Bjartmar Leósson says at first he was motivated by his anger at Reykjavík’s bike thieves. Now he empathises with them
It all started in 2019, when Bjartmar Leósson started to see a rise in bike theft in Reykjavík. Rather than accepting that once a bicycle was stolen it had disappeared forever, the bus driver and self-confessed “bike nerd” decided to start tracking them down and returning them to their rightful owners.
Neat. Good that he’s helping people get their bikes back as well as the thieves. Though I reckon this works better when it’s an inherently smaller community like this.
He’s definitely got a nicer approach to bike theft than I would. I’ve had a bicycle stolen and would happily feed the thief to a woodchipper to be honest.
Yeah, we have no shortage of bicycles which leads to a whole different stance on bike theft.
Theft is also a given if you live in one of the larger cities, which leads to culture shock for those from the countryside. Not chaining your bike down to something firmly attached to the ground is a surefire way to get it stolen.
It leads to these interesting stances people have where buying a cheap second-hand (often stolen) bicycle that looks like it has been through hell for €50 is usually considered the best way to prevent theft.
Thieves usually have the audacity to take an angle grinder to your lock in broad daylight because they’re counting on the fact that everyone will assume they are the owner and they’ve lost their keys.
Since the bicycle is usually the most efficient form of transportation, getting your bike stolen requires you to improvise and fall back on public transport or walk home. Which is why, in the moment, you’ll be likely to commit murder if the thief was still around. Getting fed to a woodchipper is probably the least horrible way I would end you if you made me walk home in a bad mood.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Rather than accepting that once a bicycle was stolen it had disappeared forever, the bus driver and self-confessed “bike nerd” decided to start tracking them down and returning them to their rightful owners.
Known as the Reykjavík “bike whisperer”, people across his home city turn to him for help to find their missing bicycles, tools and even cars.
While not a globally renowned cycling city, two-wheeled transport is on the rise in Reykjavík, which has a population of 139,875 people.
“Bjartmar Leósson is doing a great job finding and collecting bikes that have been stolen,” said the Reykjavík police chief, Guðmundur Pétur Guðmundsson.
He he says he now sees the bike theft problem is often driven by addiction, aided by long rehab waiting lists and closures during the summer.
He put notes through neighbours’ doors and before long he had a description of a person believed to have been seen with his bike in the city centre.
The original article contains 920 words, the summary contains 157 words. Saved 83%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Bad job.
