Where do I stand regarding parking over my own driveway?

taffy056

Can you please post in a new thread as this one has no resemblance to your case

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.php?f=163

Money_maker

Best to start your own thread bhafc123, try housing board.

The_Slithy_Tove

You'll need to check the deeds for the property - the garage may be a separate document, depending on when it became part of the overall property. Wherever there are shared parts, e.g. party walls or roofs, there will be documentation saying who is responsible for what, and potentially covenants saying what you can or cannot do. You need to dig this out. Are they all council or ex-council? Or have some always been private?

Coupon-mad

bhafc123 wrote: »

Block of garages at back of houses - some are owned privately and one rented (council) - they are in a bad state of repair - massive cracks and leak badly...
A neighbour wants pull his down and build a new one....but of cse this will affect the other garages - all joined together.....can we be forced to to build another one or share the cost of building these?
We own our house but I'm curently unemployed and we cannot afford to build another garage? or share in cost of......we dont have a car but use it for extra storage....when we bought the hse the garage was included in the sale.

Welcome to MSE! Sssssseeeeeeeeeeeagullllllllsssssssssss!!!!!!!!!! :T

Try posting on the housing board, as already advised. Is this in Hove or Brighton, out of interest?

Own_My_Own

Sorry am I missing something ?

Your Mum does their shopping and laundry?
But they are putting notes through your door complaining about your car ?

spiro

RachVG wrote: »

Surely the point is that I'm not blocking his access to the drive itself at all? He can get whatever he likes in and out of the gate and onto the pavement - he can happily use the full width. The only thing he can't do if I park there is get down onto the road (public highway), and as his right of way doesn't include vehicular access to his property it shouldn't be an issue.

My understanding with a dropped kerb/garage access is that it is illegal to block someone on their drive but not when you block them getting on their drive.

RachVG

Own_My_Own wrote: »

Sorry am I missing something ?

Your Mum does their shopping and laundry?
But they are putting notes through your door complaining about your car ?

That's the basic story, yeah! Mam's found the whole thing quite upsetting which is just making me more angry!

spiro wrote: »

My understanding with a dropped kerb/garage access is that it is illegal to block someone on their drive but not when you block them getting on their drive.

That was the way I understood it too - and as he doesn't have a vehicle, and nobody parks in the drive so the actual width of the driveway is always clear, I don't see how there's any genuine legal claim he could make.

We haven't seen him since. Will be interesting to see what he does if I find I have to park there again!

fivetide

Sounds like a nice passive aggressive man.

I'd also advocate having a chat with him, perhaps going round with his washing that your mum has nicely done for him. No harm in having a friendly chat.

Certianly you don't want him to do anything silly and sour the relationship. If you ever needed to sell the house you'd have to declare it so that isn't great.

Hopefully a quiet word will stop it. If not then I think he can wash his own sheets and get his own groceries!

5t.

bazster

If you obstruct someone's driveway then you could get a Fixed Penalty Notice, regardless of whether you are stopping them getting in or out.

The difference between getting in and out used to be a question of whether the Fuzz would tow you: if you were blocking someone in, they would tow your car. If you were stopping them getting in, they wouldn't. I have no idea where things stand in that respect now that parking enforcement is decriminalised, but since your neighbour doesn't own a car it hardly seems relevant.

The first thing you need to do is to find out the exactly where you stand vis a vis his claimed right of access. You say you have a letter stating that he has no vehicular access, but that doesn't really tell us anything: who is the letter from? Who is it to? What was the context? And what exactly does it say?

The real answers, though, are at the land registry, if your house has changed hands recently enough to be registered. If you don't have a copy of what's on the register regarding your house, you can easily get it: http://www.landregistry.gov.uk/public/online-services

If your house is not registered then you need to find the deeds and see what they say.

Once you have established beyond doubt (hopefully) that your neighbour doesn't have vehicular access rights then, if I were you, I would park there with impunity. If you do get a fixed penalty notice for obstruction, appeal it on the grounds that it's your drive, no-one else has a right of vehicular access, and anyone who has a right of access on foot, wheelchair or whatever can still do so. So you're not obstructing anyone.

If he has no right of vehicular access then he has no right of vehicular access, whether or not emergency vehicles can get in is irrelevant. There is no general obligation to provide access to the rear of a house for emergency vehicles; otherwise, there wouldn't be any terraces, would there?