Dubai students concerned after bicycles stolen at Metro station

Sohrab Anwar took his new bike on a ride and it got stolen on the first day despite using two locks to secure it. The Sharjah to Dubai traffic in the morning caused the university student to shift houses. Anwar studies at the Canadian University Dubai and recently shifted to Dubai’s Rashidiya area from Sharjah so that he can take the Metro to his morning class.

“Our home is still almost 2 kilometres away from the Metro station and a bus does not cover the area,” the youngster said. Anwar’s father got him a bicycle to ride to and from the station. However, that did not work out for too long.

In fact, on the first day of taking his new bike to the station, Sohrab was faced with an unfortunate incident — his bike got stolen.

On September 3, he had left it parked at 10am, at the Rashidiya Metro station and only in a few hours’ time, at 3pm, when he returned from university he found that it was missing despite taking measures to keep the bike safe.

“Since my friend’s bike was stolen at the same Metro station sometime back, I used two chain locks while parking the bike at the designated bike parking area,” the engineering student said. Distraught, the youngster went to an officer of Dubai Police patrolling the area.

“I reported the matter to the police on duty at the Metro station immediately. I was sent to Rashidiya Police Station where I was advised to go back to the location and call police again. I did that and the matter was reported to the officer who came there,” Anwar said.

However, Anwar failed to file a formal complaint about the matter, hoping he would eventually find the item.

Currently, after a month of waiting, Anwar still has not found his bike neither has his friend.

“My father bought another bicycle for me as walking up and down from home was taking too long. However, I never tried to use the bicycle after that, as I feel, it will also be stolen,” he added.

Public transport

“I am sure authorities are trying to promote public transport in Dubai. As students, my friends and I are keen to use public transport. But such incidents have cautioned us,” he said.

Anwar said that his and friends he would like to ride their bikes to the Metro without the fear of them getting stolen.

Anwar said that he and others like him would like a system in place that ensures the safety of their bicycles they park at Metro stations. “For example, an ID initiated locking and unlocking system at these parking lots would help,” he said.

Dubai police

Gulf News contacted Dubai Police regarding the matter and a representative told Gulf News that a victim must contact the call centre and a complaint will be immediately registered.

The representative also said that the victim will get a reference number on their mobile phone via text message of the complaint ticket filed. Talking about bikes being stolen at the Rashidiya Metro Station, the representative said that once the complaint has been filed, an alert to the nearest police station to look into the issue will be sent.

We also followed up with the Roads and Transport Authority on whether there were any plans to increase bicycle parking facilities around Metro stations, but no response had come in till the time of publishing.

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