Milton Keynes Central "Worst for bike thefts"

[thenorthern]

Just seen this in The Daily Mail:

Revealed: Milton Keynes station is the worst place to leave your bike in Britain while thefts are also rife in Cambridge, London and Portsmouth

• Milton Keynes, East London and Cambridge top of the list for bike thefts
• They are also commonly stolen in Birmingham, Slough and Manchester
• Study finds nearly 82,000 bikes were stolen in 12 months to September
• Worst place to leave a bike is Elder Gate at Milton Keynes train station

Locations in Milton Keynes, Cambridge and East London are the worst places to leave your bicycle in England and Wales, a study revealed today.
Bikes have also most commonly been taken from areas of Manchester, Birmingham, Slough, Southend-on-Sea and Portsmouth over the past year.
The research also revealed that in the 12 months to September nearly 82,000 bikes were stolen – the equivalent of about 225 a day or almost 1,600 a week.

The worst place to leave your bike is Elder Gate at Milton Keynes Central railway station, according to the study of police data by insurer Protect Your Bubble.

In the past year 72 were stolen from the parking area on the street and 19 more from another location on the road, which runs around the front of the station.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3986186/Milton-Keynes-station-worst-place-leave-bike-Britain-thefts-rife-Cambridge-London-Portsmouth.html

Seems Milton Keynes is not a place to leave a bike although I never understand why people do leave bikes chained to railing for long periods of time.

I suppose though it defeats the object of what the Milton Keynes Development Corporation wanted when the town was designated in 1967 of a cycle friendly new town.

 

[JamesRowden]

Just seen this in The Daily Mail:



Seems Milton Keynes is not a place to leave a bike although I never understand why people do leave bikes chained to railing for long periods of time.

I suppose though it defeats the object of what the Milton Keynes Development Corporation wanted when the town was designated in 1967 of a cycle friendly new town.

More bikes should attract more thieves. Perhaps more should be invested in security.

 

[Domh245]

It'd be interesting to see this weighted for bike usage - a city like Cambridge which is very bike friendly and thus has a lot of bikes would naturally have more bikes stolen from it than somewhere that isn't as bike friendly with less bikes in it...

 

[charley_17/7]

Thames Valley Police are responsible for bike thefts at MKC, rather than BTP, due to the forecourt/porte cochere area being owned by Milton Keynes Council/MKDP, rather than the 'railway'.

Ever since the new facility at MKC opened there has been issues with it. Despite being right underneath CCTV cameras, the lighting has been subject to many failures, and during the daytime is only overlooked by passing pedestrians. Problem is that people buy expensive, attractive bikes, but don't bother with decent locks.

Same with begging, which there is no need for with a homeless shelter (in the old Bus Station/Buzsy) opposite.

Now, if London Midland provided bike parking on the platforms, like in more enlightened areas of their franchise, I think the figures would be very different.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I'm actually surprised that thefts from the new racks are so high because it's such a public area where there are people around most times of the day and night. I'd expect thefts from Bletchley, where it's a bit hidden away in the old goods area, to be higher.

That said, the new bus station is turning Station Square into an area much more like bus stations elsewhere, with a *lot* more antisocial behaviour than before it was built.

 

[thenorthern]

It'd be interesting to see this weighted for bike usage - a city like Cambridge which is very bike friendly and thus has a lot of bikes would naturally have more bikes stolen from it than somewhere that isn't as bike friendly with less bikes in it...

Most unfriendly for cyclists? Got to be Stoke-on-Trent.

I am surprised though that Manchester Piccadilly is so high whoever manages to cycle there is a super human.

 

[HLE]

A D lock (kryptonite), steel chain and robust padlock plus a cable lock should be more than enough to make thieves leave a bike alone.

 

[Cliveblackpool]

A D lock (kryptonite), steel chain and robust padlock plus a cable lock should be more than enough to make thieves leave a bike alone.

good advice

How secure is your bicycle lock?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pywN558dJaU&spfreload=10

 

[Butts]

They have just installed a new "Double Decker" Bike Rack at Falkirk Grahamston - never seen anything like it

 

[pitdiver]

We have a Double Deck cycle rack in Flitwick,there is also one at Bedford Midland.

 

[Clip]

I'm actually surprised that thefts from the new racks are so high because it's such a public area where there are people around most times of the day and night. .

Very public areas are the best places to steal a bike from - I mean if someone is bent over fiddling with the lock then it just looks like theyre unlocking them. They dont generally steal them with big bolt cutters and such that you may see in the movies or tv shows.

 

[ys123]

Most unfriendly for cyclists? Got to be Stoke-on-Trent.

I am surprised though that Manchester Piccadilly is so high whoever manages to cycle there is a super human.

What's super human about cycling to Manchester Piccadilly, I do it often. Please elaborate...

In the report did they release what percentage of bikes had proper locks? I think it makes a big difference if most people at station A use D locks then naturally they'll have less bikes stolen than Station B where most people use average locks.

 

[thenorthern]

What's super human about cycling to Manchester Piccadilly, I do it often. Please elaborate...

With all the traffic in the city centre it just seems a hard thing to do.

In the report did they release what percentage of bikes had proper locks? I think it makes a big difference if most people at station A use D locks then naturally they'll have less bikes stolen than Station B where most people use average locks.

Are you suggesting that people may be using the bike locks that will open when lightly tapped with a metal object or the ones that have the same key as every other lock of the same make?

Both of these type of locks exist.

 

[ys123]

With all the traffic in the city centre it just seems a hard thing to do.



Are you suggesting that people may be using the bike locks that will open when lightly tapped with a metal object or the ones that have the same key as every other lock of the same make?

Both of these type of locks exist.

I cycle to Piccadilly from the direction of Bury so I'm lucky enough to have cycle lanes most of the way. It really depends which direction one's coming from.

I was referring to locks that would take a few mins or less to cut through. Typically sell for a fiver or less.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
How about stations having some sort of insurance policy for bikes stolen from stations? Maybe £2-3 a month. There would have to be T&C's like proper locks and maximum time it could be parked there at any one time but it would encourage more people to cycle and it would make the station want to make the bikes more secure from cctv to shelters etc as more secure bikes means less robberies and less payouts...

 

[thenorthern]

I cycle to Piccadilly from the direction of Bury so I'm lucky enough to have cycle lanes most of the way. It really depends which direction one's coming from.

I was referring to locks that would take a few mins or less to cut through. Typically sell for a fiver or less.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
How about stations having some sort of insurance policy for bikes stolen from stations? Maybe £2-3 a month. There would have to be T&C's like proper locks and maximum time it could be parked there at any one time but it would encourage more people to cycle and it would make the station want to make the bikes more secure from cctv to shelters etc as more secure bikes means less robberies and less payouts...

Fair play, coming from Salford the route isn't brilliant

I know at Derby there is a bike shelter where to enter you need a key to enter which you have to register for. You then lock your bike up in the shelter.

At Macclesfield they have bike lockers where you use a standard padlock to store your bike which works quite well.

 

[ys123]

Fair play, coming from Salford the route isn't brilliant

I know at Derby there is a bike shelter where to enter you need a key to enter which you have to register for. You then lock your bike up in the shelter.

At Macclesfield they have bike lockers where you use a standard padlock to store your bike which works quite well.

They have a cycle hub shelter that cost a tenner a year and one can use them at a range of places around Manchester but as of yet Manchester Oxford Road is the only major station that currently is part of the cycle hub scheme. As most of my journeys are either from Victoria or from Piccadilly not in the direction of Oxford Road this is pretty useless for me. http://cycling.tfgm.com/Pages/join-a-hub.aspx

 

[al green]

MKC has space for about 600 bikes in double deck racks. I suspect that the reason for high number of thefts is high number of bikes. If there were only a dozen racks number of thefts would be much smaller.

Most of the anti-social behaviour in Station Sq is committed by car drivers, private cars and private hires. They block the car loop while dropping off/picking up causing huge tail backs that mean in the pm peak it can take more than 10 mins for a bus just to get into the bus lanes.

I'm actually surprised that thefts from the new racks are so high because it's such a public area where there are people around most times of the day and night. I'd expect thefts from Bletchley, where it's a bit hidden away in the old goods area, to be higher.

