a question of morality.
 

i need a frame.

in a nicer section of the city is a schwinn, just my size, locked to a pole.

it has been stripped of its wheels, seat, a pedal, and somebody must have attempted to remove the handlebars/stem.

i have watched it for three or four months now and it hasnt budged an inch. it has a krypto u-lock on it, and i highly doubt i could get through that anyways, but...

whats the deal with (obviously) abandoned bikes? would you consider them fair game? i mean a bike doesnt deserve to be locked to a pole, when it could be used by someone.

We've been over this before....

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=70737

it's true,
just take the bike, nobody will miss it. good karma or bad....unless you snaps some photos [and post them] of your daring attempt to free it.....then that would be interesting.

There are a bunch of disciples that might rush into this thread and tell you god is whatching, and that you'll go to hell, etc.... just be careful

i'll take some before, during and after pics of the liberation and reconstuction of this bike.

i have a bic pen and crowbars... but i'm not really sure how to use either. this could pose a problem.

its in one of the nicest parts of philly... so i'll wait till like 2am or something. i mean i'm not really doing anything wrong... but eh.

"just take the bike, nobody will miss it."

yeah, except the guy who cared enough about it to buy a 50 dollar lock and secure it to a pole. Just because the other trash in the neighborhold thinks its okay to steal doesnt mean the owner doesnt want/need it.

Funny thing is- a friend gave me a "borrowed" bike with no wheels, etc... and a year later it was stolen from my apt. storage locker. Color me superstitious, but I believe there is some sort of karma about this sort of thing.

I draw the line at not cutting any lock... but I wouldn't judge anyone for freeing an abandoned, stripped frame.

it's wheel-less, seat-less, missing a pedal, covered in leaves, dirt, and flyers , and i wouldnt be surprised if a couple homeless guys have peed on it. if someone really cared about it, they'd put it in the closet or something. winters almost here in philly.

but the question at hand is no longer morality, it's how the hell am i going to free this poor, poor, neglected bike-minus-a-few-crucial-parts?

Take it. There comes a fine line when a bike is truly abandoned, and I think it has passed that.

If I personally cared about my bike, I would not have left it out long enough to get its parts stripped off. I highly doubt there is some guy who walks by it each day, pining for his incarcerated steed.


Now to get it off, use the bic. Otherwise an angle grinder will work wonders. No power outlet? Borrow one of the battery powered circular saws (4" ?) and put a grind or cut-off wheel on it. Like butter. Not a possibility? Get a car jack and pop the sucker open.

Last resort; contact your local PD and let them know that you have a bike that you would like freed.

"it's wheel-less, seat-less, missing a pedal, covered in leaves, dirt, and flyers"

so?

"if someone really cared about it, they'd put it in the closet or something".

Ill remember that logic when I see your bike locked outside 'here in philly'.

touche. buuuut...


my bike would never be locked outside for more than 20 mins and thats in good weather. this bike is stripped, un-used, open to the elements, and is probaly going to end up in the dump in a few more weeks. it's in the type of neighborhood in which you would expect someone to buy something nice, be overly critical of it, and just dump it somewhere. thats an assumption though, so i'll just go with what i know. this bike is abandoned, whether or not it has an owner. if i get this frame, i'm donating all the parts i wont use AND my old bike to the bike co-op. so i'm definatly not a bad guy.

and on the rare chance that i'm riding it and some dude is like "hey! thats my bike!", i'll promptly return it, tell him the story, and hope he doesnt kick my ass.

I meant if it's been sitting there for many months, in a half disassembled state, and obviously neglected.... then chances are it's been completely forgotten by the original owner...

*sigh* this argument about morals is endless...

@filtersweep - that's a good rule about cutting the lock...

arg! i'm the evil schwinn-swipin' pirate and i be comin' for yer bike.

as much as that bike is probably forgotten about and asking to be liberated and restored and ridden... is that the only frame in philly? i doubt it. just go to goodwill or look on ebay or whatever for a frame. stop being lazy. i think it's bad juju to take it. it is locked up after all. now if that frame was sitting next to a dumpster unlocked... then by all means.

if you're not gonna take it, wanna tell me where it is?

i'm taking it. but it's at 20th or 21st and spruce.


the only things that worry me are:

1. its in the rittenhouse area. people there would probably call the cops, mistaking me for an actual bike thief, and not the proud liberator i am.
2. its in front of a house with huge bay windows, that have no curtains. (it's not theirs BTW, i've delivered to those people and their like a bazillion years old.)


