East Vancouver bike share ‘slasher’ deflates 36 tires: Mobi

People living near Trout Lake in East Vancouver say someone has been deflating the tires on the bikes at a Mobi bikeshare station.

Residents of the neighbourhood have pleaded to whoever’s doing it to stop. A sign on a nearby tree is asking the unknown “slasher” reads:

“Please stop taking air out of the tires. I need these bikes to get to work.” The note was signed by a “neighbour.”

However, another sign popped up, tacked onto the original sign that read “Too bad, so sad. Us motorists want our parking spots back!”

Note posted on a nearby tree pleading the unknown “bike slasher” to stop airing out tires. (Julian Mentasti-Meza/ Twitter)

The sign continued to list options for the “neighbour” that bulleted choices of buying a car, buying their own bicycle, walking, taking transit, and joining Evo.

Julian Mentasti-Meza, who lives in the neighbourhood, noticed the sign and posted it on social media.

“It was just like a neighbour, like, pleading to the slasher, hey, can you please stop doing this? I need to get to work, you’re damaging all the bikes. And then yesterday, I was walking around again and I saw the response from what we think is the slasher,” Mentasti-Meza said.

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Across from the bike station, one café worker believes the slashing happens in the middle of the night.

“I’ve had a few customers come in and just ask hey, what’s going on with the bikes? I see that the tires are flat. it’s happened two times – once a week now. This is the third time I’m hearing it,” a barman at the Commercial Street Café said.

In a statement, Mobi says 36 tires have been slashed over several days at the bike station. It says it’s a ‘rare and isolated’ incident. The Vancouver Police Department is also investigating.

Jade Buchanan who advocates for safe road use calls for understanding. As a regular bike share user, he also shares in the frustration.

“It’d be the same start to your day as your bus being late or finding out somebody has slashed your tires,” Buchanan said. “Whoever’s doing it, I’d ask to actually give riding a Mobi bike a shot, you might enjoy it. And then instead of slashing tires, you’d be slashing your gas bill.”