Vandalised bike (portarlington)

Aoifemckay2013

Hi my mam had left her bike in the bike shed of the train station in Portarlington as she does every morning for work , but today as she came back this eveing at 19.15pm she walked out to find her bike smashed up at the back ! Some scumbag had literally kicked the **** out of the back of her bike and for what reason I do not know! She was very upset , its a very good bike and is just a year and a half old and cost €550 ! The man who works at the station said the bike shed its self has cameras but they are broken and the ones in the station only flicker around so might not see anything on these ! She has reported it to the gards but I say not much can be done now .. Im just so annoyed at what someone has done to her bike and for what ! like what the hell would anyone get out of doing that to someones property accept hurting that person !

Roaster

Scum are scum!

They probably think it was great craic.

I'm surprised you actually got a response off the station. Their normal response is "nothing to do with us..." Best of luck with Garda, wasted exercise I'm afraid.

janedoe75

Aoife I had to register just to reply to you! We saw your mums bike at around 6pm yesterday evening and were wondering who owned it. My husbands bike was stolen about 3 weeks ago from the station.

Another man had his bike vandalised yesterday evening as well. We think that they were trying to steal it and your mums bike but couldnt get the locks off so just wrecked them instead. The other man went into the station to complain but I dont know how he got on.

We reported my husbands bike theft to the guards and while they've been very nice, we've heard nothing back.

irish rail are worse than useless - 3 bikes and a car stolen last week alone, this is a regular occurence and they are doing nothing. Apparently they are even taking the stolen bikes on the train to dublin!

Husband hasnt bothered getting a new bike as theyll only steal it too. Perhaps the Leinster express would be interested??

jack of all

Sad to see but I think the only solution is to make your bike "unlovely" and thus unattractive to potential thieves. In Dublin cyclists usually leave an old clunker of a bike in the stations for the short runs or else I've seen quite good bikes which have been deliberately (badly) spray painted to make them look like junk and thus unappealing to the thieving scum. You should try and get a petition together and write to Iarnrod Eireann and demand proper CCTV coverage and lighting of their facilities at least, they may not have a legal liability but they most owe some duty of care to their customers, what if a passenger was attacked or robbed at the bike shed?

Kimbot

Aoifes mam's bike was destroyed badly, I had a look at it today and the rear forks are so badly bent that they snapped so the bike cant be repaired. Bike was expensive enough so I am going to scrap it and replace it with a cheap bike, im going to try get answer off irish rail in the morning and I won't be brushed off easily by them

s14driftking

Port was a nice place to live and socalise in till they started shipping them all down outta dublin to live there.

jamesbondings

s14driftking wrote: »

Port was a nice place to live and socalise in till they started shipping them all down outta dublin to live there.

Hardly true.... Originally from Dublin, grew up in Port, I have many good friends from the area all of whom are very respectful people... Even the people I would have regarded as scum back then are genuinely nice people who for one reason or another I didn't get along with! ... I went back 3 times in the last 10 years or so and it has just got worse and worse!

Why have they got cameras if they don't even work?

sydthebeat

s14driftking wrote: »

Port was a nice place to live and socalise in till they started shipping them all down outta dublin to live there.

Rubbish, the biggest scumbags around town are still the local scum bags we've always had
...

kerry4sam

Aoifemckay2013 wrote: »

Hi my mam had left her bike in the bike shed of the train station in Portarlington as she does every morning for work , but today as she came back this eveing at 19.15pm she walked out to find her bike smashed up at the back ! Some scumbag had literally kicked the **** out of the back of her bike and for what reason I do not know! She was very upset , its a very good bike and is just a year and a half old and cost €550 ! The man who works at the station said the bike shed its self has cameras but they are broken and the ones in the station only flicker around so might not see anything on these ! She has reported it to the gards but I say not much can be done now .. Im just so annoyed at what someone has done to her bike and for what ! like what the hell would anyone get out of doing that to someones property accept hurting that person !

Seriously sorry to hear this. I'd bet you Mam was well shook on finding it in that condition. The mindsets of these individuals truly is something special. Hope she is okay and that it won't deter her from cycling and leaving another bike somewhere safe, even close to the station perhaps, but close and safe enough for reaching at that late stage in the evening when she arrives in the evening after work.
Was the bike covered under any insurance? House insurance perhaps?

Give her a big Hug though,
kerry4sam

Roaster wrote: »

Scum are scum!

They probably think it was great craic.

I'm surprised you actually got a response off the station. Their normal response is "nothing to do with us..." Best of luck with Garda, wasted exercise I'm afraid.

Does seem to be a common response alright.

jonny24ie wrote: »

Aoifes mam's bike was destroyed badly, I had a look at it today and the rear forks are so badly bent that they snapped so the bike cant be repaired. Bike was expensive enough so I am going to scrap it and replace it with a cheap bike, im going to try get answer off irish rail in the morning and I won't be brushed off easily by them

I'd like to know how you get on with this if you wouldn't mind.

Thanks,
kerry4sam

sky6

I'm pretty sure a claim against inroad eireann would be successful. I'll tell you why,
you cannot contract out of a legal responsibility. Most of the signs claiming no responsibility are there to put people off claiming. They have little legal basis.
Iarnrod Eireann clearly do have a duty of care in the confines of the station not just on the trains.
The fact that they installed Camera's demonstrates that they know there's a problem.
If it were my bike I'd make a small courts claim.

Kimbot

I went down the station earlier and they have 2 tiny signs, 1 on the entrance and one on the wall of the station with the usual "we are not responsible" bull but they have now fixed the camera looking onto the bike racks so hopefully that might deter them.
The bike is now replaced at a very low cost so that's a plus at the moment. If it happens again I don't care what any sign says I will take it as far as I can because it's shocking that irish rail are doing nothing about it.

Also when I was there today there was at least 7 or 8 cut off locks lying on the ground.

sky6

J hope you took a Photo of the Locks for future evidence.

janedoe75

s14driftking wrote: »

Port was a nice place to live and socalise in till they started shipping them all down outta dublin to live there.

Please. Sick of hearing this about Portarlington. It gets trotted out time after time when anything happens. Believe me some of the locals bite too!

janedoe75

jonny24ie wrote: »

Aoifes mam's bike was destroyed badly, I had a look at it today and the rear forks are so badly bent that they snapped so the bike cant be repaired. Bike was expensive enough so I am going to scrap it and replace it with a cheap bike, im going to try get answer off irish rail in the morning and I won't be brushed off easily by them

I'd also be interested in how you get on with them. My husband is so disheartened he hasnt replaced the bike, figures they'll only steal it as well. Hes walking for now.

Roaster

I'm from Dublin and have been living in Port for 11 years now and love it.

You'll always get the odd scumbag no matter where you live but I've found that the last 2-3 years there have been some amount of undesirables living in the town. I've my own ideas who's responsible for all the anti-sociable behaviour but it's speculation on my part.

I think the lack of a 24 garda presence has a huge bearing on what's going on at the moment. Imagine letting scumbags know when you are not on duty, you couldn't make it up.