A friend recently had her bike stolen. This brought me back to that one morning when I left my apartment to unlock my bike and found it missing. While I knew that bike theft happens at an alarming rate in Chicago, I was stunned when I happened to me. There are a lot of things you can do to prevent the theft of your bike but despite that it’s still possible to become a victim.
Here are some of the things that I did when my bike was stolen and also things that I learned when it happened to me. Some of these are Chicago-specific, but can apply to other locations as well.
If you are in that situation and your bike is stolen. There are some things you can do to increase the slim chance that you’ll get your bike back
- Examine the site where your bike was stolen, take pictures, recover any broken locks, see if there are any surveillance cameras that may have caught the theft
- File a police report. You can do this by calling 311 or by going to your local police station
- Make a listing at http://chicago.stolenbike.org
- Alert your friends to your loss via social networking and put them on the alert. The cycling community, www.thechainlink.org has a thread for listing stolen bikes as well.
- There are several other Internet-wide stolen bike registries that you can use as well, though some do involve fees.
If your bike is stolen, hopefully it won’t completely turn you off from cycling. You may have some recourse for getting on the road again.
- If you were using a U-Lock, you can look into if the company offers replacement guarantees. This can mean a lot of hoops through which to jump and take some time, but may provide some financial reimbursement. You generally need a piece of the broken lock.
- Your home or renters insurance may cover your stolen bike. Whether or not to make a claim is up to you, and will almost certainly increase your rates and you’ll have to meet a deductible of some kind.
- Borrowing a bike from a friend can help get you on the road again and keep your spirits up.
If you are set on doing whatever you can to get your own bike back here are some things that you can do:
- Browse Craigslist. Some stolen bikes turn up there. Often they are not being sold by the thief, but by someone else who purchased the bike from a shady person. You can also create a post about your stolen bike. It’s free, but you may get spam.
- Set a Google alert and be emailed whenever a bike like yours is listed on ebay or craigslist (Note- some sellers intentionally spell names wrong, or don’t include sizes, so you may get too many listings or won’t get your listing at all)
- Visit pawn shops and resellers. Pawn shops supposedly have rules against buying stolen merchandise, but there’s always a chance it could turn up at one or a shady bike shop.
- Do a sweep of a swap. This is probably the most likely place where you’ll get results, but is also a place where there is some risk involved. I’ll I have a post entirely about that here.
I never did recover my bike. I actually let searching for my bike take on a little bit of an obsession for a couple of months and spent a lot of time looking for it. Even after I filed an insurance claim and had a new bike, I kept on looking. Hundreds of bikes are stolen annually in Chicago, however only a small number are recovered. It took me a while to realize that I did what I could. At that point I let myself really love my new bike.
While it happened under unfortunate circumstances, I do feel like I have a better bike since I was able to utilize the knowledge that I’d gained through my years of riding. I feel like it fits me better, its a higher quality bike and I’ve loved getting to customize it from the start. I’m okay.
Having your bike stolen is a sad event. If you know of any additional resources, or want to share your bike theft story, please leave a comment.