That said, the new bus station is turning Station Square into an area much more like bus stations elsewhere, with a *lot* more antisocial behaviour than before it was built.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Most of the anti-social behaviour in Station Sq is committed by car drivers, private cars and private hires. They block the car loop while dropping off/picking up causing huge tail backs that mean in the pm peak it can take more than 10 mins for a bus just to get into the bus lanes.

No, that problem isn't anti-social behaviour per-se, it's appalling design. The bus station should never have been, and by its original concept was not, designed to allow that situation to arise - the cars should have had a separate entrance and exit from the buses, and had the original design of a sawtooth bus station on the left (facing away from the station) and car/taxi area on the right been implemented there would not have been a problem - and Station Square would have been far less blighted with ugly plastic bus shelters, as a single, higher-quality and perhaps more architecturally interesting shelter could have been provided because it would have been shorter to cover a sawtooth bus station of maybe 12 bays.

It was a terrible piece of design, which would have been fine as it originally was intended, but some prat at the Council decided, incorrectly, that they knew better. The best bit is that the first iteration of the revised design was designed not for full-size buses but for Optare Solos and Mercedes Beavers, so having built it it had to be ripped out and done again.

The anti-social behaviour to which I refer is more littering, petty vandalism, alcohol consumption etc, not traffic issues. Part of the cause of that, though, is failure to make proper provision for homeless people in MK.

IOW, it's all largely the Council's fault.

 

[jopsuk]

They have just installed a new "Double Decker" Bike Rack at Falkirk Grahamston - never seen anything like it

Quite common at stations across the UK now, used extensively across The Netherlands. most of the almost 2800 spaces in the Cambridge station cycle park are double deck, following Dutch convention

 

[IanD]

No, that problem isn't anti-social behaviour per-se, it's appalling design. The bus station should never have been, and by its original concept was not, designed to allow that situation to arise - the cars should have had a separate entrance and exit from the buses, and had the original design of a sawtooth bus station on the left (facing away from the station) and car/taxi area on the right been implemented there would not have been a problem - and Station Square would have been far less blighted with ugly plastic bus shelters, as a single, higher-quality and perhaps more architecturally interesting shelter could have been provided because it would have been shorter to cover a sawtooth bus station of maybe 12 bays.

It was a terrible piece of design, which would have been fine as it originally was intended, but some prat at the Council decided, incorrectly, that they knew better. The best bit is that the first iteration of the revised design was designed not for full-size buses but for Optare Solos and Mercedes Beavers, so having built it it had to be ripped out and done again.

The anti-social behaviour to which I refer is more littering, petty vandalism, alcohol consumption etc, not traffic issues. Part of the cause of that, though, is failure to make proper provision for homeless people in MK.

IOW, it's all largely the Council's fault.

They could have avoided the bus station congestion problem if they had built the bus station the other way round so that buses entered via the same route as taxis and blue badge holders then they would not be caught up in the jams caused (as al green said) by inconsiderate car and private hire drivers who insist on waiting on the double yellows. Too late to change the bus station bit now but they could reverse the access routes for the other traffic.

Not sure how the Isle of Wight comes in to it but it's definitely the Council's fault.

 

[SPADTrap]

Horrendous and awful place. Not surprised.

 

[Bletchleyite]

They could have avoided the bus station congestion problem if they had built the bus station the other way round so that buses entered via the same route as taxis and blue badge holders then they would not be caught up in the jams caused (as al green said) by inconsiderate car and private hire drivers who insist on waiting on the double yellows. Too late to change the bus station bit now but they could reverse the access routes for the other traffic.

Yes, it'd probably help to swap over the black cab side with the car side.

FWIW, something they appear to have done (which beggars belief) is permitted cars on the second line of bus bays at certain times of day, to allow them to "give up" and get out - but nobody realises this as the signage is quite confusing. I only noticed the odd signage the other day and I'm sure it's been like that for ages.

Another thing that doesn't help is the UK's approach to taxis - in MK the black cabs are often unreliable, untrustworthy and are expensive compared with private hire, so most people use private hire - for which there isn't proper provision. So the "car" bit gets blocked with them.

I don't find people wait for very long on the double yellows in practice - it is mostly used for loading, which is legal and probably quite deliberate. There just isn't enough capacity for the demand. So if the "car" situation won't change, it needs completely separating from public transport to prevent it getting in the way, then cars can queue as they wish.

