Ethical bike thievery?

So there’s a bike in my bike shed that’s been locked up ever since I’ve been locking up there, so coming up to 2yrs. It’s clearly been there for ages, being covered in dust with flat tyres and stuff. It’s nothing that flash; a steel Avanti MTB with an STX group, but snot an ugly bike ATMO. Kinda attractive really.

The wheels are not installed and it’s all locked up with a D-lock, but it’s got one of those locks you can pick with a Bic pen.

Hypothetically, if one were to remove the bike and take it home, what would your approach be? It’s in a swipe access only bike cage in a multistory car park at a public institution. Should the carpark manager be informed? Should a note be left with a bit of a deadline to removal? Should it just be removed?

Righto

Ta.

I’d leave a note with a week deadline… If it’s still there, go and chat to the manager - I reckon you’ll find they’ll be glad to get it out of there!

take it and then sell it to Horatio at an inflated price.

Note with a deadline for removal if not donated to local charity would be one way to do it.

I had this happen a while ago, really nice bike chained to a shitty fence, used to pass it every day for a few weeks.
Went past once and the fence had been cut open and the bike gone.

Wish I’d taken it and left a note for the owner.

But yea, I’d leave a note giving them a week.

Write your name on it then urinate on it… it’s legally yours now.

There’s one like that at my work = but it’s full XTR team cannondale mtb from late 90s. Has not been moved in over a year. I really want it, but it could be a foreign correspondent’s bike or something.

I hope it’s Mark Simkin’s.

Yeah, I’d feel bad for someone if they got caught thieving in these circumstances and got charged or sacked over it eh.

Mark Simkin would be a mad downhiller.

The only building I’ve worked in that had bikes accrue over years ended up doing a full clear (signs up for a couple of weeks) when they were going to resurface the floor.

The bikes left were moved to a separate lockup, people could request their return, and I think after a month or so they were junked/donated. Fair enough, some had been left to rot for years and were falling over, taking up rackspace.

Yeah the Darwin bike shed was full of dungas dumped by blow-in Mexicans (Southerners) for a while. They all got turfed when they moved the shed to make way for a new building. No Cannondales with XTR there though…

Take the bike and leave a note behind. No harm in a note staying there for months, no fear of a note being stolen.

Peter Greste?

Personally, I think that if said bike was to be “liberated” it should be passed on to a charity initiative such as bikes4life etc. to get someone less fortunate onto a bike.

http://www.bikes4life.com.au/donations-register/

Cadel hasn’t really ridden a mtb for a while, he probably wouldn’t miss it.

They’ve done cage clearouts once or twice at my work. There was a shitty e-bike (with the charger in the front basket!) that just sat there unlocked for over two years. Was pretty tempted to take it for a spin…

We get bike cage clear outs at work to fix up and then donate. Mostly is BV doing it as if they assist a company/organization to put them in they will also clear them out.

I reckon email the building manager then it’s all above board, see what they say.

I reckon set up a time lapse camera, then every time you go to work take a piece of the bike, so it will look like the bike has just erroded away to nothing…

Plus if you email and it all goes south you have a good trail of correspondence to show your intentions were all good.