Durango police look to help bicyclists retrieve their ride quickly in the event it’s stolen.
The Durango Police Department will host a free bicycle registration event Saturday from 8 a.m. to noon at the downtown Farmers Market on West Ninth Street.
“The benefits of registering one’s bike in the system is that once it is registered … it then goes into a national database,” said Durango police Sgt. Padraic Ingle, who’s overseeing the event. “A lot of the stolen bikes that we have, they don’t just stay local. They go down into different communities and get shipped all over the Four Corners.”
Durango PD has registered bicycles since 2019. To log them into the database, Durango police will record serial numbers and take a photograph of the bike to keep track of identifying characteristics.
Those who register will receive a tag with contact information that will go on the stem of their bike, Ingle said.
A registered bike typically is found within 48 hours after it’s reported stolen, depending on circumstances such as where it was taken and where it was found.
“If we locate a bike through a routine contact, we can get those bikes back into the hands of the owners within hours of finding the bikes,” he said.
If a suspected stolen bike’s serial number does not appear in the system, Ingle said police will assume it belongs to the person who’s in possession of it and let that person go.
For more information about the event, call Durango PD’s Service Technicians department at 375-4772.
mhollinshead@durangoherald.com
