Why Do Most Bike Thieves Get Away With It?

In today's Los Angeles Times, an editorial writer asked the question on the minds of many cyclists:

"Why are cities allowing bicycle theft to go virtually unpunished?"

The editorial points out something that most of us already know:  Bike theft simply isn't a high priority, if it's a priority at all, for most police departments.  There are a variety of reasons, valid or not, for this.  One is that police tend to concentrate on high-profile, high-value crimes.  So a stolen Maserati gets more attention than a missing Masi, possibly because insurance companies and lawyers are likely to have similar priorities.  

Another reason might be one a police officer expressed to me:  "Well, if you have a good lock and insurance policy, you can replace your bike."  This is true, up to a point:  Most policies--whether from lock makers or insurance companies, have deductibles.  But, even if a bike's owner is reimbursed for its full value, he or she may not be able to replace the stolen bike with another like it, especially if it is a custom or discontinued model. 

Even if a cyclist is reimbursed for the full price he or she paid for the bike, that amount of money probably won't buy as good a bike as the one that was taken, especially if the bike is more than a couple of years old.   And, of course, the deductibles and depreciation mean that the cyclist is likely to get considerably less than he or she paid for the bike.

From Priceconomics

What that means is that the newly-bikeless rider will buy a lower-quality bike than the one that was stolen--that is, if he or she buys another bike at all.  The LA Times editorial points out that according to one study, 7 percent of bike-theft victims in Montreal never replace their bikes.

The article makes a point that for many cyclists (such as yours truly), not having a bike is not merely an inconvenience.  An increasing number of people, mainly in cities, are depending on their bikes for everyday transportation.   Most of us aren't rich:  According to a Federal government survey cited in the editorial, the people most likely to cycle (or, for that matter, walk) to work, school or errands--or simply to get around--are those with household incomes of less than $10,000 a year.  That group of people is likely to include, in addition to low-wage workers, the unemployed, retirees and students.  

Also in that group  are many who make their livings on their bicycles.  For a year, I was one.  In nearly every city--and in some suburban and even rural areas--there is an army of folks who deliver everything from documents to dim sum on their wheels.  For them, losing their bikes is catastrophic.

And they, as often as not, are the least able to afford to buy another bike of any kind.  In much the same way that Kim Kardashian being robbed of 10 million dollars' worth of jewelry is not going to affect her lifestyle as much as the average person is affected by losing the watch he or she wears every day, the guy (or woman) who loses a Porsche can more easily afford to replace it than the delivery person who purchased a Peugeot U-08 from a tag sale.

That, I believe, might be the most important "take away" from that L.A. Times editorial.  It may be that law enforcement authorities still see bicyclists losing their bikes as kids losing their toys but someone whose luxury sports car is stolen as the victim of a "real" crime.  Unless that changes, bike theft will be a mostly-unsolved crime and bike thefts will continue to be under-reported.

New Museum For Old Bikes In Newburgh?

I have been to Newburgh, New York twice in my life.  Both times I got there on my bicycle:  once on a day trip there and back from New York City, another time during a long weekend mini-tour of the Catskills.  

Although a decade separated the two visits, I had almost exactly the same impression both times:  It's rather like a miniature, and more compressed, version of The Big Apple, my hometown.  What I mean is that it's the sort of place where you can see grandeur and despair side by side, and see them together again on the next block, and the block after that.  

It's as architecturally and historically rich as any place I've seen in the US.  I say that as someone who has spent time in large cities like San Francisco, Boston and Philadelphia (and, of course, New York) as well as smaller but impressive towns like Savannah and Providence.  The Downing Mansion would be impressive anywhere, but its setting on the Hudson River, with the mountains in the background, makes it even more so. 

Nearby is the house that served as George Washington's headquarters during the final year of the American Revolution.  It was there that he issued the Proclamation of Peace, effectively ending the war and beginning the independent American nation.  In that house, he also rejected the idea that he should be king and ended the so-called Newburgh Conspiracy that would have left the government controlled by the military.  And, while there, he also conceived or made other contributions to the founding of this country, including ones that influenced the writing of the Constitution.

That house became the first publicly owned historic site in the United States.  The Downing Mansion and other beautiful old houses have been preserved through doting private owners or the efforts of organizations devoted to preservation.  

But literally steps (or pedal strokes) away from those houses is urban blight that reminds people of places like Camden NJ or the South Bronx during the 1970s and '80's.  I saw lots, and even whole blocks, that looked as if bombs had been dropped on them.  In fact, they are the remnants of "urban-renewal" projects begun and aborted or abandoned, for a variety of reasons, decades ago.  And there were other blocks where people huddled up in homes splintered and full of holes, like coats they wore through one winter after another.

