(All photos © J. Maus)
Portland is tied for the fifth spot on Kryptonite’s latest list of the Top 10 Worst Cities for Bike Theft.
The results are from 2007 and they were posted to the Kryptonite blog today. Joining Portland in the top five are Philadephia, Chicago, San Francisco, New York City, and Tucson.
According to Kryptonite spokeswoman Donna Tocci, the list is compiled by proprietary data with “input from regional managers, hundreds of bike shop visits, input from colleges and universities, customer service interactions and data from police in various cities.”
In 2006, Portland was tied for ninth place on the list, so things appear to be getting worse.
is also a good deterrent.
There has been a lot of stolen bike activity in North and Northeast Portland recently.
Last week, Gabriel Tiller and his friend got their bikes stolen. When he got a tip from a friend about the bikes being in the area around Jefferson High School and Portland Community College on NE Killingsworth Ave, a call for action was put out on local email lists and a posse of 15 showed up to look for the bikes. A few hours later (with help from the Portland Police Bureau) three bikes had been recovered — but several others are still missing.
With summer approaching, bike theft season is likely to heat up.
Robert Pickett is a Neighborhood Response Team officer with the Portland Police Bureau who reviews police reports by patrol officers from inner southeast neighborhoods like Buckman, Sunnyside, Kerns, Laurelhurst and others.
“Recording the serial number is the key factor in increasing chances of recovering the bicycle later.”
— Portland Police officer Robert Pickett
He said he’s “been struck by similarities” in reports of bikes stolen from porches over the past few months. Pickett says the theft victims were all surprised at their bike’s disappearance and he noted that all the bikes were locked with only cable locks (some weren’t locked at all).
“I know many people don’t have garages in which to store their bikes,” advises Pickett, “but the next best thing is definitely a U-lock, and back yards and porches are better th an front, but still not completely safe.”
Pickett also strongly recommends that people record their bike’s serial number, noting that it’s “the key factor in increasing chances of recovering the bicycle later.”
If you want to keep your bike, make sure it’s always locked with a U-lock and review some important bike theft information here. (Note: The BikePortland.org/Finetoothcog Stolen Bike Listings are currently down. Hope to have them up and running again soon.)