Hub cops are cracking down on the Boston “Bike Life,” launching a major operation aimed at stopping, ticketing and even arresting the roving gangs of dirt-bike and ATV riders that they say have been terrorizing neighborhoods as they tear down busy city streets.

“The people of the neighborhoods have spoken, they’re fed up and they want those responsible held accountable for their reckless, dangerous behavior,” Boston police spokesman James Kenneally told the Herald, “and the crackdown aims to do just that.”

Police have been patrolling neighborhoods this weekend amid “growing community unrest and complaints” about the unruly crews of dirt bikers — including in Roxbury, Mattapan, Dorchester, Jamaica Plain and the South End — and are calling on the public to share information about the illegal operation and storage of the ?all-terrain vehicles.

Carmine Duran, an elder care worker, said she has had enough of the dirt bikes and motorcycles.

“I just don’t like it, period,” Duran said. “It could cause an accident. They could get hurt. Sometimes in the middle of the night, they go running around and they don’t let nobody sleep.”

James Cox, a maintenance ?worker at the Pine Street Inn who rides a scooter to work, applauds the crackdown.

“I don’t do the wheelies and all that. I’m not Evel Knievel, so it’s not in my blood,” Cox told the Herald yesterday. “They know the rules well, so they need to crack down on them — not me.”

Cops say they will be scouring the neighborhoods each weekend for the rest of the month in their search for the illegal riders. In their petition to the public for help, police said they will “stringently guard and protect” the identities of people who call in with information about the riders.

The outlaw lifestyle — referred to as “Bike Life” by dirt-bike gangs across the country — has picked up steam in recent years and the illegal ATV riders are becoming a perennial concern in the Hub.

Mayor Martin J. Walsh and police Commissioner William B. Evans promised a similar crackdown last summer and seized dirt bikes and other vehicles after officials said crimes connected to their use had skyrocketed.

Although police were unable to provide the Herald with a list of complaints or crimes involving dirt bikes, scooters and ATVs in recent months, the year in policing the supercharged vehicles has already been busy.

In February, cops seized nine off-road vehicles from a U-Haul container after receiving word that a large group of dirt bikes were disrupting traffic on Atherton Street in Roxbury.

Then, in March, officers impounded two ATVs and one dirt bike in Mattapan from an unlicensed 31-year-old Dorchester man. Less than a month later, officers arrested an unlicensed 27-year-old on a dirt bike, who they say ran multiple traffic signals while popping wheelies and riding through a park packed with ?children.

Carol Hyatt of Dorchester, a retired teacher, says more has to be done to educate young riders.

“It’s because of the attitude of the owners,” Hyatt said. “I feel that there should be workshops or seminars for motorists that they are required to attend about the consequences and after effects of not complying with what the law says.”