I have thought of the idea of moving something (possibly cars would be best) downstairs to the "Platform Zero" area - though the trouble with that is that it won't feel very safe (even if it won't *be* unsafe) so I think it would be a very unpopular move. You could of course move the buses back to the old bus station, but then that's a lot less convenient and might cause a reduction in usage.

Not sure how the Isle of Wight comes in to it but it's definitely the Council's fault.

In Other Words...I've obviously been on t'Interweb for too long

 

[Butts]

Quite common at stations across the UK now, used extensively across The Netherlands. most of the almost 2800 spaces in the Cambridge station cycle park are double deck, following Dutch convention

Is that 2800 a misprint....

FKG's must hold about 12 !!!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Quite common at stations across the UK now, used extensively across The Netherlands. most of the almost 2800 spaces in the Cambridge station cycle park are double deck, following Dutch convention

The ones at MKC are too and are very large. Because of a combination of poor local public transport and reasonably-OK dedicated cycle facilities, cycle use in MK is quite high.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Looking at the article again, I wonder where the ones that weren't in the racks were stolen from? Other than the lockers, which might as well be got rid of if they are that insecure, there aren't really other facilities and you don't see them locked to the fences (why would people do that when there's a proper facility on the Square)?

Perhaps those ones were nicked where people took their chances and left them leant up against the wall outside Costa, Subway etc without locking them to anything? It would be nice to be able to do that without fear of them being nicked, but pragmatism says you shouldn't do that any more than you would leave your car running with the keys in the ignition[1], as the chance of a theft is very high, and if insured you won't be covered.

[1] It gobsmacks me that people actually do this.

 

[al78]

Most unfriendly for cyclists? Got to be Stoke-on-Trent.

I am surprised though that Manchester Piccadilly is so high whoever manages to cycle there is a super human.

What do you mean? Whenever I use the train to visit family I cycle from Piccadilly to Swinton (Salford) to get to my fathers house (5 miles) and apart from seemingly endless red traffic lights it is not a bad journey. Cycling from Swinton to Piccadilly is easy as it is a net descent.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Perhaps those ones were nicked where people took their chances and left them leant up against the wall outside Costa, Subway etc without locking them to anything? It would be nice to be able to do that without fear of them being nicked, but pragmatism says you shouldn't do that any more than you would leave your car running with the keys in the ignition[1], as the chance of a theft is very high, and if insured you won't be covered.

[1] It gobsmacks me that people actually do this.

Apparently some people do this to defrost their cars, leaving the engine running until the windscreen heater kicks in, it is illegal to do this, and people have had their cars stolen off their driveway doing this. It is quicker and safer to get the scraper out and clear the windows in about 30-60 seconds.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Apparently some people do this to defrost their cars, leaving the engine running until the windscreen heater kicks in, it is illegal to do this, and people have had their cars stolen off their driveway doing this. It is quicker and safer to get the scraper out and clear the windows in about 30-60 seconds.

If you're going to do that, locking the keys into the car with the spare key removes a fair bit of the risk - most thefts like this are opportunist and they won't go as far as even breaking the window.

 

[gordonthemoron]

I've left my reasonably expensive bike at Elder Gate loads of times with no problems, mind I do have good locks

 

[TheDavibob]

Is that 2800 a misprint....

FKG's must hold about 12 !!!

Nope.

And it's perpetually mostly full. I always go straight for the second floor these days (especially as the double decker racks are a little rubbish).

 

[kevjs]

Fair play, coming from Salford the route isn't brilliant

I know at Derby there is a bike shelter where to enter you need a key to enter which you have to register for. You then lock your bike up in the shelter.

At Macclesfield they have bike lockers where you use a standard padlock to store your bike which works quite well.

Nottingham has a city card cycle hub where you can use your registered City Card or Robin Hood Card to access a "secure" area with the usual Sheffield stands - slightly annoying it's at the opposite side of the stations to the loos meaning you've got a bit of a trek if you want to get changed before jumping on the train. Only slight problem is that if you crack your card (as I managed to do) you get locked in and when you follow someone else out you can't get back in until office hours at the BUS station where the travel centre can issue a new one...

 

[Bletchleyite]

That sounds like a fire risk. Is there not an emergency door release?