We mapped 2022 Toronto bike theft data. Here are the riskiest neighbourhoods.

Thefts dropped for the second straight year, but downtown remains a hard-hit area and hopes for bike recovery are slim.

The number of Toronto bike thefts fell for the second straight year in 2022, according to Toronto Police Service data released late last month.

A total of 2,975 bikes were stolen across the city, down 6.7 per cent from the 3,188 stolen in 2021. That’s the lowest number in the database, which goes back to 2014.

This downward trend should come as some relief to Toronto bike owners considering it comes on the heels of a prolonged period of the opposite. In 2018, a record 4,004 bikes were stolen, and 2020 saw a similarly high 3,950 thefts.

Of course, while the total number of bikes stolen has dropped, that drop hasn’t been felt equally across the city. And in fact, some areas remain consistently riskier than others.

To visualize this, we mapped the latest data. Check the map accompanying this article to view individual areas year by year, and read on for some key takeaways.

Note: The TPS can only collect data from bike thefts that have been reported, which means it’s possible their figures underestimate the full situation.

Key takeaways

Here are a handful of observations on the latest batch of Toronto bike theft data:

• Downtown remains the hardest-hit area. In fact, the two individual neighbourhoods with the highest number of thefts are the Yonge-Bay Corridor and Downtown Yonge East, which combine for a rectangular area from Dundas St. in the north, Jarvis St. in the east, Front St. in the south, and University-Simcoe in the west. A total of 407 thefts — about 14 per cent of the total number of bikes stolen in the city — came from this area.
• The next three hardest-hit areas are St. Lawrence-East Bayfront-The Islands (124 thefts), University (116), and Wellington Place (115).
• There were a total of 1,089 thefts categorized as residential — 25.6 per cent fewer than in 2021. But commercial thefts rose 16.6 per cent to 386. A total of 1,500 thefts were categorized in the database as “Other.”
• Thefts continue to follow a general day-of-the-week trend. Weekends tend to have fewer incidents than weekdays, with the bulk of thefts coming mid week.
• Unsurprisingly, summer months — when more people are cycling — see way more bike thefts than winter months. In 2022, July and August topped the chart with 463 and 459 thefts respectively, while January, February, and December had 193 combined.
• Finally, although thefts are down, hopes of recovering a stolen bike remain slim. According to the data, just eight stolen bikes were recovered in 2022. This is down from 24 the previous year, and 56 in 2020.

Why is the number of bike thefts dropping?

Unfortunately, there’s no easy answer here.

In an email to Torontoverse, a TPS media relations officer said the organization can’t confirm why specific crimes drop, but added that police make a point of “giving members of the public tips on how to prevent these crimes from happening.”

These tips include choosing a proper lock and registering your bike with the TPS.

As we reported last year, cycling advocates believe there is still more the City could do to help in this regard, such as passing bylaws to create more secure bike parking inside apartment buildings.

For more information on protecting your bike, please check out the City of Toronto’s bicycle theft prevention page.

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Code and markup by Chris Dinn. ©Torontoverse, 2023