im going to try it tonight or tomorrow night.

after that, it's fair game. but i call the next two nights.

so knock on the door, and say 'do you want me to remove this eyesore from your house?'. If youre truly liberating the bike it shouldnt be a problem.

before you waste your time cutting steel (or sitting in Jail), have you even finished building your first bike yet?

oh yeah, my roomate told me about an abandoned lotus frame somewhere on samson by the roxy.


i dont care though, i want that damn schwinn.

the concord frame i am/was using on my project is rusted through and through, and weighs a ton. i'm dead broke though, and my current bike is falling to pieces. so the fact that the schwinn would be free helps alot.

its hard to find frames to fit a short-statured man like myself, and that schwinn is the first half-way decent frame ive seen that would fit me. but knocking on the door seems like a damn good idea, and will be a little easier on the concious[sp?]. thanks.

Jesus. At what point is it ok to take it? When the public works guys show up to cut it free and trash it? Because that's the next step in this scenario, particularly in a nice neighborhood where people are going to start contacting the city about this trash that's locked to a pole.

sounds good, ill give you 2 days! i should check out that lotus in the meantime... ive done some cleaning for the city before... saving nice frames from the junkyard is good IMO.

If you see his bike locked up sans wheels, seat, post, covered in dirt leaves and pee it probably means he lost it, so it'd be finders keeprs stevo, and he'd never know you took it. scant revenge

do it in the daytime and as though you aren't doing anything wrong. You're probably okay anyway even if the cops ask, especially if you ask the people whose place its in front of if they want it removed. Most cities have ordinances against abandoning property to protect themselves when they come around in the springtime and remove thinkgs like that and other trash lost in the snow. If the police do ask you what you're doing ask them if it's registered, be cooperative and explain yourself, they're pretty observant, likely as not they'll know the thing has been there awile.

"you must do what you feel is right, of course."
OWK
1977

Take the lock, leave the bike

The best thing to do is to get someone else to rationalize your action for you. Years ago I saw an old Schwinn Twin (tandem) resting unsecured next to a liquor store and across the street from a bike shop. I went into the bike shop and asked them if they knew who's it was. They said, "It is yours". So I asked how long it had been sitting there. They said “too long; you need to take it home now”. So I rode it home (despite the flat rear tire and lack of brakes). My actions being blessed by the holy bike shop owner was good enough for my consciousness.

That said, I think the responses in this post ought to be enough to rest anyone's conscious.

****.

if the cops show up, just tell 'em you lost your key.

how will they know? happens all the time.

Why bother stealing/stripping someone elses bike when used bikes are so cheap?
My friend just bought a fully functional Trek for $4 at a police auction. I just bought a Fuji Sagres at a thrift store for $7.99. The local bike co-op has bikes thay give away or can be earned with volunteer work. They also have boxes of free parts.
Justify it all you want theft is wrong.

Reclaiming something that's abandoned isn't stealing, else you'll all burn in hell for an eternity for each penny you've ever picked up. If it's in the shape he describes it, for as long as he sez its been there then he should be able to help himself.

I personally appreciate it when abandoned bikes are removed. In T.O. the program for bike removal isn't nearly as robust as the program for installing ringposts for locking bicycles. This results in ample parking, but it's often that I see the rings taken by bikes whose chains would shatter if you tried to put a foot on the pedal, bike that aren't salvaged because they are too far gone. There are a LOT of these bike friendly ringposts everywhere in T.O. so it's rare that an abandoned bike is in your way but it does happen. The number of abandoned bikes here would fill every signpost we had to lock up on in Houston to the top and take every space on the building provided racks a few times over due to that cities hostile and indifferent take on cycling.

There isn't a dictionary in the world that will associate salvage with theft, and this fellow asked to see if there was anything else he could do to cover his bases before salvaging the frame. From this he got the advice to ask the folks it's neares to, to possibly post it up on "craigs list", to possibly check with the philly PD to see if it's registered, and to avoid going about it in a furtive manner. Nothing of this smacks of dishonesty. Consider how reviled bike thieves are in this community before suggesting someones actions are parallel. Buddies not doing a thing wrong as he describes it.

oh man, thats down the street from my apartment. I wish I was home to go and check out the condition of that bike.... as well as the lotus frame?? If its still there when I get back from Amsterdam I AM going to take it. hahahaha actually, thats a lie, i cant bring home anymore frames. or can i? hmmmmm