Parking

The other day I saw a fancy car in my village parked right in the middle of the pavement. Not near it or half on it but totally blocking the whole width of pavement to protect the car. It hasn't happened since. thank goodness. The selfish driver probably worked out what might happen to his car if he left it there.

Incidently, it's not worth getting into a dispute with a neighbour as it has to be noted if you sell your house. Not only can neighbours be a pain but they can knock tens of thousands of pounbds worth of value from your principle asset.

Our ex neighbour parked his car outside our house almost daily for eight years and it pissed me off big time. However, not as much as her new man who parked a large red transit van outside my house, blocking all the light. This time I did complain to no avail so ended up parking my own vehicle in the same spot.

I live in a cul de sac houses with drives and garages but 85% park on the road outside their house because they can't possibly have anyone else park there which makes It difficult when people have visitors. I share a drive with my neighbour but the share part is mine and have to allow him access to his drive which is ok but he takes the piss one van 3cars and the weekends are a nightmare so occasionally I just remind him who's drive it is and that he only rents the place. He gets the van and one car down the side of house and the other two cars have find a place down the road. Most new houses being built only have one parking space if your lucky two

Suggest you have a quiet word with your neighbourhood police officer. They can do a quick check not only on tax but need for MOT and insurance. Contravening those regs would mean the vehicles going away? Parking permits are usually two per household - watch out if you are sole resident as council tax could be endangered.

You can do that on line yourself Barrowlass all you need is the reg number.

Well, this sort of thing happened in our small cul de sac a coupe of years back.

Our neighbours fell out with each other over parking which led to a hell of row, and they still don't speak now.

One of them decided to extend his driveway to accommodate two cars, but it still didn't solve the problem because the kerb had to be dropped which reduced the on road parking even further.

So, bad feeling still exists which is a shame. Not sure what the answer is for you, apart from creating more space on your driveway if possible.

You will probably get the reply that "I pay road tax". If he's across your drive and won't move, the police will move him, ON your drive or on a public road - you're on your own!

My ex neighbour used to park right against my gate up on the pavement. If I turned sideways I could just about wriggle out with a lot of difficulty as I have to use a walking stick. I was totally ignored for the six months that they lived there & was so very pleased when they moved on.

I'm afraid it is a public highway, so unless there are road markings or they are blocking your access, there is nothing you can do legally. What amazes me is that people with garages don't seem to use them for their cars. My car is always in the garage unless I am going out. In our street, we all have double garages and I think I am the only one who actually puts the car in it. We have a very large shared driveway which has never been a problem with the neighbours next door. The problem comes when other neighbours with cars on their drives use our drive for deliveries. E.g. A great big John Lewis van was there the other day delivering furniture to the house across the road. The Tesco man does the same all because they cannot get into the driveways because cars are parked there. Because the drive is so large, we have also had people parking their cars on it when just visiting the neighbours. I have got into the habit now of, on catching them parking, " can I help you, are you lost?" A woman said she was just going to a party up the road and would only be a few hours. I told her this was a private driveway and she should park where she is going. She got in, slammed the door and shot off. I know it seems petty but it's all unnecessary wear on the tarmac and she had parked right in front of our dining room window. One of the reasons we liked the house when we bought it is that there was space at the front and people would not watch us eating our dinner.

We have a similar problem with one of our neighbours. They have a drive of their own but don't always use it, parking outside our house and leaving us to park at the end of our long road, or in another road.

Nothing can be done - none of us owns the space outside our houses. But I do think it is inconsiderate - and rather annoying.

If its a public highway outside of your front door, there is absolutely nothing you can do about it, and it is not worth getting into a row about it. I know how frustrating this can be...as I have a neighbour with 3-4 cars. We have resident permits to park on the road, it really annoys me when there is no space when one of their brood who doesn't live there parks and doesn't move for 2 days at least! But as I say its not worth the aggro. The only way "I get her back" is that she always parks in the same place at the end of the row, because she has no idea how to reverse(!), so when my husband or I see "her space" free we always park in it just to annoy her...maybe for a whole week sometimes...there is nothing she can do about it! Oh the sheer pleasure! (little things eh!).

It may be very annoying but you only own your house, not the road it's on. I have neighbours opposite who now have 5 cars and although their drive accommodates 2 of them the other 3 are parked in various parts of the road and as soon as they know somebody is going on holiday they immediately park on their drive!

I have a marked driveway and a garage, at the rear, my next door neighbour has neither. She parks her large Range Rover within 2 inches of the white markings although there is space for two cars behind her. Our road is narrow as it was originally the road to a farm, so trying to reverse into my space is a nightmare. I only park at the front if I am going out more than once in the day.

