A lot of the bike cops I've seen around here (Houston, Sugar Land, Missouri City) have both a cruiser and a bike. The cruisers have cheapo trunk racks. They all seem nice enough. You usually can find them at malls, large movie theaters and parks.

Never had a conversation with one though.

they got nice fun little mountain bikes tho...

i'd football tackle you from behind if you threw a bottle at me, jus sayin... that's justified.

Some of them; it depends on agency policies/procedures. Ditto. Usually not. I am sure some of them do.

I am not a bike cop myself, though we tried to start a bike patrol in 1985, and my sergeant at the time sent a letter up the chain of command. The command staff rejected the idea with extreme prejudice. In the 1990's, after it became trendy, my employing agency took a huge leap into bike patrol, assigning hundreds of officers to it, a few volunteers, but mostly mandatory assignment of rookies just off training. By this point, I liked my shift, which was nights, and liked being a field trainer, both of which I would have to give up to be a bike officer, so I did not volunteer. Then, hiring slowed, attrition decimated the ranks, and most bike officers had to be put into cars, simply because we patrol a huge area, larger than one of the smaller states, IIRC. Now, the officers on bike assignments patrol the nightclub area downtown, the larger parks, and one of the greenways in an outlying area, where the locals have enough political stroke to get what they want.

There are also bike officers who patrol outside their normal shift hours, being paid by private businesses, local civic/business groups, and homeowners' associations, functioning as on-duty police officers, and supervised by the on-the-clock supervisors in their areas. These officers are doing because it they like to ride, and are using bikes and related equipment thay have bought with their personal funding. I have considered doing this type of moonlighting myself, if the right opportunity presented itself, and would certainly think of building a single speed or fixie, set up as a cross bike, for this task.

Disclaimer: I do not work for the PD of my listed hometown of Bellaire, but for a much larger agency in the area. I could tell you, but then I would have to kill you. Just kidding! Really, I am not supposed to discuss policies and procedures while being identifiable as a member of my agency; only the PIO is supposed to do that.

With all due respect, lumping all police together as being of one mind is just not realistic. While an agency's hiring practices may tend to select certain personality types or political leanings, and family traditions may tend to influence the applicant pool in a region, overall, we are a diverse group. Large agencies, especially, reflect this. While my agency's demographics to show the majority are still "white" males, a meeting last week, with the command staff and captains present, plus employees reps from the various divisions, showed that the people actually running the show are a very diverse in appearance, and the open forum nature of this quarterly meeting quickly reveals we are not all of the same political and philosophical leanings.

yeah, there are tons of as$hole cops on the street, but there are also just as many genuinely nice people doing their job. i've met enough cool officers and complete dickheads to know that "fu*k the police!" is an unfair generalization.

the USF downtown campus cops have decent hardtails and have pretty sweet all black uniforms (black shirt with black cargo shorts). they just ride around in a group and hangout. seems like working as a university bike cop would be pretty sweet.

Good on you. We all need more guys like you out there, Brother.

+1000

If only you left some sort of clue. . .


Appreciate the perspective. I'm wondering how you cope with peoples prejudices surrounding your job. Especially when consolidating your passion toward a particularly lawless splinter of the cycling community with a job that you are asked to bring home with you.

edit: replaced image with a working one

Only lately, and only some of the community.

George Bush park sounds sweet

i was at my friends house a while back when i was young. we where in the ghetto near his house, and these bike cops where chasing this guy who robbed a store down the street. they chased him down this cliff/mountain, with a 10 foot drop. i was decently impressed. they no doubt had some mtb skills.

Yep, just a minor clue. But, there is the one big city, and then there is the county sheriff's office, also a huge agency, patrolling a county about the size of Connecticut.

There is an organization called the International Police Mountain Bike Association; my agency is affiliated with them on some level, or at least the ones instructing the bike patrol certification course. My agency's bike training is brutal, with a high wash-out rate; broken bones are not an unusual occurrence. A high level of aerobic fitness is needed to be able to complete the week-long cert class. I am not sure I could do some of the agility-related stuff required to pass, such as dismounting at speed, and remaining upright while keeping the feet on the pedals for a set time, while remaining inside a very small box painted on the pavement, and riding a figure-8 within a quite small painted square. I may attempt the one-day intro class soon, which will give me an idea whether I should attempt the longer cert class later in the year.

1. there are a lot of bike cops here, especially in the downtown area. they all ride trek mtb's with about 25 kg of gear on them and they almost always ride on the sidewalk.

2. bike cops here are picked for their 'fuzzy' appeal. or at least that's the general perception. i think this pretty much came about from the g8 demo about five years ago when the pf rolled out a huge force of bike cops for crowd control. the plan was to have happy smiley cops on bikes out front and keep the heavy riot types hidden for back up. the bike thing just kind of stuck after that.

3. i firmly believe that all cops start off as idealists -- they want to be the 'good guys'. sure it's a one-dimensional attitude, but at least it's noble. of course, as lord acton said: "power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely" and, eventually, a hardened attitude develops in a lot of cases. my usual attitude is this: be wary of anyone carrying a gun... whether they have matching outfits or not.

4. my last observation is that bike cops seem to be, here at least, mostly about good p.r., high visibility, enforcing bylaws and summary crimes, and doing 'crowd control'. they're pretty adept at using those treks as mobile barricades. a couple of months ago about a dozen neo-nazis here held a demonstration and the eight or so bike cops there demonstrated an amazing proficiency at blocking off the 75 counter-demonstrators who showed up to give the local fasicst element and well-deserved running-out.

They don't ride Urbanite frames anymore, they are on Bianchis, hybrids I believe. Urbane still has the contract to work on the bikes though, at least, they did last year. Here in Toronto we also have paramedics on bikes. They have a pretty big bag with a defibrillator and oxygen in it plus all sorts of bandages and gloves, etc, to help people out.

The bike cops that I have talked to in Toronto feel lucky to get to ride around and most choose to be out there. But yeah, they look funny.

I disagree regarding number 3. There are basically two kinds of cops. The dickhead jock who wants to kick ass and make money, and then the honest dude. If you get arrested by a guy that is 6"1 210 pounds of pure defined tanned ****-gay, then you know which of the two you got arrested by.

Bike cop trackstands FTW!

and one of them is still walking, because i saw the homeless guy on the police bike again yesterday

I don't know why, but homeless guys on bicycles that are clearly not theirs make me laugh. Reminds me of the episode of Seinfeld where the homeless dude runs off with Kramer's rickshaw.