A graveyard of Google bikes

[Portion removed because it was in response to a post that has since been removed for violating terms of use.]

Google can try to assert their bikes are only for employees but if they're going to dot my neighborhood with them they better be okay with the neighborhood using them as well. I consider Google bikes to be community bikes and I'll happily hop on one if I come upon it when I'm walking to and from downtown. But I always leave it parked in a convenient spot for the next user.

I have noticed the abandoned bikes over the last months along the Stevens Creek Trail, and have actually stepped in a couple of times when people were clearly going down to retrieve them for their own use. I rolled at least 2 bikes back to the Google campus on Whisman when I was walking back home. In contrast to PeaceLove, I feel that Google property is Google property. There are a lot of houses and cars around my neighborhood, but I don't think I have the right to drive them or sleep in them. Nor do I think the flowers planted on my street are there for me to pick, nor do I want anyone else taking mine. Using things that don't belong to us without permission is just plain rude.

I agree with CourneyB, however even people retrieving them for their own use is better than leaving them dumped in the creek. So if somebody is willing to go down and fetch them out I think it's fair that they get to keep it. If Google wants them back then they should go retrieve them.

Google should come to an agreement with the city. The city should pick up each and every bike it sees in the parks and on the trails. Then Google should come get them and pay a couple bucks for each one for the service. Or maybe Google should increase their patrols to find these lost bikes before they end up in the creeks.

I have absolutely no problem with Google providing bikes for its employees to ride within and between campuses (I live near the Waymo building on Central, and I see (presumbably) Googlers riding between campuses all of the time--this removes cars and buses from the roads). But when I see kids riding them, I have to assume they aren't from Google. And, by the way, this is theft, plain and simple--removing other's belongings from someone's property is theft.

Unfortunately, Google does nothing to secure the bikes at their locations. They could have them in a locked area or use something like is used for bikeshare stations, but I suspect that would eliminate the 'freedom' of using these bikes for their employees. But, if they are ending up on city streets and sidewalks or worse, in Steven's Creek, then a discussion with Google might be in order.

The bikes are all over my neighborhood and I think anyone should be able to hop on and off. I personally have my own bike but this keeps people out of their cars and provides a nice service for the folks who cannot afford a bike or car. I thought Mtn View and Google wanted to get more folks to commute by bike; this is a good way to start. Lets make it legal!

I haven't heard anyone say they called the Google number. Does it work?

I've called Google Security multiple times to report orphaned bikes. I know it's expensive, but Google could keep their bikes in fenced in pens with locks activated by employees' card keys. I've heard that many Google bikes end up in the Los Angeles area.

I found a Google bike left outside my house on a quiet Palo Alto street and rang the number. I was told that the truck would come and pick it up. It was there for almost a week and in my mind I had decided the following weekend to ride it to Mountain View and leave it near Waymo. But the Friday before the weekend it disappeared. I was surprised that it had remained so long without some joyrider taking it for a spin.

Google bikes have been a nuisance all around Mountain View since the day they were introduced. An extremely simple solution to the problem is to install a wheel-lock device on every bike that is keyed alike and issue a key to every employee that wants to ride. A quick search on google shopping brings up a version made by ABUS for only $17. If they bought 1000, they could probably be had for $10 each.

Google bikes litter the streets of my neighbor each and every day. There is absolutely NO EXCUSE for this. It is not up to Mountain View, Sunnyvale, Palo Alto or any city experiencing the influx of google bikes to round them up and return them to Google. Nor is it the responsibility of city residents to police the streets; or the Friends of Stevens Creek Trail to rid the creek of Google's bikes. It is the responsibility of Google and it's employees - clear and simple. A Google bike should be ridden by a Google employee to get from one campus to another and should be picked up from and returned to a safe, key-carded enclosure at the originating and destination Google site. Bikes should not be ridden home, ridden to the market, to the library, to the coffee shop, etc. Bikes abandoned by Google employees in the street or on the sidewalk become easy marks for theft. This isn't the fault of the community, it's Google's fault. Get your employees under control, Google, and stop littering the streets. Wasn't there once a motto of DO NO EVIL?

