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Parents with no common sense
Jojo_the_Tightfisted
Posts: 27,228 Forumite
My front wall is about three foot high on average - the house is raised above the average ground level by about 6 foot in total due to anti flood regulations when it was built, and the wall follows the slope that the garden path has to take. It's also stepped in height to avoid it being incredibly high at any point - but there's a maximum height of roughly four foot and a bit in the middle, down to the pavement.
It's a small child magnet. Due to planning constraints, not only is it kept to that maximum, nothing can be put on top of it and for disability access rules, gates aren't permitted. This means that small children love climbing on it, walking along it, running up next door's half of the slope and down my half. And riding their scooters up and down it.
I'm generally quite tolerant of small children - I understand it is tempting to have a bit of a run and climb, plus grab a few flowers out of the window boxes and bang on the window to get the cat's attention or ring the doorbell because it's low enough for them to reach. The flowers out there look pretty. So I get around 12 -15 small children doing this every single day on the way home from school.
However, the idiot parents that not only let them do it but encourage them to do it are annoying the hell out of me. Some of the bricks have been dislodged from thousands of little feet using the edge as a jumping off point. The solution? Chuck the bricks away so nobody can find them and remortar it.
And then there are the falls. Oh, the falls. Faceplanting six year olds screeching like they've been murdered, the three and four year olds that have fallen off the wall and landed headfirst on concrete, the cuts and the bruises.
Anyhow, I've contacted the local school several times over the years and been very measured, asking if they can remind the children that it's somebody's garden. The school is great, always polite and understanding and I am sure that they have asked both the children and the parents not to do it anymore on many occasions.
But the parents continue to allow it. I've just heard a massive thud and a child wailing and keening like a banshee because she's fallen the full four and a bit foot off it. And the parent has picked her up, then despite her crying that she's never going to walk on the wall again, forced her child to walk all the way along it and jump off at the end. When she was at the point, along with her brother who saw it and didn't want to do it again either, of learning how gravity works and that it's not a very good idea to go playing on/in somebody else's property - but the daft mare has made it almost compulsory for them to do it now. :mad:
I'm not the freeholder. I wouldn't get permission and I don't have the money to pay for illegal height fencing and big gates for both properties. But somebody's kid is going to either smash their nose across their face, fracture their skull or break a limb or two eventually. And all because their parents can't differentiate between a climbing frame and somebody's front garden. Or can but don't care.
And I'm willing to bet that somebody will claim it's my fault when that happens.
Oh well, I've got an audit trail of trying to stop it. Nobody's getting compensation for their sprog getting hurt whilst off the leash from me or the freeholder. And I'm not budging off the sofa to offer first aid or call for an ambulance either.
Grrr.
Mainly moaning to get it off my chest but, seriously, if you're a parent or grandparent who allows their kid to do this where you live, just use your brain and stop it. You wouldn't let them tapdance in the middle of the main road, you hold their flaming hands as soon as they get (or fall) off my wall because you're about to turn into the main road and that's dangerous, apparently. You don't let them climb on any of the walls round there because they're old and dirty (lots of HMOs) and it's not safe, despite their largely being lower. And you don't let them go into those gardens and help themselves to flowers just because there isn't a gate to stop them.
You're utter muppets. And it will be nobody's fault but your own if your kid ends up needing surgery to pin their arm or leg back together again.
Argh! Rant over.
It's a small child magnet. Due to planning constraints, not only is it kept to that maximum, nothing can be put on top of it and for disability access rules, gates aren't permitted. This means that small children love climbing on it, walking along it, running up next door's half of the slope and down my half. And riding their scooters up and down it.
I'm generally quite tolerant of small children - I understand it is tempting to have a bit of a run and climb, plus grab a few flowers out of the window boxes and bang on the window to get the cat's attention or ring the doorbell because it's low enough for them to reach. The flowers out there look pretty. So I get around 12 -15 small children doing this every single day on the way home from school.
However, the idiot parents that not only let them do it but encourage them to do it are annoying the hell out of me. Some of the bricks have been dislodged from thousands of little feet using the edge as a jumping off point. The solution? Chuck the bricks away so nobody can find them and remortar it.
And then there are the falls. Oh, the falls. Faceplanting six year olds screeching like they've been murdered, the three and four year olds that have fallen off the wall and landed headfirst on concrete, the cuts and the bruises.
Anyhow, I've contacted the local school several times over the years and been very measured, asking if they can remind the children that it's somebody's garden. The school is great, always polite and understanding and I am sure that they have asked both the children and the parents not to do it anymore on many occasions.
