Graffiti and What's Being Done to Prevent It? - Trains Magazine

The motives of graffiti is being misunderstood here. Vandals don't do it because they think it's pretty. They do it for recognition, pride, and to mark their territory. L.A. has a terrible gang problem. Other cities do, too, but not as big as L. A.'s. There are gang members and gang wannabes. They all deface property to impress their fellow members, show up their rivals, or get initiated into the gang. Being part of a gang is all about breaking the law and killing other people and protection from those who would kill you.

Gang members contribute to most of the graffiti but there are a few rouge markers out there. But of course they wouldn't like it if you went and sprayed "their ride" with paint. That'd be enough to start a war with them.

But other reason railcars are targets has to do a little bit with psychology. Let me give you a quick lesson in crime prevention. People who commit crimes need 3 things present: 1 the willingness to commit a crime, 2 the opportunity to commit a crime and 3 the lack of guardings present. Let's say you leave your bicycle out not locked up. Say you leave it unguarded. And say someone comes along who want's to steal your bike. No lock, no one to watch it or stop someone, the perfect opportunity for a crime to be committed.

Now, property: we have private areas, semi-private areas, semi-public areas, and public areas. Private areas: a house, semi-private: a duplex or quadplex home, semi-public: apartments, high rises, public: librarys, stores, offices, etc.

The closer you get to the public level the more crime is committed. Why? because ownership is not clearly defined. In a high-rise apartment building no one really owns the parking lot, the courtyards, the hallways, and these are high crime areas especially in inner-city areas. Criminals feel like they can walk right up to these places and commit their crimes because no one will see them or care. They have access to these semi-public areas because they have a feeling they're allowed to be there. But as in the case of a private home it's obvious you don't have a right to be there and if caught you get in trouble.

This brings me to the railroads. These vandals that spray the cars don't see or don't know when they're in the yards on the tracks that they're on private property and they don't care. They don't see any ownership of they rail cars. All they see are nameless, faceless companies, where nobody's gonna care if they spray the cars. They have a general disregard for private property to begin with.

This leads me to my idea. You put 14-inch iron spikes on all the railcars at about 6-inches apart. When people spaypaint graffiti they hold the can nozzle about 1cm above the surface to get those clean, sharp lines. You put spikes on the railcars and you can spraypaint art on the cars anymore. But then again, this might be a disadvantage causing injury to train crews.

But seriously, there is a paint out there designed to stop graffiti. It doesn't absorb it. It's designed not to allow anything to stick to whether it's other paint or glue or whatever. But I don't know if this works for railcars. It was designed more for buidings than rail equipment.

But there's nothing you can do to stop it. We'll just have to puni***hose who get caught.