The Google phone number for security does NOT work. Someone answers but they'll tell you that someone will be by to pick up the bike on your property in a week. No one came to collect it. Google no longer has 1000 bikes. Next time I'll give them 24 hours before disposing of it (and certainly NOT in the creek!).

What about tracking devices on them? Google's a tech company, right?

It's an ongoing joke in our household that roadside trash in Mtn View is a Google bike. I even have a collection of photographs as proof for my social media. On a more serious note, the problem seems to be getting worse. I called Google a few weeks back about a bike outside my home that was abandoned and blocking the sidewalk. To their credit, they picked it up right away.

Littering Stevens Creek is terrible and littering our neighborhoods is rude, but oh wouldn't it be nice if that were the only problem google were causing in Mountain View (and Palo Alto)?

Google people leave these bikes all over my complex, including blocking sidewalks and access points that wheelchair people need to use.

This irresponsible behavior has to stop.

I'm thinking that the next time I see one of these things I'm going to consider it trash and throw it in the dumpster.

I am really confused by the comments that express irritation with Google, yet say nothing about the individuals who take the bikes. I frequently see adolescents on these bikes. As a community, shouldn't we be expressing concern about our young people who take things that don't belong to them and dump them when they are done.

When I first visited Mountain View in 2011, I thought it was charming that Google provided the use of these bikes to anyone and as a tourist, my kids and i thought it was so much fun to hop on a google bike and ride the Stevens creek trail. We were nor aware at first the bright bikes were only for employees. We always returned the bikes we used back to the Google campus and thought it was the neatest thing. Then we moved here. I am sorry to see may bikes damaged and vandalized over the years. The concept is utopian and magical in our increasingly lock-it-up world. I think Google should maintain the program but maybe market it that the bikes are for the community to share and to take care of. Maybe sponsor occasional Community Google Bike Collection drives and Google bike Rehab weekends. They should be treated as a Silicon Valley Icon.

I cannot believe what I'm reading here. It seems like half the people are angry at Google for having bikes, and half think that everybody should be able to just grab one. Everyone seems to think that the bikes are a personal insult to them from Google. I don't know why there is so much hate for Google. I'm guessing it's currently just popular. That being said, blaming Google in this case is kind of strange. That would be akin to me blaming you for somebody stealing your car and then parking it on my driveway. While it is true, you may hold some of the blame for not securing it well enough, but in reality the person who stole it holds most of the responsibility. Google bikes are only to be used by Google employees. I promise you they are not the ones dumping the bikes in the creek or leaving them in your neighborhood. So why don't you turn your anger in the direction should be? The people stealing those bikes without permission, and then dumping them. And no, you cannot use one. Just like I cannot use your car, even if you leave it unlocked on your driveway.


PS: this Google hate is ridiculous. Who do you think pays most of the mountain view property taxes that part for your schools and roads? Googlers.

Yeah, the bikes seemed cool at first. Now it's just corporate litter. If anyone else left junk all over the city, you can bet MV dept of public works would be all over it.

If the bikes were dumped in front of the main Google building, how fast do you think Google would address the issue?

Wow, people are really messed up. How can you blame Google for this? People are stealing and destroying property that Google is making available for everyone. And you are blaming them? Blaming the victim? Pathetic. Stop your whining, entitled BS and appreciate the fact that a giant corporation is making community resources available at no charge. And no, I don't work for Google, have never work for Google, and don't have anything to do with them.

@Dave

Except that Google is not making it available for everyone. Read the article. They're for Google employees only.

And perhaps you like to see abandoned Google bikes littered around your neighborhood (blocking sidewalks, in the Creek) like shopping carts, which is great for your perhaps, but it shows a total disregard for the look and feel of the community.

When Google is right up the street, right on Space Park way, they have all their trucks parked there with hundreds of bikes, either for repair or just parked, what do they expect?

They are taking over the town and the least that can be done is that residents have the ability to use their bikes.

I agree that they should not be dumped into Stevens Creek but limiting the bikes to only their employees with GPS-tracking is not the right course of action. Whose to say that a Google employee doesn't ride the bike home and then park it outside someone else' home and now they get the blame?

Hire more people to clean up bikes if you don't want the mess. But anytime you have a service for employees, it is bound to be taken advantage or and abused.

Google's been about google. They clog our streets and sidewalks. Yet they gard there parking lot 4th for July so locals can't park in their precious parking lots for Fourth of July fireworks. Damn shame. Won't get into the rents because of Google.

Abandoned property should be picked up and sold at auction. It is like shopping carts.

There are definitely more Google bikes in Palo Alto during the summer months when the tunnel under 101 opens. I have reported a bike outside my house and I thought that if it wasn't picked up soon I would ride it myself to the Waymo campus to return it as a helpful deed. If I had done so, I think I would have felt a little guilty while doing so in case someone thought I, a non-Google employee, was stealing it. It kind of reminds me of the time I found a wallet in a cart at Target. I held that wallet in my hand held high over my head as I walked into Target to drop it in at customer service. You can't tell nowadays if I was stealing a wallet or doing the right thing in taking it back.

There are times that fear of being called a thief makes you think twice about doing the right thing.

Simple solution: City declares "Company owned, personal powered transportation devices in the same category as Shopping Carts." No need to call the "Google bikes". All the same rules, requirements, and regulations apply. Once the city starts fining the "company" for abandoned ones, they'll get cleaned up pretty quick.

These bikes are left by my house at the park ALL THE TIME one in front of my driveway.. well of course I let it sit for a couple days, then called the number for google security " who is in charge of getting them " and no problem a WEEK LATER they picked it up. what a joke

There are services that retrieve abandoned shopping carts and return them to the businesses that own them. It seems to me that abandoned corporate bicycles (Google isn't the only company that has them) could be returned in the same way.

Wow! What are people getting SO excited about???? I live in downtown Mtn. View and there are occasionally bikes left in the neighborhood, but is that really something to get that worked up about? I'm not associated with Google in any way, but they seem to be a responsible member of the community, looking for ways to give back, and they're not the ones leaving the bikes in town.

I also see that they send crews out to gather the bikes that non-employees take and dump around town, so what else should they be doing?

If this is the biggest problem in your life, you should be really really grateful!!

With all this crazy venting, people are forgetting ....

Each bike that a Googler rides is one less car making our bad traffic worse.

Sure they dropped the ball half way and they need to fix it. Of course we can't have bikes in the creek, but that's a lot of cars off the road... thousands of less cars, belching pollution into the air.

If these bikes were stolen, then there must be hundreds of police reports. Let me guess. Not a single police report. So they weren't stolen. It was expected they were going to be taken and left around town as rubbish.

In response to PeaceLove's comment:

1. What do you mean by "if they're going to dot my neighborhood with them"? It's not Google who's dotting your neighborhood with the bikes, rather non-employees who use it without permission and leave it where convenient. Based on your comment, you belong to them.)

2. "I consider Google bikes to be community bikes". It's not up to your consideration. If I would consider your car as my own, I would be a thief.

For Reference since property tax was mentioned in one comment:
From New York Times 5 years ago: Web Link
"While that portion of Google’s land is taxed at a rate of approximately 35 cents per square foot, the land under Intuit’s corporate campus, which is just around the corner, has an estimated property tax burden of 3 cents per square foot. Meantime, tax rates on land under recently purchased neighboring single-family homes ranged from $1 to $1.25 per square foot, according to a Bay Citizen examination of assessments on 2010 home sales in Mountain View."

I don't think we are all convinced it is "non-employees who use it without permission and leave it where convenient". If only we had actual data about this ....