But the parents continue to allow it. I've just heard a massive thud and a child wailing and keening like a banshee because she's fallen the full four and a bit foot off it. And the parent has picked her up, then despite her crying that she's never going to walk on the wall again, forced her child to walk all the way along it and jump off at the end. When she was at the point, along with her brother who saw it and didn't want to do it again either, of learning how gravity works and that it's not a very good idea to go playing on/in somebody else's property - but the daft mare has made it almost compulsory for them to do it now. :mad:
I'm not the freeholder. I wouldn't get permission and I don't have the money to pay for illegal height fencing and big gates for both properties. But somebody's kid is going to either smash their nose across their face, fracture their skull or break a limb or two eventually. And all because their parents can't differentiate between a climbing frame and somebody's front garden. Or can but don't care.
And I'm willing to bet that somebody will claim it's my fault when that happens.
Oh well, I've got an audit trail of trying to stop it. Nobody's getting compensation for their sprog getting hurt whilst off the leash from me or the freeholder. And I'm not budging off the sofa to offer first aid or call for an ambulance either.
Grrr.
Mainly moaning to get it off my chest but, seriously, if you're a parent or grandparent who allows their kid to do this where you live, just use your brain and stop it. You wouldn't let them tapdance in the middle of the main road, you hold their flaming hands as soon as they get (or fall) off my wall because you're about to turn into the main road and that's dangerous, apparently. You don't let them climb on any of the walls round there because they're old and dirty (lots of HMOs) and it's not safe, despite their largely being lower. And you don't let them go into those gardens and help themselves to flowers just because there isn't a gate to stop them.
You're utter muppets. And it will be nobody's fault but your own if your kid ends up needing surgery to pin their arm or leg back together again.
Argh! Rant over.
I could dream to wide extremes, I could do or die: I could yawn and be withdrawn and watch the world go by.
Yup you are officially Rock n Roll
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Comments
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Same type of thing in my area, a 4/4.6 ft steel railings, signs up "no ball games" yet parents sending there young children out with footballs for a kick about. Ball ends up over the railings and as gate is locked climb over risking being caught on the uprights or clothes catching and falling causing themselves serious damage.
I have given up trying to stop them and dread the summer school break as if just a flash of sun I know it will be another few weeks of cuts,crying and plasters {not mine} so you have my sympathy as I know just how you feel. :0)0 -
Understand your frustration. I live 2 minutes away from a school and have a privet hedge instead of a wall in my front garden for exactly this reason. Walls attract children. I used to tell my two off when they walked on one further down the road, because I knew full well I wouldn't like it and didn't have a wall for that reason. Is planting anything next to it an option?0
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pm me an address & I'll post you some goosberry bushes - the sort that give fruit and have lots of nice healthy spikes.
Wonderful how the little darlings learn to avoid the prickly things, and who will chide you for planting things in your garden?!0 -
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Can you put a "private property keep off" sign up?0
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I would go even further and plant Berberis. A bit remember the variant name but one has spikes around 1in long and they are needle sharp. I had one at my old house and had to triple glove to prune it! A spike once went through three layers of my thick clothing and cut my arm.
No one goes near that stuff twice unless they really have to.0 -
Can you put a "private property keep off" sign up?
Small children can't read. Parents would ignore it.I would go even further and plant Berberis. A bit remember the variant name but one has spikes around 1in long and they are needle sharp. I had one at my old house and had to triple glove to prune it! A spike once went through three layers of my thick clothing and cut my arm.
No one goes near that stuff twice unless they really have to.
I'd have to prune it.
Maybe some hawthorn would work, along with Gooseberries? I might have to put some things in pots, though. Then they'd have to be very spiky to put off any chancers.I could dream to wide extremes, I could do or die: I could yawn and be withdrawn and watch the world go by.Yup you are officially Rock n Roll
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DigForVictory wrote: »pm me an address & I'll post you some goosberry bushes - the sort that give fruit and have lots of nice healthy spikes.
Wonderful how the little darlings learn to avoid the prickly things, and who will chide you for planting things in your garden?!
I have been chided twice for my pampas grass because it ..
a) hurt the fingers of a small child who was allowed to reach in and pull on it - parent rang bell to demand I remove it as they had to walk past my garden on way to school each day
b) made a neighbours cat sick when it daily came into my garden to poo and took a chew on the pampas while it was about its business!
And of course it is perfectly ok for them to throw their sweetie and lolly wrappers into the garden - I seem to be the perfect distance between shop and school for that!
Ok so that's me ranting now:mad:0 -
I have been chided twice for my pampas grass because it ..
a) hurt the fingers of a small child who was allowed to reach in and pull on it - parent rang bell to demand I remove it as they had to walk past my garden on way to school each day
b) made a neighbours cat sick when it daily came into my garden to poo and took a chew on the pampas while it was about its business!
c) not to mention what it symbolises when planted in the front garden :rotfl: Oops LOL.
People have quite honestly gone mad. Bloody cheek knocking on your door. I'd be tempted to add something really scary to the front garden LOL.
As for the OP - try adding some of the anti-bird spikes along the wall. The long ones or short sharp ones. That should stop 'em!
Jx2024 wins: *must start comping again!*0 -
You said you need to keep the wall & height etc but what about something like this: circular coping stones
Would discourage most I imagine.You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means - Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride0
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