A couple weeks ago I spoke with Whole Foods’ store manager Stephanie Steele about a recent rash of bicycle thefts from their parking garage downtown. To her credit, she didn’t sling me over to the Public Relations office.
We ended up having a conversation about how to improve the situation. Stephanie pedals to work and is as concerned as anyone else about the issue. Turns out, most of the bicycles that were stolen were secured with cable locks (very easy to ‘cut and run’). We agreed that a good first step is education. What’s a good lock? An updated version of the U lock or something equally terrifying. How to properly secure your ride? From as many points possible to the heaviest thing around. She called me back to let me know they have a class of kids coming in to see the store. As part of the Whole Foods’ presentation, they will have some dialog on how to properly lock your bike.
ATXBS has a post on the poster campaign that just went up. Will this fix the problem? Probably not. Will it help? Probably so. When I took the picture above, there were five bicycles parked around me. Three with U locks. Two with cable locks that I’m pretty sure I could have yanked apart if I had a mind to.