Neighbours!! What would you do?

I can’t see any photo, so can’t comment

Well, you could say nothing, smile sweetly if you see them, as you let your passenger out, then park at the end of "your" drive, right next to their car! (I wonder how long it will before they might want to initiate a conversation with you about getting in and out of cars/plant pots/boundaries etc!) Of course, if they open their passenger door and hit your car and damage it you can send them the bill!

Alternatively - you could be the bigger person and transplant your special plants (carefully!) and make your drive wider, and keep the peace with your neighbours!

I know what I would do (although option 1 would be tempting!)
Oh, and as others have said, have a sudden bad back next time they want some logs stacking!)

Germanshepherdsmum

I doubt my car doors would clear the wall.

OP said wall is 6 inches at its highest. Either an optical illusion is happening or that square beige planter is very small. The difference in height looks a good 12 inches near the gates. Even the doors of my bog standard hatchback only clear the ground by 10 inches.

I once lived in a village house on a hill where our drive was higher than next door’s. We had not lived there very long when DH reversed up the drive one dark night and missed the edge. Nobody was hurt but it did the car’s suspension no good at all not to mention the embarrassment of having to enlist neighbours to lift the car back onto our driveway and explain to a garage next day what he had done!

It would be unfair and maybe unkind to jump to conclusions about why the neighbours behave as they do in case one or other is suffering from a mental illness. OP has mentioned that one of her neighbour’s has experienced a breakdown. Maybe her behaviour now is something that has arisen from that.

I helped a former neighbour a great deal but also accepted that she could behave very strangely when it came to her own boundaries and even things in her field of vision. She hadn’t always been that way but a particularly traumatic event in her life seemed to change her, making her very protective of what was hers and what she regarded as her space.

I'm rather confused, though.

I thought the gates were at the entrance to the drive but they're at the house end 🤔

I still believe forfeiting some of the front garden is the answer.
Less to mow/weed as well. Win win.

Mo65

I cant see the pic. Just never be available for them again. Any help, sorry we are to busy. They sound a nightmare, and very petty.

I thought so but, having now seen the photo with identifying details omitted, I have changed my mind.

I cant see the pic. Just never be available for them again. Any help, sorry we are to busy. They sound a nightmare, and very petty.

Having seen the photo I withdraw the last sentence of my previous post.

What the neighbour has done and why he has done it, is abundantly clear. The pots are there, to protect the neighbours themselves from damaging their car or themselves by going over the edge of the wall and down the drop into next-door's drive.

Everything they are doing is on their own property. The Op and family need to understand and respect what their neighbour has done and why and make sure that they too can intrance and exit their caar entirely on their land.

Eleanor Roosevelt “Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent”
Keep calm and remain classy.
I live in a very crowded street in NW London. A day does not pass when some obnoxious neighbour does not beep their horn because someone is going too fast, too slow, trying to park, trying to pull out, getting in the car, getting out of the car. All I ever think is what miserable lives they must lead. You cannot change these people. Smile and continue on your blessed life.

I'd probably trip over that wall as I was getting out.

And I can quite see why the neighbour would have qualms about going off the edge, it's quite narrow.

Quite honestly, the best thing would be to widen your own drive further up near the house, jackypat. I wouldn't want to be getting out on to the neighbour's drive even if they were friendly.

I doubt my car doors would clear the wall.

Where are you all seeing photos? I can't!

Once a picture is posted on GN - even though deleted from GN - it can usually be found.

I have taken the liberty of cropping it down to omit distant detail and to conceal detail about the car.

Note how the driveways slope down and where the neighbours’ house wall is. The neighbours’ drive is on a higher level. For them, that means if they reverse further up the drive, the passenger would be getting out where there is a drop to the left.

From their perspective, putting pots on their own drive could act as a visual safety warning that there is a drop on the other side and may also be picked up by reversing sensors so that they don’t reverse over the edge when it’s dark. Even if they were to reverse up to just short of their house wall, there is still a drop that could twist an ankle.

As I said before, it is up to OP to figure out how to access her vehicle within the boundaries of her own property. For someone driving a very low slung car, the doors might not even clear the difference in height.

I haven't seen the picture but if the low wall is the boundary between the two properties then it is the boundary and if your car door opens across it, you are trespassing on the neighbour's land.

Now, in most situations like this, there is a usually give and take between neighbours. However, if your neighbour does not want you trespassing on their property when you open your car door, then he is quite within his rights to put obstacles on the wall to stop you doing it.

I am assuming that his deeds show that the wall is his, since you say that the back fence is his then it is likely that the front one is.

I have read of similar cases where a neighbour has increased the height of the wall or put railings or trellis along it to stop air trespass.

I am afraid that all you can do is adjust your parking procedures or your garden so that you do not trespass on the airspace above your neighbours land when getting in and out of the car. Your neighbour is entirely in his rights in doing what he is doing.

Having said that, I think he is being mean spirited and petty.

If it were me, I will have a friendly word with the neighbours and mention to them that I would like to erect a fence in the middle of the low boundary wall, so that neither of you will encroach on each other's driveway.

Maybe a quiet chat would help to diffuse the situation? Explain how said pots are impinging on your ability to get out of the car.
Go with cake !! Talking better than moaning surely?

I do not understand your point OP. What your neighbours do on their drive is their business not yours. And I cannot believe you have a drive in common, as I have never heard of any such thing.

About the fence: if it is entirely on your neighbours' side of the boundary between your properties, they are soley responsible for its upkeep and are well within their rights to ask you not to hang things on it.

If, on the other hand, it is on the actual boundary, then you may do as you please on your side of the fence, but may not hang anything up, nor plant a creeper that encroaches on their side of it.

Strong fences make good neighbours, if boundaries are well defined they can’t encroach on your property and you shouldn’t encroach on theirs, you certainly shouldn’t assume they wouldn’t mind.

It’s not being petty, the OP should widen their drive to make it more convenient if that’s what they want

Catlover123

where is the photo Germanshepherdsmum?

GN deleted it because it clearly showed the registration plate on the neighbours’ car, making them identifiable.

PS please try to be pleasant with your neighbours though OP but just don’t be available when they next need a favour.

Oh my, we have wonderful neighbours with whom we share a double width drive with a hedge down the middle, only our garages are joined. I can’t see them ever doing something like the OP’s neighbours but it makes me think what might happen in the future! 😳

Catlover123

where is the photo Germanshepherdsmum?

It's been deleted.

LilyGransnet

Hi OP

We're just getting in touch to let you know that we have removed the image from your post.

If you would like to repost, please remove identifying info from the image (eg. blurring numberplates).

Gransnet is a public site and so we don't allow photos that could identify third parties.

Best wishes
GNHQ

I thought I was going mad as couldn't see any photo 🤪

I agree

Wow what nasty people. I wouldn’t be doing anything more to help them as they obviously don’t value what great neighbours they have

shared drives are a nightmare. We live opposite one and the one side drive onto the other sides drive to get in and out of their own drive instead of reversing their own other car off and then driving the next one iykwim
people in drive which is constantly being driven over by the other side of the drive are not happy and I wouldn't be happy either but I am unsure whether the shared drive think it is completely shared, do you know what I mean

anyway OP I cannot help! I would just try not to speak to them much and don;t let them annoy you as you have to live next door to them