The third annual Cycle Crime Conference, hosted by BikeRegister, the national cycle database, in association with British Transport Police (BTP), ran in Birmingham on Tuesday, July 5. Officers from 28 police forces attended the one-day event, besides partners from the cycling, education and security industries.
The theme for this year’s conference was ‘Bike Crime – Breaking the Cycle’. Speakers aired numerous initiatives to tackle bike crime to around 150 delegates. Andy Gregory, Former Police Sergeant from West Midlands Police chaired the event, which also featured the 2017 Cycle Crime Awards ceremony (winners listed below) and the results of the 2017 National Cycle Crime Survey.
There were also presentations from a number of guest speakers including Detective Chief Inspector Darren Malpas from BTP, whose overview on cycle crime opened the day. Sarah Burr from Transport for London spoke about the impact of cycle crime in London, while Fergus Campbell from the online classified website Gumtree spoke of what steps the site is taking to tighten the net on bike thieves.
Belinda Hopkins from the University of Oxford had ideas to counter university bike theft after the introduction of a BikeRegister scheme across all Oxford colleges; and Wing Commander Keith Dear gave an insight into ‘how feeling watched can change behaviour’ of a bike thief.
James Brown, BikeRegister MD, told delegates of a new BikeRegister Police App that is launching to make stolen bike checks simpler. He described BikeRegister as a cycle database with more than 665,000 bikes registered online and over 250,000 searches performed a year.
James Brown said: “We are thrilled with the success of our third Cycle Crime Conference and are very grateful to the many police forces and industry partners who attended.”
However, he warned that a lack of funding to deal with cycle crime is an issue. “Our concern is that after the big strides made over the last four years, police forces are taking resources away from tackling cycle crime. As a result, we are seeing huge spikes in bicycle theft in many areas of the UK, in some jurisdictions by up to 50pc. With cycle journeys rapidly increasing, we should be increasing not decreasing our combined efforts.”
He added: “A highlight of the conference was the 2017 Cycle Crime Awards which pay tribute to the great work being done by so many police forces and partners using BikeRegister to fight bike crime.”
Winners:
Most Stolen Bikes Recovered (using BikeRegister)
Winner: Thames Valley Police; who arrested a man suspected of handling stolen goods, after 164 bicycles was found in his garden.
Most Amount of Bikes Marked
Winner: Met Police – Hillingdon Safer Transport Team; it’s marked 2,969 cycles with BikeRegister over the period of 2016/17.
Most Significant Reduction in Cycle Theft
Winner: Lancashire Police that achieved a 58pc reduction in bike theft through Operation Derailleur, a multi-stranded operation to prevent and deter theft of pedal cycles.
The Partnership Project Award
Winner (pictured): the public transport body Network West Midlands, Safer Travel Police Team and the train operator London Midland made a series of initiatives to address that and ensure new and existing cycle rail commuters would have the confidence to cycle and ride including the ‘Love Your Bike’ sessions.
