Abandoned bicycles cluttering campus during the year have been moved out and will go on sale today.
About 120 impounded bikes left the MSU police impound lot Thursday to be sold at the MSU Surplus Store, 1344 S. Harrison Road.
In May, the bike racks across campus were emptied of unregistered bikes as a part of the annual bike impoundment, and police collected more than 800 bikes, said Dawn Mazur, parking enforcement supervisor for the MSU police.
The bikes were brought to the MSU police impound lot, where they are required by law to sit for 30 days, Mazur said.
After the impoundment, the bikes are sent to the Surplus Store in increments because the store doesn't have enough room for all the bikes collected during the summer, Mazur said.
Aaron Cookingham, a Surplus Store employee, said the store receives a lot more calls regarding bikes as students start moving back for fall classes.
"Usually there is a good enough selection that you can find a bike in good shape," Cookingham said. "We have seen a lot of bikes that have only been ridden one to two times. They look brand new other than they have sat outside for a period of time."
The cost is based on the type of bike and the condition it's in, he said. Cookingham said the store sold more than 1,000 bikes last year.
This year's collection of 842 bikes is less than last year's impoundment of about 1,500 bikes, Mazur said.
The decrease is a result of eliminating the bicycle registration fee, which the MSU police implemented last year, she said.
Bikes are collected throughout the year, but the largest impoundment is done in the summer.
The bikes that are in the greatest disrepair are given to the MSU Bike Project to be fixed, painted and loaned to students who need them for the year, said Tim Potter, MSU Bike Project coordinator.
In the past, bikes have been obtained through the Surplus Store, but this year the project will get them directly from the police to provide more time to repair them.
"We are getting them sooner so we can provide better bikes," Potter said. "We don't have a shortage of bikes, we have a shortage of people who can work on them."
The bikes are repaired by volunteer mechanics who come to open-shop nights. Potter says the project is looking to expand its services to a full bike maintenance shop on campus.
"Right now demand is really high, so it's hard to keep up with it," he said. "We are always looking for volunteers with mechanical skills."
