“You have to place them in a thoughtful manner, or things could look pretty unsightly very fast,” adds Cabot House Superintendent Gene Ketelhohn.

Scrap Metal

Although the limited number of bike racks available for the Houses and some classroom buildings is the prime source of overcrowding, abandoned and derelict bikes left on the racks claim significant space.

“At Lowell House, there are so many old, decrepit wheels and abandoned, rusty bikes around in addition to the regular in-use bikes that it’s absolutely impossible to find any space,” DeMarco says.

Superintendents say they try to clean the racks a couple of times a year, but it’s often difficult to tell which bikes are abandoned and which are simply old.

“It’s very tricky to identify which bikes are abandoned—we usually end up having to put a notice on the bike if we suspect it of being discarded, and then we cut it off the rack if no one responds,” Ketelhohn says.

Some superintendents have established rules for eliminating forsaken bicycles.

“My criterion is that if a bike is loaded with dust or the chain is rusted solid, then I cut it off and get rid of it,” says Coveney, who cut about 10 bikes off the Lowell racks prior to school opening.

Cutting the Locks

And when bikes block wheelchair access ramps or the railings of stairwells in the Yard and at the Houses, their owners can face even greater inconveniences.

Yard Operations does not remove bikes unless they present an immediate safety hazard, Gingo says.

Instead, they place a special lock on the bike, in turn forcing the owner to contact the Harvard University Police Department to have the bike unlocked. There are no fines for releasing these bikes.

But some House superintendents take a harsher approach.

“If a bike is blocking a walkway or stairway, I will cut the lock off in a heartbeat,” Coveney says. “It is inconsiderate, and it imposes danger.”

Coveney then holds the bike in the Lowell House basement for a week, and if no one comes to claim it, he turns the bicycle over to Phillips Brooks House or Harvard Transportation Services.

At Winthrop House, where many students lock their bikes to the building’s gutters and the parking signs that run along the street, Superintendent David Simms takes a similarly harsh approach.

“We cut a lot of locks, but students don’t seem to complain too much about it,” he says. “They just want their bikes back and they come down to the basement for them pretty quickly.”