<p>are there any current students on this forum that use bicycles?
maybe to travel the campus? the city?
can you take them into your dorm room? or do you have to lock them outside?
how is the theft at MIT?</p>
<p>they have some bikes with cool paint jobs, but I just want a plain one so that no one steals it..!</p>
<p>theft at mit is terrible. I had 2 or 3 bikes stolen at MIT. I had 2 U-locks on them. In grad school elsewhere my bike was never stolen.</p>
<p>u can take them into your dorm room, but u might not have room for them. </p>
<p>bikes do help to get around assuming they won't get stolen.</p>
<p>If you get locks that can't be easily cut off it should be fine to have a bike at MIT, plus almost all dorms will allow you to bring the bike inside into your hallway if you want (you don't need to put it into your room, just into the hallway).</p>
<p>And yes, I wish I had a bike everyday I'm at MIT, much more convenient, especially when you wake up at 9:25 for your 9:30 class.</p>
<p>how did they get stolen with the U-locks? where did you put the locks on the bike, and what was it locked to?</p>
<p>what do you think about installing a little GPS thing with SMS texting that could send you the coordinates of the bike every hour or so?</p>
<p>I don't know, although years later i did see a special on 60 minutes where they demonstrated how to pick a U-lock with a ball point pen.</p>
<p>Yo panasonic, I was wondering about this too! I get around on bike much more than car (partly because I still don't have my license, haha) and honestly it's so much better than walking, especially when you're running late. My bicycle is a piece of junk but if it gets stolen in college I'll be so mad, I'm very attached to it</p>
<p>FYI, the old round hole key style u-looks are pickable with a bic pen. However, the new NYC kryptonite locks are supposed to be very theft proof. You may also need good technique when you lock up, seat post and rear wheel, and even taking off and adding in the front wheel. I have also read about sets of locking skewers and seat postclamps that one can order from peter white if you have an expensive bike. Even at Wellesley, my daughter had her seatpost/seat stolen. I am a bike commuter in Texas, and I just leave a NYC lock on the rack at the university where I park my bike. I plan to send my son to MIT with an old bike and a NYC kryptonite lock. I did have a bike stolen in my post-doc days at MIT,and also here in texas. What I learned is it is best to not leave bikes locked outside at night, to store them indoors whenever allowed, and use a NYC krypto lock.</p>
<p>I like the gps idea. How do you actually do it? How expensive is it?</p>
<p>where in TX are you? I'm in Dallas.</p>
<p>I remember reading an idea about the GPS/SMS thing a while ago. I think the application I heard it from was for a car... can't remember though.</p>
<p>Here's a link to a similar device:
<a href="http://www.kh-gps.de/trackbox.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.kh-gps.de/trackbox.htm</a></p>
<p>I didn't read the entire thing, but it appears it requires a cell phone. If I bring a bike up, I think I'm going to make one of them.. they look sweet :]</p>
<p>Some of the dorms also have indoor bike rooms where you can store your bike.</p>
<p>I never had a bike stolen at MIT (and I left mine outside at all times), but I also bought a deliberately crappy bike.</p>