CTA took my bike, and I almost didn’t find out. Help me change this for others.
I recently locked my bike to a bus stop pole in front of the Fullerton el station. When I returned the following night, the bike was gone— and my U-bolt sat on the ground, sawed in two.
I reported the theft to the police and to my insurance agency. To be fair, when I returned to the bus stop that night, I saw a sign, a few inches down from the CTA route sign, that I had never seen before (and I had passed by the stop many times): it warned that bikes locked to the pole could be removed.
I e-mailed CTA customer service to ask if it was possible that one of their employees took it. And if so, if it was normal practice to take a bike without leaving a notice.
I asked, too, whether— if that was the case— the CTA recorded the serial numbers of the bikes it took.
An agent quickly wrote back to apologize for the inconvenience, adding, “On occasion, we have bicycles abandoned at racks at CTA stations; we post a note on the rack to give the owner time to claim the bike. However, if no note was ever posted as a warning, then we will forward this information to the responsible General Manager for corrective action.”
I later came across a Web page that said that if a bike were taken quickly, without any warning, it was probably a thief, and not the transit agency.
That was that, I figured; if the CTA had my bike, the serial number would get cross-referenced with the police report, and I’d be notified.
I bought a new bike, along with the accessories I had lost. Yet I couldn’t get over how someone could saw through a U-bolt lock in front of a 24-hour station with a security guard— and on a busy thoroughfare, no less.
I did some more searching on the Web and found this on the CTA’s site: “Cyclists are prohibited from securing bicycles to handrails, railings, doors, ramps and stairways, or in any way blocking access to and from stations. Bicycles in violation of these regulations and/or creating a public safety hazard will be tagged and removed without notice. CTA will store these bicycles for 30 days. When in doubt, cyclists should ask CTA Station personnel.”
I went back to the station and asked the agent on duty if it could have been the CTA. Oh, yeah, he said; you shouldn’t lock up your bike to a bus stop pole. (Thanks.)
The Web page also mentioned that cyclists could call a toll-free number or e-mail the Bike and Ride Program Manager directly. So, I e-mailed the program manager, asking if the transit agency catalogued the serial numbers of the bikes they took— and whether they reported them to the police, or to the National Bike Registry.
I never heard back.
I decided to go out to the garage on the West Side where removed bikes are stored. It had taken some doing to find the address online— 3920 W. Maypole Ave., just off Pulaski Rd— but I eventually reached the garage.
They had my bike, and I got it back.
Back to why I’m posting this: I want to petition the CTA, in a respectful way, to start cataloging the serial numbers of bikes it removes. It seems only fair that a police report get cross-referenced with the inventory of a government agency. I don’t want what happened to me to happen to anyone else.
Can anyone help?
Even with ideas of an advocacy group that could offer assistance?
Views: 1365
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John Greenfield on
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Well, the City's bicycle ordinances explicitly state that it's
legal to lock bikes to sign poles, so this seems to be a conflict with CTA
policy - see below. I will consult the authorities on this.
John Greenfield
9-52-070 Parking - Permalink
No person shall park a bicycle upon a street other than upon the roadway against the curb or upon the sidewalk against a rack, parking meter or sign pole to support the bicycle or against a building or at the curb in such manner as to afford the least obstruction to pedestrian traffic.
Added Coun. J. 7-12-90, p. 18634; Amend Coun. J. 7-21-04, p. 28659, § 1
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Permalink Reply by Jan on
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M.A.R.K. said:
The sign post may indeed be the property of the CTA, but that sign post is located on municipal property.
John Greenfield said:Well, the City's bicycle ordinances explicitly state that it's
legal to lock bikes to sign poles, so this seems to be a conflict with CTA
policy - see below. I will consult the authorities on this.
John Greenfield
9-52-070 Parking - Permalink
No person shall park a bicycle upon a street other than upon the roadway against the curb or upon the sidewalk against a rack, parking meter or sign pole to support the bicycle or against a building or at the curb in such manner as to afford the least obstruction to pedestrian traffic.
Added Coun. J. 7-12-90, p. 18634; Amend Coun. J. 7-21-04, p. 28659, § 1
I think the conflict here possibly is the difference between city property, and private property.. The city says you can do certain things on their property, while the CTA says you cannot on theirs. Bus stops and the like are their property, and they do not want people locking and abandoning bikes to their property.
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Permalink Reply by Pablo on
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I don't want to be the bad guy here, but once in a while I see a bike parked in the bus stop at Chicago and Milwaukee right where they let people out of the Eastbound bus. The parked bike blocks exiting passengers when the bus can not pull up all the way. I would guess this policy is an attempt to solve this problem. When locking up just keep in mind the other users in our busy urban environment.
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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I think the problem with the CTA policy isn't that bikes aren't allowed to park to bus stop signs, but that when bikes are removed they are not taken to 1 known facilty and there is not a clear record of the bike, seriel number, date, time, and location of removal and where the bike is located.
