Firstly id like to say im not sure if this is the right thread…
Secondly id like to apologise if it not the right thread…
But Im curious as to know if anybody knows what/where the highest area of bike theft is on london?
Then we can all have a day trip out… Park up a few unsecured bikes and wait with afew baseball bats!
Never know crime rate might go down, few people may get to keep there bikes if the messege is passed around
Sorry im just getting fed up seeing so many bikes being posted stolen and they never get seen after… At some point we have to say enough is enough.
The only people that actually seem to care when a bike has been stolen is the owner and other motorcyclists!
Even the manufacturers couldn’t care less…(IMO) Otherwise they would be fitting steering locks as reliable as their engines, immobilisers that cant be crossed and alarms that arnt made in china!
The more prolific bike thieves appear to operate in teams, do you honestly believe a couple of baseball bats is sufficient preparation to do street battle with 3 or 4 chavs?
Lifting bikes from the streets is too easy, and in London those so inclined are spoilt for choice. Why not raise the security bar a little, I know if they want it they’ll take it but chances are they’ll move on to an easier take. How often do you hear of properly secured machines being taken?
Spend £130.00 on a pair of decent disk locks and £110.00 on a decent padlock and chain, lock up both wheels, chain it to a random piece of street furniture and relax.
We definitely need more rails/posts located at bike bays so we have something to chain them too.
In fact I think with the level of bike crime in London the presence of rails/posts/anchors should be mandatory - otherwise people will be disccouraged from using bikes which as we know ease congestion and take some of the pressure off public transport.
It’s part of ‘joined up thinking’ on London’s transport system to make biker/scooter riders lives as pleasant and sustainable as possible.
Completely agree with this. If it costs a grand to install a rail and that stops one bike theft, I’d consider it a success.
About 6 months after Westminster council started charging for motorcycle parking there was a flurry of bike thefts near where I was working in great portland street, including a colleague who had his brand new Ninja loaded into a van in broad daylight under a CCTV camera.
I wrote to Westminster to ask them why they didn’t install more security rails/anchor points and they said that there was security available in a bay near New Scotland Yard (how convenient) and that they found not many people used the available security rail there. They didn’t seem to understand that if only 1% of your bays have something to chain a bike to then a lot of people won’t bother lugging a big chain around with them, only to find it has nothing to attach to .
Where I work now, Southwark council seem pretty good about security rails and as a result, bikers are pretty good about carrying chains.
Yeah but are these anchors as safe as the top chain? Because the chain is just as strong as its weakest link, which for most cases is going to be the anchor. I can easily imagine someone cutting that up in a couple of seconds and the bike is gone
Bolt croppers wouldn’t work on a 3" rail so they’re going to have to saw through it - that either takes a hacksaw and a long time or involves an angle grinder lot of noise & sparks.
The problem is that there aren;t enough dedicated parking spaces for M/C only and it is a nightmare parking in central London. So many empty spaces for disabled badge holders though.
I’m up for it, i have a better idea though, we do what they do, park the bike up, get 6+ of us and hide out in a van get go pro’ed up with video cameras then when they come up and start fiddling with the bikes, we jump out completely covered up with paintball guns and just unleash.
nones getting killed but it will hurt like hell, cover them in paint and the bike will not get damaged!! Something along these lines would work well and mean we don’t get in to much trouble.
I don’t think you’ll necessarily be dealing with ‘a few chavs’, it’s well known that a lot of bike thefts in London are carried out by organised eastern european gangs. I would be more interested in a sting operation where the theft is secretly filmed, the van and the thieving scum followed and filmed, then maybe do this a couple of times and approach the media (TV/newspapers) because approaching the police won’t get you anywhere.
that’s all well and good parked up for the night at home but how do you carry all that when your out and about?
you don’t, or many don’t carry anything, not even a disc lock…
that said i know of loads of well secured bikes going missing, many from underground car parks that are supposedly secure and out of the way, often chains are cut through, even an Almax are not gonna stop them.
trackers work, if the thief doesn’t or cant find it, ones that page you or call you are very good, but what if your say 10 mins away from the bike?..
it would be great to paintball them if you catch them in the act, but you prob get nicked for it.
also a mate recently had an attempted theft on his R1, he run out with a bat, 4 of them causally backed off, they came back later that night and tried to kick his front door in.
becarefull some of them are the kind you really dont want to have to row with in everyday life let alone trying to stop them nicking summit.
South London its a gang called the Depford rats, I think more value would be had in following the bike to its final storage / dismantling location, I don’t think it would be wise to advocate any physical or illegal action on a public forum, we do have contact here with the serious auto crime copper, who after speaking with him I’m sure would act swiftly on information received.
I can’t remember the last time a copper acted swiftly on bike theft, honestly they don’t give a rats arse and it really p$$'s me off. It’s apparently okay for us to lose out on our possesions and then pay higher insurance and not be able to do anything about it…brilliant!! I love living in london.
There have been a number of reports of bikes nicked with trackers etc and the police not even bothering to turn up at the known location of a stolen bike.
I’m sure that’s the exception rather that the rule but it doesn’t exactly fill you with confidence.
All jokes aside we need to do something, i think a bike with bits of the engine disconnected so it does not start is a good idea. monitor the area/bike with lots of camera then hand it over to the police. If nothing else if will put people off doing it as they will never know if there being filmed. They did it with cars a few years back and it dropped they in some areas by 60%!
I think I remember someone doing it with a mk1 escort,
They left the keys in the drivers door, when someone attempted to start the engine. The doors locked the engine turned over ( but wouldn’t start) and the air vent blew bubbles out… It was hilarious!
look I’m not the biggest fan of the beat bobby especially after loosing two bikes in a year with very little help from them, however as from my last post which you poowhod also this guy does actually give a rats ass, we can all site around pi55ing and moaning or get on and do something about it, so with that said either get with the program or stop posting negatively for the sake of running your post counter up
:Whistling: