Saturday 10 December 2016

Quibans 49: Bike thefts

From the Cambridge News:

Cambridge branded bike theft capital and rail station ranked third worst cycle theft hotspot

Criminals swiped 2,173 cycles in 12 months and streets within the city account for 13 of the top 100 bike theft hotspots listed in police recorded crime data, more than any other local authority area.

The top hotspots for theft are Station Road at the railway hub with 63 thefts, and Parkside, next to the city police station and Parker’s Piece, with 62, following new analysis of crime data from every police force in England and Wales analysed by online insurer Protect Your Bubble.

The bike theft problem in Cambridge is underlined when the thefts are calculated per 1,000 residents. The overall rate for England and Wales is 1.4 thefts per 1,000 people. In Cambridge it’s 16.6.

Government figures show that across England 9.5 per cent of adults cycle at least once a week. But Cambridge is way ahead of other cities with 52 per cent.


Questions
Can students create their own questions?
Here are mine:
1) What percentage of bikes stolen in Cambridge were taken from Parkside (near the police station)?
2) How many residents does Cambridge have?
3) Roughly how many people in Cambridge cycle at least once a week?

Answers
1) 62/2173 = 2.85%
2) (2173/16.6) * 1000 = 130,904 (This is very close to the official figure of 130,907 and rounding is likely to be the issue.)
3) Hmm. The article says that 52% of _adults_ cycle at least once a week. If we assume that the same is true of children then we would get about 65,000. If more children cycle then it will be a little higher.

Source: http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/cambridge-branded-bike-theft-capital-12264943

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