Our Filthy Bus Stops (an occasional series)

The bus stop at the OSU-area Kroger on North High Street between Fifth and Sixth avenues is also one of the city's filthiest. Frequented by the drunk, the doped, the deranged, and many OSU students, it was built as part of the new Kroger store that opened in 2012.

Its predecessor, while unremarkable, did have an enclosed shelter. It, too, had a colorful clientele; it wasn't uncommon to stumble onto an impromptu Ripple party on occasion (the area still retains a hint of its past as Columbus's Skid Row; someone forgot to tell the street people that the area has been totally gentrified and hipsterized over the past 20 years).But what irked me about it were the numerous nearby magazine racks from which people would pull out newspapers, ad rags, and the like to use as bench covers, then leave them there, where they invariably ended up on the ground. The litter would congeal into a pulpy mess when it rained.

The replacement is a spartan affair with an overhang that doesn't really protect one from the elements.

It provides weary riders with a nasty-looking concrete bench that is usually being commandeered by one of the area's many derelicts. These photos, taken last fall, show the bench and the surrounding sidewalk. I tend to walk around the stains, being as they are of undetermined origin, and NEVER sit on the bench, which is a favorite sunning spot for the lost and the wandering.

I would think that the store and COTA might have a general agreement on upkeep of the stop, but apparently this is not the case. Some of these stains survived our admittedly mild winter. As summer draws near, the stop is once again a thriving social hotspot, and will soon return to the conditions I've documented. Is it too much to ask that a disinfectant scrub-down of the stop occur once in a while? Just asking--not that I'll EVER sit on that bench!