Bicycle Thieves Take City for a Ride
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MILAN, Italy — The city’s residents have taken a bicycle promotion campaign literally and made off with hundreds of bikes.
The city’s campaign to encourage the Milanese to take to two wheels started on Sunday when about 500 bright yellow bicycles were left at various points in the city center in a free “ride and park” experiment.
But by Tuesday morning, more than half had disappeared and about 50 others were found abandoned, either vandalized or with their tires punctured.
City officials, however, refused to be discouraged.
“I wouldn’t say people have stolen the bicycles but that they have used them too much. We wanted to encourage people to cycle and ironically, we have succeeded,” Attilio Schemmari, Milan traffic chief, said.
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