I find a lot of bike left around the town are Google workers. The get off the bike leave it where ever they like and go inside a building with G on the door. It in parking spots on sidewalks and at the street coroner. They are convenient to G workers who can legally use them but a mis place eyesore pain for Mtn View citizen (like a 6 year old leaving a bike in the drive way)

I used to work at Google. The bikes were for employees only, and not to be taken off campus. However, when something is "free", people don't respect the rules very much. I saw quite a few employees taking them downtown or nearby shopping, which they were asked not to do. Quite a few of the bikes are likely employees taking them off-campus, and quite a few are also stolen. I wouldn't be surprised if googlers are taking those bikes and leaving them near the creek, and some troublemakers then toss them in for fun. Google buys many of these bikes and gets a great deal on them, and they decided it's cheaper to replace stolen bikes than to secure them some way.

Apparently there is a Google bike on the roof of Blach Middle School right now! This is more than 5 miles from the Google campus!

Seriously, these things are a nuisance! They are all over town. If Google can't figure out a way to keep them on their campus then they need to do away with them altogether. I run into them everywhere! Enough already!

Too many of the young googlers seem to believe that their mothers will clean up after them or are simply too preoccupied on whatever triviality they're engaged in at the moment to be considerate of others and so just leave these bicycles everywhere. Perhaps Google HR should program them to behave like responsible young adults; such a strategy would probably be wildly successful, given the apparently algorithmic nature of their interpersonal skills.

@Dmitrygr: Let me see if I have your reasoning straight, Google pays a lot of taxes that go toward our roads and schools and that entitles them to not have to wrangle their bikes more effectively? That certainly sounds like what you're saying!

If you didn't lock your front door and the police has to continuously come out to your home because you were robbed over and over again, I'm pretty sure that even law enforcement would tell you were asking for it at some point! It is the same with the Google bikes. It is well known that it is not a community bike service yet the problem persists so now it's time for Google ---the OWNER of the program --- to do something about it. Stating that is NOT GOOGLE HATE! It is a simple matter of fact --- IF YOU OWN THE PROGRAM, YOU FIND WAYS TO MANAGE THE PROGRAM!

NOTE to moderators:
Please stop deleting content for so called "terms of use" violations

when there are no violations, only opinions that the moderators dont agree with

because of "political incorrectness".

While some of the activity may be googlers themselves, I think logically most Google employeees would ride them back to their office even if they took them off campus to get back to their jobs after a lunch date or whatever.

[Portion removed; don't state your opinion about criminal actions by specific people as "fact" unless you have verifiable data to back up your claim.]


I have observed this activity myself (google bikes have been dumped on my property and in my business parking lot) and I'm sure many other people have had this experience as well.

yes, it would be nice to have hard data beyond just observation.

SFGate picked up this story this afternoon, and a Google spokeswoman said the company is "brainstorming" solutions to the problem. Why the need to "brainstorm"? As one poster noted, there are companies that routinely pick up abandoned grocery carts. Google should be able to contract with one and do a sweep every 5 days. As far as the bikes being designated for use around the various campuses, when did Century 16 Theaters become one of the company's sites? Last month, I went to a weekday matinee, and the entire bike rack was filled with Gbikes (I personally refer to them as RGBs -- random Google bikes). I'm not mad at Google -- they just need to initiate a program to keep the bikes contained -- and take responsibility to get the abandoned bikes from Stevens Creek.

Graveyard of google bikes is WAY better than the graveyard of RVs parked on our streets. Coming out of target onto Latham today I almost got hit for lack of visibility, RVs blocking view of the street. Totally dangerous.

The bikes are a public nuisance and the city should fine Google for abandoned bikes in the community.

I've seen Google bikes in Sunnyvale, most recently someone was riding one down Hollenbeck near El Camino. Thought it was strange, but perhaps a Google employee was riding it off campus for some reason.

