[Photo from file]

Campus Safety and the Ottawa police have partnered to promote a bicycle safety service on Carleton’s campus this week.

The service is an app and website, called 529 Garage, which allows bike owners to register their bikes so that—in the event their bike is stolen—Ottawa police can more easily track down and return owners’ bikes to them.

Carleton’s Sustainability Office, which works to promote sustainability initiatives on campus, is also involved in the partnership to promote the bike safety service.

Sgt. Art Wong, an Ottawa police officer involved in the initiative, said part of the reason the Ottawa police is promoting the service at Carleton is the high number of the student and staff population that cycle to campus.

“It’s an important program for the police and our community because it’s a program using technology to help reduce bike thefts in our community, and returning bikes to their rightful owner,” Wong said.

Carleton Campus Safety officers help a person register their bike with 529 Garage. [Photo by Tim Austen]
The service involves inputting information about your bike, including photos, so that the bike’s serial number could be added to a registry accessible by Ottawa police.

Wong said Ottawa is the first major city outside of Vancouver, B.C. to introduce the service.

“It’s a pilot project for us in the Ottawa police, but we are confident that it will be adopted moving forward,” he said.

“We have folks from Montreal police, Toronto police that are looking at and seeing how we are doing . . . the technology behind this makes a lot of sense,” he added.  

Wong said the Ottawa police don’t have statistics that show the service is capable of preventing bike theft in Ottawa just yet.

However, Vancouver has seen a 30 per cent decrease in bike thefts since implementing the service, according to him.

“In Ottawa, we average about 1,100 stolen bikes annually, and statistics show that only 1 in 4 actually report their bike stolen to the police,” he said.

Ottawa averages about 1,100 bike thefts annually, according to Wong. [Photo by Tim Austen]
Brittany Basten, community liaison officer with Campus Safety, said while the current initiative is aimed at staff and faculty who are still on campus during the summer, Campus Safety hopes to repeat outreach events for the initiative when more students are back on campus in September.

Basten said one of the purposes of the initiative is also to teach Carleton community members the safest way to lock their bikes, which, according to Basten, is to use a combination of a U-lock and a cable lock.

Cable locks used alone are easily cut, she said.  

Basten also recommended bike owners remove any accessories from their bikes—such as saddlebags and seats—and taking them to class or work with them, rather than leaving them behind and vulnerable to theft.

—With files from Tim Austen

Photos by Tim Austen

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR