Life-Cycle

Get a bike. Lock it to a post. Take a pic every day for a year. And this is what happens:

A project by RED PEAK For Hudson Urban Bicycles.

(Thank you Tania)

21 Comments leave a comment below

  1. interesting. it lasted longer than i would have thought.

  2. There’s a day in the 200s where the lock disappears, but not the bike. The bike actually sticks around for awhile after!

  3. here’s what else happens to bikes…

    http://www.joequint.com/#/skeleton-bikes/bike0821

  4. That bike has skills! See how it disappeared?

  5. yeah i saw the lock disappear. then it was dismantled piece by piece. people only took what they needed. and by took i mean stole.

  6. So *you’re* the reason I couldn’t find anywhere to lock my bike up for half the year. Jerk.

    Just kidding, cool video.

  7. Day 223 – someone stole the lock and basket but left the rest of the bike there??? It looks like it was respected as someone’s bike up until the U lock was removed. Afterwards it was treated as abandoned…which 223 days in is kinda true :-)

  8. why didnt you remove it after the lock was gone, it was possibly a test to see if someone was going to complain. the one who stole figured that nobody was around to keep a watch on the bike. rest was obvious :-). just kidding, nce visual experiment

  9. sad reflection on modern society!

  10. Funny how it stays OK, and 100% intact for a while, but then the decay happens rather fast.

  11. someone seriously stole the handlebar grips??

  12. I think the fascinating thing is how long it lasts — the water bottle is there for 6 months! Also – there was a note left on the bike on day 211 – what did it say? In my mind, its from the bikes that regularly use the post, asking if the bike is abandoned after 211 days! How long would such a bike last in a less urban area? I wonder if the lock is clipped by someone (such as the cops) trying to get rid of abandoned bikes.

  13. I call BS.

    Looks like nothing was happening to the bike for 200 days and they decided to lose the lock to speed things up. No thief or cop saws a U-lock off a bike and leaves empty handed.

    I’ve had my bike stolen in Soho at dusk after 1.5 hrs. locked up. The neighborhood has many opportunistic bike thieves working the area.

    It looks nice but fake.

  14. dfg, good catch re: the note on day 211. may not be mere chance that lock disappeared on day 212. maybe the note said, “I will take the lock off tomorrow…feel free to take any parts that you want, but please try not to take the whole bike at once”? still a cool video.

  15. djp,

    You are saying exactly what I was too polite to point out. Nothing happened til the U lock was removed. I also suspect the project owner got bored of 200 days of nothing and decided to make it a bit easier for the vultures ;-)

    If you look closely, there is also a krypto chain lock down near the BB. So the lesson is, a bike locked with a chain AND a U is not likely to be tampered with even if left for 200 days!

  16. Look at it from a more positive side. You can leave a looked bike with accessories for 125 in NYC before someone steals something.

  17. Gotta confess, once a bike looks like it’s been abandoned (ie: it’s been there more than a month) I’m always tempted to steal bits off it myself.

  18. I find extremely odd that the bike isn’t stolen after the lock removal.
    Seems to me that the lock and the basket are going on day 212.
    Furthermore, let’s admit it’s a combination lock, so the thief can open and re-use it, but who’s the thief thas stoles the lock and leave the bike?
    I often laugh at the tinfoil cap conspiration theorists, but this smells odd IMHO

  19. you can see there’s another lock on the bicycle, a chain lock in a black sleeve, not just the kryptonite one on the front wheel. It’s visible on day 269, when the bicycle has nearly been dismantled.