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What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

blog.priceonomics.com

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Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#81

Post by frankus »

Bike theft seems like one of those quality-of-life crimes (like graffiti and coercive squeegee-monkeys) that's begging for some kind of creative enforcement strategy.

- If there's an open-air bike market at 7th and Market, it seems like you could use some of the same strategies that have been used to shut down open-air drug markets.

- Police in the greater Vancouver area have had a lot of success with bait cars, but I'm not aware of bait bikes being used more than experimentally (cf. tocatchabiketheif.com)

- If one could devise a concentrated enforcement strategy, one might not need to "take six guys off a murder" for very long. Basically the idea would be to tip a high-crime-low-probability-of-punishment equilibrium and into a low-crime-high-probability-of-punishment equilibrium that should presumably remain equally stable. One approach would be to target a geographic area and communicate (and follow through on) a threat to throw the book at anyone caught stealing a bike.

(pretty much all of these are stolen from the book When Brute Force Fails).

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#82

Post by pavel_lishin »

brk wrote: post #71
pavel_lishin wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't this something that would be trivially bypassed by passing a big spark through the frame? Burn out all electronics, without harming the rest of the bike.

Most likely not. First, how you are going to pass a "big spark" through the frame? Carry around a big ass battery while you're on the hunt for bikes? Secondly, the current would follow the path of least resistance, through the frame itself. Unlikely to really affect a module inside the frame, especially if that module is wrapped in an insulator.

I imagine it wouldn't be done on the spot - pedal to where you parked your theftomatic van, which comes with a nice, big battery pre-installed.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#83

Post by agumonkey »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #17
lallysingh wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not terribly hard to find out -- the bike generates its own power, and is run outside. A few bikes with GPS and call-home device (powered by the bike) would draw traces to their destinations pretty quickly.

A pair of low-res cameras - one pointing forward, and one pointing upward - would result in some fantastic shots as well. (Though there may be privacy and legal concerns.)

With recent circuit sizes we could all turn our bikes into wheel powered google cars.

    distance sensors
    front,back,driver cameras
    automatic brakes
    gyroscope balancer
    whatever ...

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#84

Post by lamebrain »

Jun8 wrote: post #55

I think a useful tactic to curb loss of expensive bikes would be to legally target the people who buy them, these are the people that cause the market to exist and perpetuate the situation. My guess is that most of these people are not crooks, i.e. they are just young people who want to but can't afford a nice bike and they know exactly what they are buying. I don't understand anything about bikes so can't give an ex…

A couple years ago I moved, and I rented a bike while mine was in transit. I wish I never rented it, because riding it was glorious, and it cost $1500 retail. (It was a Kona bike, called "Rage" or "Fire" or something like that.)

It's like retina displays -- you don't know what you're missing until you use it, and then after that, you always know what you're missing.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#85

Post by pavel_lishin »

wtvanhest wrote: post #66
pavel_lishin wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've spent 24 hours in a holding cell right after high school. It was cold, my seatmates weren't particularly polite, sleeping was an awkward proposition at best. But if I was paid $2k to do it? Sure. Aside from the toilet situation, it's not significantly worse than being on a intercontinental flight. (In fact, I'd rather spend 24 hours in that cell than three hours on a turbulent flight.)

You were in a holding cell, not jail. 5 days in jail, you would be with everyone else. Not just some guys going through processing. My friends that have done both describe the later to be a completely different experience.

My friend who was transferred out of the holding tank into jail actually said it was much nicer once he was processed, and assigned a cell.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#86

Post by zurn »

Jun8 wrote: post #55

I think a useful tactic to curb loss of expensive bikes would be to legally target the people who buy them, these are the people that cause the market to exist and perpetuate the situation. My guess is that most of these people are not crooks, i.e. they are just young people who want to but can't afford a nice bike and they know exactly what they are buying. I don't understand anything about bikes so can't give an ex…

> I can't understand people who shell out thousands of dollars for a bike, are these so much better than a $500 one?

Sure, if you want a MTB for blazing offroad trails or a road bike for touring. For your regular 20 minute commute, a sub-$1000 city bike is pretty much the sweet spot (depending on your available disposable income of course).

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#87

Post by mseebach »

lallysingh wrote: post #4
midas wrote: post #2

I've heard rumors that lots of stolen bikes are exported on container ships leaving the US. The argument is that the shipping is basically free, since most ships are carrying large deliveries to the US and are empty on the return trip. Does anyone know if this is fact or fiction?

Not terribly hard to find out -- the bike generates its own power, and is run outside. A few bikes with GPS and call-home device (powered by the bike) would draw traces to their destinations pretty quickly.

A bike doesn't generate it's own power. An in-hub generator is rather expensive and thus rare, so might serve as a hint to the sophisticated thieves to check the bike for the phone-home device.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#88

Post by TallGuyShort »

fffggg wrote: post #70
Jun8 wrote: post #55

I think a useful tactic to curb loss of expensive bikes would be to legally target the people who buy them, these are the people that cause the market to exist and perpetuate the situation. My guess is that most of these people are not crooks, i.e. they are just young people who want to but can't afford a nice bike and they know exactly what they are buying. I don't understand anything about bikes so can't give an ex…

"I just know that is a stolen car" Which is why criminals do not charge half of its used value -- they charge 100% of the used value just like everyone else. You cannot tell a stolen bike on craigslist apart from a non-stolen bike based on the price alone. The problem of stolen cars is addressed through licensing and registration. Not to mention, bicycles do not have a reliable and standardized VIN system like cars d…

I lived in a town that required all bikes to be registered and licensed, and all sales of bikes to go through the local government. It was such a big pain that I would rather just live with the higher risk of theft and the lack of enforcement.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#89

Post by pbhjpbhj »

rosser wrote: post #35
dmm wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thief is using a battery powered angle grinder to remove the u-lock. The owner uses a key. The snipers will be well trained to distinguish between the two. Hmm. Maybe this would be a good application of unmanned drones?

And what happens when an owner who lost his key gets shot for cutting his own lock?

Colateral damage. It also encourages owners to keep a spare key ... so it's not all bad.
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