Before the Olympic Park was built, so before 2010, I used to commute down the Lea Valley path alongside Hackney marshes. I’d been hearing on the local news that commuters had been targeted for their bikes and expensive possessions in bags. I thought that the early time I was using the path would be before undesirables got up, but then got chatting to another cyclist whose friend’s bike had been taken at knife point along that path.
The thieves had remained hidden in the long grass until the last minute, and then appeared in the path and stopped the cyclist, who had no option but to hand over his bike. They made off over a nearby bridge into a housing estate. He called the police, who quite promptly went to the housing estate, looked behind some bins, and recovered his bike.
After hearing about this I stopped using that path once I got into Hackney, except in the late afternoon when I knew there would be plenty of people about.
