Prevent Phoenix Bicycle Theft
05/16/2016
Downtown Phoenix is such a great area to spend the weekends biking around going cafe to cafe and bar to bar. Which means your form of transportation, your bicycle, is important to enjoy the nice weekends out. Every year there are approximately 1.5 million bicycles stolen throughout the U.S. and that’s just the bikes that are reported stolen. Over 5000 bicycles were reported stolen in Phoenix last year alone. Check out this blog we’ve put together for you on how to prevent bicycle theft in Phoenix.
How To Prevent Bike Theft
In Phoenix, there is a local bicycle shop that took it upon themselves to create the Phoenix Stolen Bicycle Registry. Aside from that, there is also the National Bicycle Registry also known as the NBR. The NBR helps combat bicycle registration, and it’s so helpful that if a bicycle is stolen, it is nine times more likely to be found than if you hadn’t registered the bicycle. When you register the bicycle, it will then be entered into it’s database that your local and federal law agencies have access to. For $10 you can use the NBR’s services for 10 years, that’s $1 a year, which is a pretty cheap investment to add a layer of safety and protection for your bicycle. If your bicycle is unfortunately stolen and is registered with NBR and it isn’t recovered, the NBR will provide you a free 10-year registration for your next bicycle.
Buy a tamper-proof bicycle lock.
One of the strongest and most common bicycle locks you can get is a U-lock. The shape of the “U” makes it so that potential bike thieves are unable to pry it open and the steel cabling inside makes it almost impossible for them to cut. Bicycle U-locks are surprisingly affordable too, when you weight the cost of a lock to the cost of your bicycle, it’s completely worth the investment. Don’t know where to find a bicycle lock that fits your needs? Check out Amazon.
Lock your bike to something secure and in a high traffic area.
Let’s be honest, you’re probably not really wanting to keep your bike for too long if you lock it in an alleyway away from the public eye or locked to a parking meter on the main streets. Lock your bike to a place that someone can’t lift it off of or easily break or cut whatever your bike is latched onto as well. A parking meter or street sign might seem secure but all it takes is for the thief to lift the bike higher than the sign or meter and off comes the bike and there goes the thief off with their new bicycle.
What To Do If Your Bike Is Stolen
While we are hoping that this is never your fate, there are many possible ways you can help recover your bicycle:
Contact the police.
If your bicycle is stolen make sure you file a police report as soon as possible, call the non-emergency phone number of your local police department and file a police report for your stolen bicycle. Make sure you follow up with the police a few times to see if there has been any progress made toward the recovery of your bicycle, or just to remind them to keep an eye out on the lookout for your unfortunately stolen bicycle.
Alert local pawn shops.
Most pawn shops around Arizona actually run the serial number of your bicycle against police records and stolen bicycle records before they’ll buy a bicycle from you, so if your bicycle is stolen, there is a good chance a pawn shop can recover it as well, even if a pawn shop doesn’t run the serial number, make sure you visit the local pawn shops and ask around and alert the employees of your stolen bicycle.
Check Craigslist.
Would you be surprised if we said that not every criminal is the sharpest tool in the shed? A lot of criminals steal stuff and don’t know how to make money off of it so they go straight to Craigslist to try and sell the stolen loot. If you find your bicycle on craigslist or another online selling website, do not try to retrieve it yourself, contact the police immediately and inform them of the craigslist advertisement and they will recover your bicycle for you all while keeping you safe and away from the criminal.
In the meantime, your safety and well being is one of our biggest concerns here at Titan Alarm, we want to make sure your house or business is just as safe as your bike is, let us get you a customized solution for your needs. Give us a call today 602-680-4567!
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Updated by Titan Alarm on November 5, 2018.
