{"id":254102,"date":"2026-07-28T22:31:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T22:31:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/254102\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T22:31:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T22:31:07","slug":"allentown-businesses-say-illegal-dirt-bike-atv-crowds-are-driving-away-customers-police-respond-with-crackdown-allentown-area","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/254102\/","title":{"rendered":"Allentown businesses say illegal dirt bike, ATV crowds are driving away customers, police respond with crackdown | Allentown Area"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>ALLENTOWN, Pa. &#8211; The Allentown Police Department is cracking down once again on illegal dirt bikes and ATVs in the City.<\/p>\n<p>Gatherings of people on motorcycles, dirt bikes, and ATVs can bring hundreds or even thousands of people to parking lots like the Mountainville Plaza on S. 4th St. We met Blanca Mendez in front of her restaurant there, called Vesuvio&#8217;s.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They push us to close early many times because of that situation, and we have customers who complains about it, and we don&#8217;t see them anymore,&#8221; said Mendez.<\/p>\n<p>She said recently, it got really bad.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;A couple weekends ago was the Puerto Rican parade, and they called for after party, and they shared this location,&#8221; said Mendez.<\/p>\n<p>The result was captured in a video shared on <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reel\/DZ3sjaBJ4P0\/?igsh=ZTZ4d2V6eWM0MjI0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Instagram<\/a> showing crowds of people revving engines and popping wheelies.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is until like three, four in the morning,&#8221; said Mendez.<\/p>\n<p>Just up the street at Big Woody&#8217;s, they get them too.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I seen a guy pop a wheelie from that end of the parking lot to that end of the parking lot, and then the cops came and his bike got taken,&#8221; said restaurant Manager Zaire Harrison.<\/p>\n<p>Allentown Managing Director Frank Kane said that&#8217;s what dirt bike and ATV riders should expect.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If you&#8217;re operating a vehicle that is not street-legal, yeah we can confiscate the vehicle,&#8221; said Kane.<\/p>\n<p>And they have. Just this year, <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/photo\/?fbid=1508720134619843&amp;set=pcb.1508720607953129\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Allentown Police said<\/a> they&#8217;ve seized 39 vehicles and made 51 arrests of people trying to flee. Kane said, if it&#8217;s a nuisance to you, call APD.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;A lot of this happens through community involvement. So, if you see something, say something,&#8221; said Kane.<\/p>\n<p>And the business owners told us they appreciate the commitment from police.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Now I see like a few more cops, so yeah, now I see the difference,&#8221; said Mendez.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Keep going, keep going,&#8221; said Harrison.<\/p>\n<p>                            <script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALLENTOWN, Pa. &#8211; The Allentown Police Department is cracking down once again on illegal dirt bikes and ATVs&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":254103,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120,1646,42173,102108,23304,203,108356,206,93326,108355],"class_list":["post-254102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-news","tag-arrest","tag-atv","tag-business-impact","tag-community-involvement","tag-dirt-bike","tag-illegal-vehicles","tag-police","tag-public-nuisance","tag-vehicle-seizure"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}