next door neighbour putting up railings/fence cant get in or out of car.

nilrs

hi

not sure where to put this but i really need some advice/help, we have a double driveway with garage on the end which goes out to line his back garden so he has a small 1m line down our driveway which then ends at the edge of our garage, now my next door neighbour has started drilling holes (presumably fence/railings) now one of the problems we have is if he puts these up it will make it vitually impossible for us to get out of the passenger side of one of our cars, the neighbour has not come round to explain/ask, i moved my car he did not say thankyou or even stop drilling. we were not on bad terms but now i am not at all happy. dh is at work and i do not feel at all comfortable about speaking to him on this, he is a builder by trade, i know i shall have to check boundries etc but i wondered if anyone had any advice or could point me in the right direction.

many thanks
kim

TiTheRev

If he's putting them up on HIS side of the divide, there's not much you can do legally, but courtesy would be to ask/inform you before he did it?! Why is putting these up a restriction to your car access? Was there nothing before, so you technically got out fo your car in his driveway?

System

as long as he puts it up on the boundry line im not sure theres anything you can do

nilrs

i got out of my car onto a small piece of land which he has put small slate type stones on,his driveway is on the other side of his house, i have read somewhere that if i have access at all times on my deeds, or perhaps if he tries to secure it to my garage then i can tell him to remove that, i am not trying to be awkward or difficult, i would not care if there was a small piece just to let us get in or out, its just that i have 3 children and a beetle with very long doors dh parks his car on the other side, plus it will make it very very difficult for us to get our cars on and off the drive, i wish i could draw a picture to show how the layout is.

TiTheRev

It sounds like a boundary issue then, and you'll need to check your deeds. If he's encroaching on 'neutral' land, then you will have a case to tell him to take it down, but if it's his land then im afraid you can't do much except plead to his good nature to take it down.

hethmar

Try the garden law website for advice.

david39

Why don't you have a word with your neighbour, ask him why he is doing it, point out the problem from your point of view and hopefully come to some amicable arrangement?

If you can resolve the problem by this method it has to be infinitely better than any other suggestion that might be put forward because it will not involve litigation or threats with eventual bad feeling on one or both sides.

If you can't solve it by discussion and you feel you are in the right, then that is the time to tackle it from a different standpoint.

ormus

is it a shared drive or a double drive?
as long as his new fence is on his land there nowt you can do about it.
older houses esp. were never designed to let easy access to both sides of a car.

System

i put a fence around my front garden as neighbours seemed to think it was ok to use my flower beds as part of their drive [stepped onto them when getting out of car]

laurel7172

Assuming it is his land, have you ever asked him if he minds you using his garden as an extension of your drive? Because it's possible (though obviously I have no idea what's going on in his head) that the silent treatment reflects his having been rather annoyed for some time.

Also, I'm a bit confused-why would it create such a huge problem for you and your OH to swap sides?

Unfortunately, if it isn't shared land, it isn't. And if your neighbour has been upset enough by your appropriation of his garden to put up a fence, I'd suggest he deserves a bottle of wine and an apology rather than legal threats.

ddoris

You aren't saying how long or how wide exactly your drive is, tho' if a double width drive isn't enough for you - move.
I live in big old mid terraced house -no offroad access, used to be double yellows on our side with streets off the other side with pedestrian terraces,lots of cars, now there are parking bays on our side -it's as good as it gets.