Steal my car!

Posted by lilith on February 1st, 2008 14 Comments

From NBC 29’s report, Hot Wheels: Vehicle Theft:

“There you go, right there; keys sitting right there in the console. A lot of car thefts could be prevented if people didn’t leave the keys in them,” he said.

How hard is it to carry your teeny-tiny keys inside a store with you? Who are these people? I want to hear an amazing argument for leaving your keys visible in your windshield and your doors unlocked.

From the press release available for download with the article, these are the top ten cities for car theft in the US:

1. Las Vegas/Paradise, NV
2. Stockton, CA
3. Visalia/Porterville, CA
4. Phoenix/Mesa/Scottsdale, AZ
5. Modesto, CA
6. Seattle/Tacoma/Bellevue, WA
7. Sacramento/Arden-Arcade/Roseville, CA
8. Fresno, CA
9. Yakima, WA (what?)
10. Tucson, AZ

Popularity: 5% [?]

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14 Responses to “Steal my car!”

  1. 01 Feb 2008 at 9:17 am1ThatGrrl said:

    I’ve seen people leave the car running and unattended, while they pop into a quickie mart. *shrugs*

  2. 01 Feb 2008 at 9:50 am2lilith said:

    Not to change topic so early, but this does remind me of the Recycling Center’s sign asking us to turn our cars off while we go. I really only have cans to dump, ever, so I try to park all the way down at the end and run and do it really fast. It would be less fuel-efficient for me to stop my car for those 20 seconds. I think we need some research on how long a car has to be off for turning it off to be fuel-efficient. In China, for example, drivers are encouraged to stop their cars while sitting in traffic for a minute. That doesn’t sound like it can be a good thing.

  3. 01 Feb 2008 at 9:55 am3Tim said:

    10 seconds is all you need to be idling to be doing more harm than good.

    http://oee.nrcan.gc.ca/communities-government/transportation/municipal-communities/articles/idling-myths.cfm?attr=8
    http://sustainablechoices.stanford.edu/actions/on_the_road/turnoffengine.html

  4. 01 Feb 2008 at 10:04 am4lilith said:

    Okay, it would not be less fuel-efficient for me to stop my car for those 20 seconds.

    I appreciate the link, and it says restarting takes less fuel than idling for those 10 seconds. What about emission?

  5. 01 Feb 2008 at 10:13 am5colfer said:

    I think in Germany you have to cut off the motor at stoplights, not that we want to be German or anything.

  6. 01 Feb 2008 at 10:33 am6baconfat said:

    i had a car of mine stolen in the fall of 2006. left it in the street with the doors unlocked and keys in the ignition. in my defense, it was a rusted-out 1985 chrysler k-car station wagon that was given to me with the caveat that i shouldn’t really try to drive it outside the city. it got about 12 miles to the gallon and handled like a panzer. also, it was about a year past due for state inspection. no way did i consider that anyone would look twice at it, much less steal it. at the time it was stolen i had moved it to clear out the driveway with the full intention of moving it back into the driveway within the next few days. the cops found it harrisonburg with some poor sap behind the wheel, but i think it had made it all the way to west virginia. i ended up selling it for $200 to cover the new brakes i put into it.

  7. 01 Feb 2008 at 12:11 pm7patience said:

    Can you imagine if we had a law like Germany’s in Charlottesville? By the time everybody got their cars started, the light would be red again. It ought to come with a warning label: Only highly efficient populations should attempt enacting this law.

  8. 01 Feb 2008 at 12:25 pm8hipster-doofus said:

    Lilith, emissions are worse at start-up, but only cold-start. Your catalytic converter has to achieve a certain temperature to function properly, and it takes a few minutes of hot exhaust gases flowing through to warm it to the proper temp. Turning your car on or off once its reached operating temperature wouldn’t have a negative impact emissions-wise. This is straight from my head (no link, no research), so should be deemed highly suspicious at best.

  9. 01 Feb 2008 at 12:34 pm9TheUpstart said:

    Lilith only recycles cans? *tisk tisk* ;)

  10. 01 Feb 2008 at 12:59 pm10belmont yo said:

    A bear stole my car. So I had it killed.

  11. 01 Feb 2008 at 1:09 pm11doof said:

    Apparently NBC29 did its research for this story on Craigslist?:
    http://charlottesville.craigslist.org/vnn/548321704.html
    Where were floozy, ‘yo and Silmo when we needed them? Could have been a much more entertaining story.

  12. 01 Feb 2008 at 1:33 pm12Silmo Syrup said:

    @ PATIENCE - # 7 is perfect

    @ Yo - LMAO

  13. 01 Feb 2008 at 2:56 pm13orchid said:

    my car key is stuck in my ignition. so if anyone wants to steal a crappy old volvo, go ahead. i’ll just find it and steal it back.

  14. 03 Feb 2008 at 5:09 pm14cVillain » Blog Archive » The Week in Review: 1/28/2008 to 2/3/2008 said:

    […] Car Stealage [Has yours been stolen?] […]

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