicycle tour, where only the wheel truth about cool local places will be spoken. But that is because I am an old man devoted to stupid puns.

The list of places on the tour is not bad.

You’ll see where to handle some basic errands: Aldi and B-Town International Market for groceries, Target for a little bit of everything, and College Mall for whatever is still left on the list. Morgenstern Books & Café gives you a bookstore, coffee shop and east-side landmark all in one stop. Bryan Park, Switchyard Park and Hopewell Park show you three very different pieces of the city’s park system.

The route also puts you on Bloomington’s two main non-motorized connectors. The B-Line Trail runs north-south through the city, while the 7-Line gives cyclists an east-west connection through the heart of town. Learn those two routes, and you have the beginnings of a mental map for getting around Bloomington without a car.

Then there is Kirkwood Avenue, the courthouse square and city hall. They’re not just sights to ride past, but landmarks that you can use to tell where you are.

The ride is not just for students. It is also for new residents, community members and even longtime residents—who might like to prove to incoming students that not everyone who has lived here for a million years is a jerk.

At city hall, the group will stop so riders can practice locking up a bike, putting a bike on the front rack of a Bloomington Transit bus and even make a smoothie in a bike-powered blender.

A smoothie is basically fruit, ice, and assorted good intentions pulverized by a machine. Bloomington has improved on the concept by making you power the machine yourself. Pedal hard, blend the fruit, slurp it down, and ask yourself if that doesn’t answer the question: What does Bloomington taste like? The town tastes like a pedal-powered smoothie.

In years past, the advice I have given incoming college students is simple: Look up!

I mean that literally. I am not telling you to aim high, chase your dreams or become your best self. I am telling you to look up, because there are red-tailed hawks perched on buildings and other high points around Bloomington. You will miss them if you are staring down at your screen the whole time.

So I hope Tuesday’s bicycle tour includes some additional spots on the list.

When the group gets downtown, somebody should point out the steeple of First Presbyterian Church at 6th and Lincoln streets. Red-tailed hawks have used it as a perch for years.

As people are pedaling down the 7-Line, the tour guide might give riders a chance to pause and check out the top of the AT&T building. A little farther west, the antenna on top of the Monroe County jail is worth a look. Those are both regular perches for red-tailed hawks.

The official route already includes the courthouse square. So I hope Tuesday’s tour gives cyclists a chance to look up at the fish-shaped weather vane on top of the historic Monroe County courthouse. A red-tailed hawk perched on the fish is about as Bloomington as anything ever gets.

There is no guarantee any of the hawks will cooperate Tuesday. They do not work for Visit Bloomington, Indiana University, or the city government.

But this bicycle tour strikes me as a pretty good way to learn something about the city. Bloomington is not a terrible place to be. Ride past the grocery stores. Find the trails. Figure out where Kirkwood goes. Learn how to put your bike on a bus. Pedal hard enough to liquefy some fruit.

And when you get downtown, look up.