These houses were built in the 60's and did have banks of garages, which were knocked down 20 years ago and sold to build a large house on. Mind you most people used them for storage.

We live in a terrace of 7 houses on a main road. The road has mixed housing - some detached and semi-detached, and another terrace of similar length. The opposite side of the road is double-yellow lined and indeed, some of our side is too, though not outside our terrace. When there were three of us with cars living here we had a rule within our family that if one of us was parked on the terrace, the other two would park elsewhere, even if there were spaces free on the terrace. We just felt it was being considerate to others living on the terrace who also needed to park. Most other residents had a similar respectful approach.
However, time has passed, and houses change hands. Our next door neighbours have two private cars and two works vehicles and, when their daughter visits over Christmas there is her car as well. I've known all five vehicles to be parked on the terrace at the same time. Not acceptable IMO, very selfish. Thing is, in all other respects they are a lovely family, really kind and generous and we get on very well with them, so I would never dream of mentioning the parking thing. It is really too trivial in the great big scheme of things, but annoying just the same, especially when you get home from the shops with 3 or 4 heavy bags and you have to park around the corner and drag them home, often in the rain

YES......if you have a dropped kerb outside of your house you are covered if someone parks across it. It's expensive to pay for; But well worth it as you can ask the police to intervene if folk park across it.

Inishowen l have every sympathy with you over footballers. Many years ago we had that problem as at the side of our house is an open grass area. All the local kids would congregate and play football on it although it wasn't meant for it and totally unsuitable. The ball was always banging against the house or over the fence so we complained to the parents and the council who put up trees and a no ball games sign. This caused a lot of bad feeling which has taken years to die down. I'm much older now and l couldn't go through all that bad feeling again so we'll probably put up and shut up. Just getting my rant out on here has helped and as many have said, they're doing nothing wrong. I already sound like the woman who's always moaning. I'm just more considerate of other people's feelings than some are.

We have a similiar problem in our road, so I now park outside my house rather than in the drive. Then when we have visitors they can use my drive. Annoying but I was advised by my community policeman that even if people park over the drive way entrance it's not against the law!

We have new neighbours(moved in three weeks ago). They have two cars, a garage and a drive which can easily accommodate 3/4 cars. For the first week she parked her car outside our house. (her drive was empty). She was unloading from the back of her car (passenger side) and walked across our garden to do so, several times. I planted rose bushes right at the edge of the grass so that she couldn't do this. I think they took the hint as they now park in the drive!

I can park 4 cars on my drive, so can my neighbour. They continually park their second car in front of my house. Why?

It is territorial and a right old pain. Do remember it turning into fisticuffs outside this old suburban road back in the day when people couldn't park where they wanted to. All zones now, so no more fighting. And we've all split up!

They only have 5 cars?! My next door neighbour, an elderly Pakistani lady (practically no English) with huge extended family including 6 children and about 20 grandchildren, plus other cousins, aunts, uncle,s in-laws etc. who have all the family celebrations at her house. So there is a birthday party practically every weekend and also lots of family visiting every day beside that. With all the family there (they all seem to have enormous cars) even though we live on a corner plot, so have loads of road space, we struggle to find a parking space. Also, they dump dead cars, (usually with no MOT) at the side of our house and they sit there for months. If I ask them, they deny owning the cars. Nobody will do anything about the dumped cars. I have tried the local police, council and DVLA. I have to wait until the road tax runs out. Strangely, they often renew it (how do they manage that without an MOT?!) (By the way I believe multiple occupancy doesn't apply to a house if they are all family, only if they are all paying separate rent.)

The roads outside our houses are public ones(normally); that means anyone can park there provided that they are not creating any hazard. We do not have any right to park directly outside our homes.

That means many streets have more cars than spaces to park them but it is a problem each of us must face up to and park where we can accordingly, even if that means parking elsewhere.

I remember my OH parking at Milton Keynes railway station in one of the little cul-de-sac parking areas. Came back to find someone had parked over the entrance blocking in all 8 cars. The police refused to do anything about it and OH had to get a taxi home and back the next day.

People will notice the change in your attitude towards them but won't notice their behaviour that made you change.

People have been subconscious taught to feed their ego so much that some don't know the different between being independent and selfish.

This is a "Self,Self,Self" world and weather we like it or not we will live in it.

No point in getting stressed or falling out with someone about this. It might be good manners to park more considerately but, as others have pointed out, they are probably not breaking the law.

Luckily we don't have parking problems because of road markings, residents' parking permits and parking bays. But then, that's part of the reason we bought in this area.