
Bike rack hack: Can thieves pop the bolts on Philly's common rack design?

Here's a depressing sight we came across recently in Old City: a bike rack where the bolt had simply been popped off, presumably liberating whatever bike had been locked there.
You probably remember the video that went around online when these things were first installed a couple years ago, on the posts of waht had been parking meters. It showed a guy easily guiding the whole locking structure off the post it was placed on. Some claimed that video wasn't an accurate reflection of the racks' durability. The Bicycle Coalition wrote that maybe vandalism had preceded the filming, adding: "A small installation problem shouldn't take away from the main point, which is Philadelphia is doing the right thing to supply more bike parking."