I'm troubled by the number of people who complain about the highly successful companies residing in this area that afford us all our way of life in some way or another, "not caring about the city in which they reside." It's silly hyperbole. I think originally, the company though the bikes would simply be for employees. Each summer, thousands of interns show up to work, who have no cars but live nearby and use Gbikes to get to and from home and work. Those bikes get left in numerous places and taken by other community members. I think the company was probably originally apprehensive about this but the bikes have become so ingrained in the community that I think the company thought of it as a public service, mostly meant for the company's employees but one that the larger public also benefits from in some way.

Now I think the company will have to more aggressively manage the location of bikes. They already track the newer bikes. Some of the older bikes don't have tracking so they're most vulnerable. My frustration is with the abusers of the bikes who see fit to damage the bikes and the creek. Those folks are the problem. It's rare that you can trust people to just do the right thing.

FYI Google has a campus in Sunnyvale Moffet Towers area and thus riding bikes to Google locations now transverse into Sunnyvale and soon into San Jose area. I see them left at the light rail system. Movie theaters Down town restaurants. So they are not just work bikes.

I think Google needs to more aggressively manage their bikes. I've lived in MV for 17 years. It used to be cute to see Google bikes around town, but when it actually became trash in our creeks, it needs to be taken care of. As taxpayers, we are already paying millions to clean up after previous tech companies who polluted our water.

I'm disappointed that Google is playing catch-up, but generally Google has been a good neighbor and fortunately it is a solvable problem. We used to have a huge issue with abandoned shopping carts, which also were being thrown into creeks.

In response to a comment made by Kristine Dworkin on the 19'th, not only was there a bike on Blach Intermediate school, (there were actually two there) but there was one on the top of MVHS! This problem is really getting crazy. An Instagram account that illustrates this problem even exists! @foundgooglebikes

Fine. Using a bike that does not belong to me is stealing. I can agree with that.

Leaving that bike on the sidewalk in front my home is then littering. At the very least it's found property.

I will call the police every time I find a bike on my street. Let them deal with. Enough calls the cops and the cops will make it Google's problem.

The @founfgooglebikes account states that, "we believe that Google bikes belong to the people. liberating them is fun and cool and resists capitalism/corporate ownership"

So it seems that account advocates "liberating" Google bikes because it's "fun and cool and resists capitalism/corporate ownership" = advocating thievery, just because.

Isn't that special?

Google mantra years ago: Do No Evil
Today: as long as it doesn't impede our profits

I moved to Mountain View from NYC recently. The thing I dont understand is why anyone is mad at anyone. These usable hikes are simply abandoned on the roadside (by a person who took it, and a company who doesnt particularly care it was taken). And like a discarded lamp, it can be useful to someone else. So why not use it?
Littering sucks. Using a discarded item makes sense.
And if I could pick up every unlocked, discarded bike of any kind, and every discarded lamp or table and fix it and sell it cheap to folks who could use it, I would consider it a positive contribution to my community.
So why isnt a church or community center asking permissiin from Google to collect abandonded bikes and then fixing them up for Bay Area kids who need bikes?

@Jodi. Do you realize that these gbikes are for the exclusive use of Google employees? I think folks would have a much more accepting attitude of the bikes littered around town if they were for public use!

I find this gbikes outrage facinating. I think they've become another avatar for how Google has "taken over" the town. Some folks are disturbed by the wastefulness and carelessness (if you're a rich kid, no need to take care of your toys, just get more toys). And some folks are disturbed because they suspect non-Google people are stealing the bikes (it's terrible to walk around suspicious of your neighbors) Others bristle at the constant reminder of how rich google is and that perks awarded only to the "royal" google employees ( made to feel like second class citizens in their own town)

Sigh, like many "big idea" projects Google has experimented with, its intentions were good but it hasn't been thought through well and they don't provide any follow through to tune it and make it work or wind it down either (City wifi? Google glass?)

We visited Google, last week and were amazed at how many of the bikes were gone

Hilarious comments abound about some bikes. HARUMPH!! HARUMPH!!
Silicon Valley Problems...the struggle is so very real.

Tommy Hilfinger's brother started a business collecting shopping carts are returning them for a fee. Someone should do the same with the Google bikes, pick them up and return them to Google for $$.