Parking a motorcycle on a city street

July 24, 2006 6:59 AM

Is consistently parking a motorcycle on the street outside my apartment a bad idea?

I recently got a motorcycle. I've taken lessons, got my plates and license and am expecting to pick it up from the mechanic this week. I do have options for private garages (friends' & family) to park it in, but none of them are a reasonable distance from my house/apartment. Is parking on the street a recipe for distaster? It is a residential street in Toronto, just off of Bloor (in the Ossington area). Are people going to mess with my bike? Is there a reliable way to protect the bike?

posted by helvetica to Travel & Transportation (12 answers total)

Yeah. People will mess with your bike pretty much no matter where it is if it's in view and they don't think they'll get caught. Add into that people trying to paralell park and failing, dogs pissing on the plastic, wind blowing it over, drunks knocking it over, etc. etc. etc... find a secure area for it. You didn't say what kind of bike it is though ... if it's a sportbike with a lot of plastic, park it elsewhere. If it's something like a Honda Nighthawk or another standard, just park it on the street and get used to bending things back into the shape they're supposed to be.

The best place to put it is somewhere where you'll hear someone screwing with it, or somewhere lockable.

The other decent thing you can do is get a disk lock and a lockable cover. Then someone really has to work to fuck with it. Unfortunately, people usually *will* if they think they won't get caught.
posted by SpecialK at 7:05 AM on July 24, 2006

The last apartment I had my neighbor would park his motorcycle in front of the building on the street. He would put a cover over it and chained it to a tree and padlocked it.

If you can secure it to something, you should be ok. Do not secure it to a street sign as he told me someone's bicycle was stolen by thieves who uprooted the sign to bypass their chain.

I did notice that having the cover on it did make the neighborhood brat brigade highly curious as to what was under there and had to shoo them off from molesting his bike a few times.
posted by pieoverdone at 7:06 AM on July 24, 2006

*nod* The thing with not having the cover on is then the brat brigade climbs *on* the motorcycle and practices making vroom vroom noises while scratching up the tank because their arms aren't long enough to reach the bars from the seat.
posted by SpecialK at 7:11 AM on July 24, 2006

A locking cover, a piercing alarm (check out Scorpion alarms) and a locking disk brake should dissuade most messing with your bike.

I always hated it when I had to park my bike out on the street. Not that people did mess with it but that they could. Some prick kicked my bike over at school one night too. I was so pissed off I hauled my nearly six hundred pound motorcycle back up to its wheels by myself (yes, I was sore the next day).

Definitely don't get a brand new Hayabusa or BMW or other "nicer" bike because it'll just get thrashed on (besides the fact that you're a new rider and don't need the fastest production bike on the road).
posted by fenriq at 7:18 AM on July 24, 2006

Fellow toronto motorcycle owner here.

I've noticed quite a few street parked bikes (i.e. as their permanent homes) on residential streets in downtown toronto. Although disc locks are great, I would also recommend something more conspicous (i.e. a big chain) both for you and for your would-be thief - it will prevent you from forgetting about the lock and starting to ride away (believe me, it happens) and it will prevent the thief from screwing with the bike, realizing too late that it's locked, and dropping it on the ground.

All that being said, I have *always* found a good non-street parking spot (non-homeowner, no garage). Is there space under a fire escape in the back of your place? Is there a backyard? Even putting the bike in view of the street but on the property closer to the house/apartment is better than the street in my opinion. Remember that bikes are easy to get into weird places. I've seen plenty of people just park their bikes on their front walk.

Hope you find a solution
posted by aquafiend at 7:26 AM on July 24, 2006

Oh, and I didn't mean to imply that you shouldn't lock the bike if you find a better spot. Ideally, you'll have something really solid to lock the bike to wherever you end up putting it.
posted by aquafiend at 7:27 AM on July 24, 2006

The MSF warns about the Big Burly Thieves, who will simply pick your bike up and toss it into the back of a truck.

But IMO, that's only likely if the bike is worth stealing. An old CB450 or my KLR650 ratbike isn't likely to get stolen, even if it was unlocked, let alone shackled to a highrise.

The bigger worry I'd have about parking in the street is having the kickstand sink through the asphalt, and the bike toppling over. Second biggest worry would be some idiot child touching the shiny muffler while it's still skin-smokin' hot. Third biggest is a child or asshat deciding they've gotta put a leg over and pretend they're boy-racer.
posted by five fresh fish at 7:39 AM on July 24, 2006

Response by poster: I'm not too worried about thiefs, as it is only a 1981 Honda CX500. I am worried about the thing getting damaged as I just put some money into it getting it road-worthy. Good ideas all, keep 'em coming.
posted by helvetica at 8:42 AM on July 24, 2006

I keep my bike in my garage but there are a few in my neighbourhood (College/Bathurst) that are constantly on the street. One's a Yamaha Seca that probably doesn't run that's been sitting uncovered for at least a year on a sidewalk; the other's an old BMW that I'd love to steal own that's parked on a side street constantly and hasn't gone missing yet.

We're fortunate to have free parking now in Toronto. While last year I had to store my bike down an alley when I got to work, now it's parked right outside the door.

Be safe.
posted by ChuckLeChuck at 10:33 AM on July 24, 2006

Yeah, I wouldn't worry much about theft on your bike, unless you leave the keys in the ignition for joyriders.

I parked my '81 Yamaha Seca 750 (a junker bike built from two wrecked ones) on a major street for a couple years, with its only security being a cable lock through a wheel and of course the locking handlebars. Nobody ever screwed with it on purpose (I don't think, anyway), but it did get knocked over twice by parallel parkers. One of those impacts broke the clutch handle, leaving just a little nub that I used with my pointer finger for the rest of the time I owned the bike.
posted by M.C. Lo-Carb! at 10:37 AM on July 24, 2006

In at least Portland and Boston people seem to leave motorcycles on the sidewalk, either chained or not. I don't know how permanent this solution was, but it was common enough to notice quite often. Many didn't appear to be locked, or if they were, they were chained to a tree or such.
posted by devilsbrigade at 10:56 AM on July 24, 2006

If you have a regular spot to park (perhaps not likely with street parking, but maybe your street isn't very populated...) there are several affordable types of bike anchor available for sinking into concrete or pavement. Once the anchor is sunk, and secured with one-way security bolts, you park your bike right over it and chain it down. This can also protect against kid-related tippage, if you cinch the chain tightly between the frame and the anchor so it hold the bike down onto the sidestand.
posted by Tubes at 11:51 AM on July 24, 2006