Many of those people, I learned, were parolees, current and former addicts and welfare recipients placed in those houses by social service agencies because there weren't any affordable places nearby.  Yes, it was essentially a taxpayer-funded Skid Row.  

But there have been attempts to "bring back" Newburgh.  Across the river, the town of Beacon is often called "Williamsburg on the Hudson" because of the hipsters and gentrifiers that have created a colony of trendy restaurants, bars, galleries, microbreweries and the like.  A similar wave is, from what I hear, finding its way to Newburgh.  

Actually, one successful attempt to keep an historic structure from falling apart--or falling altogether--has been the creation of a motorcycle museum by a city native.  Gerald Doering bought a 1929 Indian Scout locally in 1947, when he was twenty years old.  He loved it, and motorcycling generally, so much that he rode it to Miami, where he sought work with a Newburgh dealership that relocated there.

When that didn't work out, he started an electrical contracting business--and the seeds of his collection, which is centered on the Indian brand and bikes from the early days of motorcycling.  That collection became the foundation for Motorcyclepedia, the museum they opened in 2011.

Motorcyclepedia board member Jean Lara with one of the bicycles to be housed in Velocipede, a bicycle museum planned in Newburgh, NY.  (Photo by Leonard Sparks of the Times Herald-Record.)

Turns out, he and his son were also collecting bicycles, also mainly from that period, though some are earlier.  In a way, it's not so surprising, when you consider that most of the early motorcycle makers (and some current ones) were originally bicycle manufacturers.   Moreover, bicycles and motorcycles were even more similar in those days than they are now.  

Now Doering pere and fils are seeking approval from the Newburgh planning board for a museum called "Velocipede", which they want to house in a former labor union hall they purchased in December 2015. 

Hmm...I may have to make another trip to Newburgh.  I'd like to do it on my bike, again!

Today Is Bicycle Day. And It's A Real Trip

Sometimes people give a knowing (or think-they-know) grin when I tell them I took a trip on a bike.  Yes, even at my age, at this late date. 

I'm sure many people reacted in the same way--or less approvingly--when they saw the title of Tom Cuthbertson's Bike Tripping.  It's one of those primers, if you will, that came out during the '70's North American Bike Boom.  Most of the advice in it is still pretty sound, even if some of what he says about equipment is dated.  And, as with Cuthbertson's other books, it can be enjoyed for its witty tone and those fun illustrations from his friend Rick Morrall.

First of all, the book came out in 1972--one year after Cuthbertson's first classic, Anybody's Bike Book.  Although the calendar may have said the world was in the 1970s, in many ways,  it was still the late '60's, complete with the anti-war and environmental movements.  And hippies. (Cuthbertson's books looked like they were created by hippies.  And he looked like one.) And, of course, drugs.

Among the drugs of that time was Lysergic Acid Diathymalide-25, better known to the world as LSD or simply "acid".  Although it still has a stigma from the overdoses and the people who had terrifying visions while taking it, there are still researchers who are trying to find ways to use it for which it was intended:  medical purposes.

At least, that was the way Albert Hofmann intended it.  He was the Swiss scientist who first synthesized it, in 1938, as   a stimulant for the circulatory and respiratory systems.  He learned of its true power five years later, when he accidentally absorbed some into his fingertips.  The "not unpleasant intoxicated-like condition" he experienced intrigued him enough that he did what any intensely curious researcher would do:  He experimented on himself.

On 19 April 1943, he took what he thought was an appropriate threshold dose:  250 milligrams.  That was a bit too  much; today we know that a standard dose is 200 mg. (I am using the imperial "we":  I have no firsthand experience!)  Within an hour, his perception began to ebb and flow rapidly.  Then he became the first person to "freak out":  He was convinced that his neighbor was a witch, and he was going insane.  He wanted to go home.

In 1943, wartime restrictions were in place, which meant that, like many other people, Hofmann had no access to a car.  So he rode his bicycle.  

Image by jibberjabber

That trip home was a stressful one:  His vision wavered and he felt as though he were motionless.  After he reached the climax of his condition, however, he came back from a "weird, unfamiliar world" to reassuring everyday reality.

Albert Hofmann, therefore, took the world's acid trip.  And he did it on his bike.  That is why 19 April is celebrated as Bicycle Day--though I think Bicycle Trip Day might be more appropriate.