Pablo said:I don't want to be the bad guy here, but once in a while I see a bike parked in the bus stop at Chicago and Milwaukee right where they let people out of the Eastbound bus. The parked bike blocks exiting passengers when the bus can not pull up all the way. I would guess this policy is an attempt to solve this problem. When locking up just keep in mind the other users in our busy urban environment.
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Permalink Reply by Tank-Ridin' Ryan on
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Ok....
My bike is located in my apartment. My apartment is owned by my landlord. Therefore, my landlord owns my bike.
Following my (and your) faulty logic here?
Jan said:
M.A.R.K. said:
The sign post may indeed be the property of the CTA, but that sign post is located on municipal property.
John Greenfield said:Well, the City's bicycle ordinances explicitly state that it's
legal to lock bikes to sign poles, so this seems to be a conflict with CTA
policy - see below. I will consult the authorities on this.
John Greenfield
9-52-070 Parking - Permalink
No person shall park a bicycle upon a street other than upon the roadway against the curb or upon the sidewalk against a rack, parking meter or sign pole to support the bicycle or against a building or at the curb in such manner as to afford the least obstruction to pedestrian traffic.
Added Coun. J. 7-12-90, p. 18634; Amend Coun. J. 7-21-04, p. 28659, § 1
I think the conflict here possibly is the difference between city property, and private property.. The city says you can do certain things on their property, while the CTA says you cannot on theirs. Bus stops and the like are their property, and they do not want people locking and abandoning bikes to their property.
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Permalink Reply by Brendan Kevenides on
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I think I agree with Liz and Pablo.
Liz said:I think the problem with the CTA policy isn't that bikes aren't allowed to park to bus stop signs, but that when bikes are removed they are not taken to 1 known facilty and there is not a clear record of the bike, seriel number, date, time, and location of removal and where the bike is located.
Pablo said:I don't want to be the bad guy here, but once in a while I see a bike parked in the bus stop at Chicago and Milwaukee right where they let people out of the Eastbound bus. The parked bike blocks exiting passengers when the bus can not pull up all the way. I would guess this policy is an attempt to solve this problem. When locking up just keep in mind the other users in our busy urban environment.
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Permalink Reply by Michael Perz on
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I believe the following is more relevant:
9-52-070 Parking
No person shall park a bicycle upon a street other than upon the roadway against the curb or upon the sidewalk against a rack, parking meter or sign pole to support the bicycle or against a building or at the curb in such manner as to afford the least obstruction to pedestrian traffic.
John Greenfield said:Well, the City's bicycle ordinances explicitly state that it's
legal to lock bikes to sign poles, so this seems to be a conflict with CTA
policy - see below. I will consult the authorities on this.
John Greenfield
9-52-070 Parking - Permalink
No person shall park a bicycle upon a street other than upon the roadway against the curb or upon the sidewalk against a rack, parking meter or sign pole to support the bicycle or against a building or at the curb in such manner as to afford the least obstruction to pedestrian traffic.
Added Coun. J. 7-12-90, p. 18634; Amend Coun. J. 7-21-04, p. 28659, § 1
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Permalink Reply by heather s on
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I have no real facts to base this on, so maybe I should just keep it to myself (but then what would the Internet even be for, right?). But I imagine you'd get farther either asking the CTA to hand the bikes over to the cops, who could then check it against their own records, or asking the CTA to put a sticker on the bus sign poles telling people not to lock there.
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Permalink Reply by Active Transportation Alliance on
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Active Trans will reach out to our contacts at the CTA to see if we can find out any additional information about this situation and if a policy change would be possible.
We'll report back as soon as we can.
David, do you have a complaint reference number or something similar that would help us connect this with CTA?
Thanks much,
Ethan, with Active Trans
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Permalink Reply by David on
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Thank you very much, H3N3, for your acknowledgment of my issue and bringing the focus back to a strategy. Going to read on and see what others may have said...
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Thanks, Ethan. I'll look for the police report. Will get back to you.
Thanks for your help.
To Heather and Cameron: To be fair, I think it's enough to have the sign (beneath the route sign) that says, effectively, don't lock your bike here. The thing is, I've passed by that pole a thousand times, and I don't remember EVER seeing that sign. I suspect that they put it up AFTER they took my bike.
If that's so, how could I-- or the average cyclist-- have known not to lock a bike there?
In any case, I think it would be nice if they left a sticker, or note, or whatever when they remove your bike, so that who-knows-how-many-people in this city can get their bikes back. But I'll settle for the one thing I've been asking for: Simply to have a database of serial numbers that the police can cross-reference.
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The problem with this proposal is that not all people bother to document the serial numbers of their bikes, some bikes have the serial number stamped in places that people wouldn't know to look, and some bikes even have no serial numbers at all. To establish some sort of system to attempt to catalog every bike that gets taken to their storage facility would be a colossal waste of labor and resources considering the very low number of people that might possibly benefit from it. Be glad that they have the courtesy to store your bike for a month free of charge, don't lock your bike where people get on and off of buses anymore and leave it at that.
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