Bicycle Security

July 25th, 2008 by Potato

A bike thief was captured by the UWO police this week, and they gave a few tips about bicycle security in the article describing it. One tip was to take your seat with you if you have a quick-release seat. This is something I’ve seen a number of people do and always wondered about. Why do it? I would think by now with my history I should know that thieves are retarded and random, but do people really steal the seats off bikes? Is there a big second-hand market for bike seats? Is it a vandalism thing? Or is it to make it more difficult for a thief to ride off with your bike if they do try to steal it?

Posted in Everything Else, London Stuff | 2 Comments »

2 Responses to “Bicycle Security”

  1. Ben Says:
    July 27th, 2008 at 5:52 pm

    I’m sure some bike nuts could/would pay a hundred dollars or more for some squishy, contoured, space gel seats, so I’d imagine that if these were quick release they’d be a prime target for bike thieves. But I think the main reason would be your last point, unless it’s the middle of the night and they’re just going to throw the bike into a waiting van, they’re probably not going to want to ride off on a bike with no seat if there are plenty of other bikes around that do have seats. I guess it’s a similar concept to “the club”, thieves aren’t looking for a challenge, unless they’re in some overly glamorized, completely unrealistic heist movie, what they’re looking for is an easy target.

  2. Potato Says:
    July 28th, 2008 at 3:38 pm

    You make a good point. I think I might start taking my seat off when I’m up at campus, as much as it sounds like a pain (I’m not as worried at the hospital, security watches our bikes via security cameras and have caught a number of bike thieves there — I think the bikes are better guarded than the cars).

    I also finally got around to taking a picture of my bike in the house and wrote down the serial number. The next step will be to register it with the campus police and etch something (my email address?) into the paint…