Bicycle Fishing

Amsterdam is the place for bicycles, between 40% to 60% of all trips within the city are made by bicycle. The city has 165 channels and unfortunately some of the bikes fall overboard. Some, is an understatement, the average number of bikes found in the canals is anywhere between 12,000 to 15,000 a year!

It is assumed that vandalism is behind these high numbers. There are bicycle thieves who want to quickly dispose of evidence. It is a thing, people just randomly steal bikes, it is a bit of an epidemic. Another way, and a little less dramatic than thieves, often comes from locks not tied to anything and high winds blowing them over to catch a dive. Very crazy and funny!

All that above leads to the local government of Amsterdam having to periodically dig up these discarded bikes to keep the city’s canals clean, safe and accessible. Making it an interesting problem to have every year!