Cathays had nearly 1000 reports of vehicle thefts and vandalism in less than two years

Nearly 1000 reports of vehicle thefts and vandalism have been made in Cathays in less than a two year period.

The information, which was provided through a Freedom of Information (FOI) request, showed that there were 942 reports between 1st January 2021 and 22nd September 2023.

The results of the inquiry also estimated that the interrogation and investigation of the vandalism would take up an estimated 357 hours of police time per year. This means that in this period, police have spent around 952 hours investigating vehicle theft and vandalism in Cathays.

The FOI request was unable to ascertain which types of vehicles were involved as it would take up too much time to gather the data.

According to a student who lives in the area, they said they’d seen many occurrences of vandalism on weekend evenings. They said they saw people going around and closing all the car’s wing mirrors.

They disclosed that events like this seem to “happen every week after YOLO and sometimes after Juice too because students are all walking back to their halls and think it’s funny.”

The student who spoke to The Cardiff Tab also added that on one Thursday morning she discovered that her own car had fallen victim to the vandalism: “I have my car at uni because it makes it easier to travel home and do the food shopping etc. I never thought it would be an issue to leave it parked outside my house. Then the morning after YOLO, I found that my wing mirror had been snapped off.”

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They said damage is going to cost around £150 to be fixed but due to a lack of CCTV in the area, no culprit has been found: “It’s really infuriating as I can’t drive until it’s fixed and I’ve had to take the money out of my savings to fix something I didn’t even break!

“It is such a shame that people feel it’s okay to vandalise and break other people’s property. With this being a weekly occurrence, something needs to be done by the university, security, and the police.”

This new information comes after Cathays was named as the worst area for crime in Wales. It is also ranked the worst place in England and Wales for bicycle thefts.

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