Cycle crime reduction shifts up a gear
Following on from last year's hugely successful event, officers from 28 police forces attended this one-day cycle crime conference, along with key partners from the cycling, education and security industries.
The theme for this year's conference was ‘Partnership Working’, with the speakers highlighting the importance of working together to beat bike crime. Over 140 delegates got the chance to hear about successful operations to reduce cycle theft and share best practice on cycle crime solutions.
Crime Reduction Expert Sgt Andy Gregory from West Midlands Police chaired the event, which for the first time featured the 2016 BikeRegister Cycle Crime Awards ceremony (winners listed below).
There were also presentations from a number of guest speakers:
• Supt Jenny Gilmer from BTP gave an informative Cycle Crime Overview detailing bike theft incidents that took place last year in areas under BTP jurisdiction. She explained the new #LockItMarkIt campaign, which is being promoted across BTP as a means to deter theft by promoting locking best practice combined with BikeRegister bike marking.
• DI Bob Stokoe revealed how BTP deals with cycle crime across the UK, explaining that the theft of cycles accounts for a significant proportion of all BTP Notifiable Crime.
• Julie Onwukegu, Head of Crime Reduction at BTP, spoke about partnership working and how BTP together with BikeRegister, Met Police and City of London Police are launching the #LockItMarkIt campaign, which will see a joined-up approach to promoting bike marking events in London. Police will benefit from a new facility on the BikeRegister website which will allow them to load details of bike marking events in their area direct to the site. This will allow members of the public to search for all their local bike marking sessions at www.BikeRegister.com/Events, instead of having to scour social media or individual police websites for information.
• Sgt Paul Byrne from States of Jersey Police talked about the success of Operation Locknut, which has used BikeRegister to drive down bike crime by 32% on the island. All local bike shops support the system and offer bike marking sessions to local residents.
• Emma Crowton from Transport for West Midlands spoke about the rise in popularity of cycling in the West Midlands; and the benefits of partnership working with West Midlands Combined Authority, which comprises 12 local authorities and three local enterprise partnerships.
• Tim Huxley, Senior Transport Planner from Mouchel Consulting spoke about how to build successful partnerships to reduce cycle crime; and how cycling should be encouraged as a sustainable form of transport for business and education.
• Roger Seal from ABUS Mobile Security UK & Ireland gave delegates some valuable advice on which lock to choose to protect their bikes. He explained that 54% of bike theft takes place from sheds and garages because many people feel their bike is safe at home and therefore don't lock it.
• James Brown, BikeRegister MD, reinforced the importance of using BikeRegister as part of a 'toolkit' against cycle crime and praised the effectiveness of working with cycling industry partners such as British Cycling, Cyclescheme and London Cycling.
He explained that BikeRegister is the UK's leading online cycle database, with more than 530,000 bikes registered on the database and over 250,000 searches performed every year.
BikeRegister is now encouraging cyclists to register their bike as stolen, even if their bike has not previously been registered on the BikeRegister database.
With over 332,000 Reported bicycle thefts across the UK in 2015 and all police forces using BikeRegister to check the status of recovered bikes, it is imperative that ALL stolen bikes are reported on www.BikeRegister.com/stolen regardless of whether they have been marked with a unique BikeRegister code.
James Brown said: “We are delighted with the success of our second Cycle Crime Conference and are very grateful to the many police forces and industry partners who attended. A highlight of the conference was the 2016 BikeRegister Awards Ceremony which honoured the great work being done by so many police forces using BikeRegister to fight bike crime.
“BikeRegister is now an essential part of the toolkit that police use to fight bike crime and we were delighted to build upon last year’s conference and be able to share so many more fantastic success stories this year.”
Winners of the 2016 BikeRegister Awards:
- Quickest Cycle Recovery Award: Winner: Lancashire Police - who not only recovered a stolen bike within an hour but also apprehended the bike thieves, all while the bike owner was on holiday.
- Largest Cycle Recovery Award: Winner: Met Police who recovered a total of 23 bikes and returned them to their owners, including 15 bikes belonging to Urban Adventure, an outdoor education facility in Tower Hamlets.
- Most Innovative Use of BikeRegister Award : Joint Winner: Met Police - for using BikeRegister to check the search history of a suspected bike thief and Joint Winner: Warwickshire Police for using BikeRegister to identify a victim in a Road Traffic Accident.
- Partnership Project Award: Joint Winner: Avon & Somerset Constabulary for events and partnerships force-wide and Joint Winner: City Of London Police led by PC Stuart Ford for their tireless work promoting safer cycling and crime prevention.
- Bespoke Achievement Award : Winner: Durham Constabulary for the development of a bespoke BikeRegister frame and Component Marking Kit.
