Well, it finally happened. I wrote in a Previous post about the pedestrian-unfriendly design of the Rite Aid drug store up the street from me.

Well, Rite Aid in it’s plan for world-domination, has purchased Eckards Drug and now, once again has a surplus of stores in Lockport.

A few years ago, Rite Aid was in the Transit Street Plaza just past Willow. About a long block further away from me. They also had two stores downtown, just a few blocks further. All were easy to walk to. Somewhere along there, they decided to close the plaza store and build the current one at Transit and High. They also closed one of the two downtown stores and opened one out on Lincoln Ave. near Davison.

But meanwhile, a Wallgreens opened down at Transit and Main. Eckard opened a store at the former Union Sun and Journal site after closing one further out Transit in the town.

As I wrote before, the High Street Rite is impractical to walk to. There is no way into the store without either hopping a fence or walking through the same driveways vehicles use.

Unfortunately, it’s the same story at Walgreens and Eckards. They have no fences, but they are so removed from any pedestrian walkways as to be just as inaccessible. A healthy person could walk in to them – at some risk from vehicular traffic – but an older person would be taking a serious risk. The Lincoln Ave. Rite Aid is similarly located away from any residential area.

The only walk-up accessible drug store in Lockport is the Rite Aid at Washburn and Main Street.

So what’s the point having so many stores, if you have to drive to most of them? Why not cut costs and build one big, efficient and well-stocked (and well-staffed) store. Since you have to drive anyway, it could be anywhere.

They want to appear as neighborhood stores, when they are anything but.

Guess which one has the “For Lease” sign out front now? The one near me. I guess I’ll be walking the extra block north to WallGreens in the future.