Bikes, bikes, (and bike thieves) everywhere

Bikes are everywhere in Amsterdam, but so are bike thieves, who swipe tens of thousands of bikes every year. So, where do all these stolen bikes end up? Are they sold in other cities or countries? Dumped in canals? Or used around town by unsuspecting riders?

Mobile trackers show stolen bicycles end up…

The mystery has been solved thanks to a collaboration between MIT and the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions. By attaching mobile trackers to a fleet of Amsterdam bicycles and keeping tabs on their whereabouts, the research team discovered that most stolen bikes stay within the city. A good number are resold and end up being used by other people, but only a few leave the area.

Fabio Duarte, principal research scientist at MIT’s Senseable City Lab and co-author of a new paper detailing the experiment’s results, said:

“I think the most surprising thing was that it’s happening locally. We thought bikes might be stolen and sent abroad. We found they are used in the same [locations]. If they’re stolen and sold, the new owner uses the bike in the same areas, probably without knowing it was stolen.

How the “stolen bike” research was conducted

The experiment was conducted on 100 second-hand bikes, tagged with low-cost tracking devices, locked in public locations and monitored from June to November 2021. During that time, 70 bikes were stolen, with most of them remaining in the local area. Out of the 68 that stayed, some spent enough time near second-hand bike stores to suggest they were probably sold there. The rest were taken to spots where informal bike sales occur. The researchers also found that some of the stolen bikes were part of the same “subnetwork” of bikes, moving in similar ways.

You let them get away!?!

The study provided valuable information about bike theft in Amsterdam and was shared with the city officials working to address the problem. The experiment was not used to catch thieves or pursue criminal cases, and the team stopped collecting data to preserve privacy.

The researchers noted that the experiment could be used for other purposes beyond bike theft, like tracking other stolen goods and providing insights for urban design.