When my children were little we lived in a lane with eight houses, three families had children, the other families were all retired, the children all played in each other’s gardens, and in the lane, yes, often till dark in the summer. Most of the neighbors were delightful, one elderly couple giving them small amounts of money for weeding, another, allowing them to join them on their long dog walks across the fields, one old lady, however, couldn’t tolerate them, complained constantly about their noise, shouted at them whenever they were anywhere near her property, well her loss I think, i think the children and our elderly neighbors got a lot from each other’s company