Nuisance neighbour causing parking mayhem

getmore4less

Looks like you have lost the visitors space for now as they have been occupying their spaces the visitors and the grass area.

The problem seems to be the visitors.

They will be think I am only dropping by for a few mins/hour it will be OK here.

if they parked closer to the grass area and the visitors space would that help, might be the least confrontational solution until enforcement commences.(do you want a PCC involved?)

I think if you know you are going out later park where the visitors do so you can get out.

If they are there when you get back that's a bigger problem as you either have to get them to move or park behind them and wait for them to come to you.


As well as covenants about business probably some about what can and can't be parked, like commercial caravans boats etc.

Sarastro

Why not suggest to the management company that they convert the dead grass bit to another parking space for visitors? Even if he does 'take it over' it will stop visitors parking in the middle of the access road.

As I see it, something needs to be done about that area anyway and the root cause of the problem is there are not enough parking spaces. You are more likely to be able to move things forward if you come at it from a more positive angle, i.e. 'what can we do about the lack of parking' rather than 'you should obey the rules. The rules don't seem very clear and not enforceable.

I doubt there's much you can do if he's running a company from his home.

FBaby

You’ve got three choices. Speak to the people concerned and appeal to their better nature.

Indeed, have you only spoken to them when you were -understandibly- annoyed and stressed because you were blocked?

What you need to do is speak with them in 'let's all be good neighbour' way. There are two issues: His hogging of the visitor space and visitors parking in such a way that you can't get out.

Firstly, the visitor spot next to his house. Is the issue that he actually believes he owns it? In this case, you can kindly show him that this is not the case. If the van parked there his work van (vs family car in the drive). If so, indeed, he doesn't own it, but it's difficult as where else could he park it.

Allowing customers/friends parking in the middle of the road so that you are blocked from getting out is totally unacceptable. Is the issue that you can actually come out, but need to maneuver (so he thinks you are just being fickle!) or are you totally blocked and so have to go and knock on his door to ask for the person to move out so you can go out/get in.

If the latter, all you can do is ask very nicely that he asks his customers/friends if they'd mind parking a closer to his drive, but in the end, if he is one of those 'I own the world, I do what I want', you are not going to get anywhere.

As for the van in the free for all place, again, not much you can do because unless you all have many visitors, the place is likely to be free almost always for him to park there, so unless it says that it absolutely cannot be used by another resident at no time, not sure what you can do.

It's very frustrating to have inconsiderate neighbours, some are defensive when feeling attacked, but you can get somewhere with them with a lot of tact and patience, some though are just rats and nothing you will do will work, in which case, you will have to decide whether to live with it, or fight with all your might which will result in what you would rather avoid.

pinkshoes

Invest in an old car with a few months tax and MOT and park it in the visitor bay and just leave it there.

moneyistooshorttomention

pearl123 wrote: »

Too many cars on the road. It's not going to get better.

Not for a while anyway.

Though the problem here is that the neighbour is obviously being distinctly selfish.:(

vivatifosi

Bat this firmly back to the management company and let them sort it out. They should be inspecting the estate on a regular basis and may have already picked up that there is a problem.

I am a director of as residents management co. How it works here is that problems with parking are referred to us and we try to sort things out. Our backstop position here is that we don't get involved in legal action as it is expensive and uses funds that take a long time to build up.

It's hard to say without knowing the specifics, but as the RMC I'd probably write to all households reminding them if the covenants. I may possibly also ask them to remove their cars on xyz day in order for no parking markings to be added to the street or add no parking signage in front of where the car is parked. This also has the benefit of not singling anyone out. It also means that if they still park there after the alterations, then they can be addressed specifically.

Aylesbury_Duck

pinkshoes wrote: »

Invest in an old car with a few months tax and MOT and park it in the visitor bay and just leave it there.

That will make the OP feel better about the situation for a while I’m sure, but all it does is exacerbate the problem. There’ll be one space fewer for everyone else and the parking will get worse. It also escalates any potential conflict. What next?

bouicca21

Nothing cogent to add except to say that I share OP's pain. I have a neighbour who frequently blocks me in, even though they have other options. They will move if asked but with at best bad grace and often with muttering unpleasantly. No matter how polite I am they make it feel confrontational.

I suspect I ought to make a point of asking them to move every time they do it, but the reality is that I hate doing it and avoid as much as possible.

SephirothX

I really don't know why they thought adding two patches of grass would be better than having two extra parking spaces. My neighbour #4 sometimes parks on the grass outside their house and have said they'd like to convert it to a drive but I suspect they themselves have no right to do so since that's under the control of the estate management rather than the home owner.

I notice right now there's a car parked on the grass beside #1 so perhaps they have been more considerate today and asked them to park there. The estate management should really convert this to a bay at the least.

I do see the point you guys are making about the actual visitor bay though, if I had an extra car and there was a visitor bay outside my house I'd use it too. My main issue is that they believe it to be theirs. I've not tested them yet as I rarely get visitors in cars and when I do I usually ask them to park around the corner so as to not block the shared access road.

As for the visitors parking closer to the grass/#1's drive - that does allow me to get out IF neighbour #4 doesn't have their car parked on the shared access road as well. If they do then the gap is too narrow to get through so I guess you could say this neighbour is also part of the problem.

I think the best suggestion for now is to take the approach that the lack of parking is the problem and highlight this to the estate management and see where that goes. I suspect there won't be enough money in the pot to convert grass to tarmac and they'd ask us to pay for it - which no one will want to do. Markings would be cheaper however.

As much as the idea of revenge sounds nice - the old banger idea, I agree it will just make the parking worse because then there will constantly be a car on the shared access road.

Aylesbury_Duck

Is it possible that planning permission was granted for that number of parking spaces and no more? That might be why there are patches of grass where extra bays might be useful. Aesthetically, acres of tarmac looks rubbish and worse when cars are dumped all over it and there is the often-cited requirement for areas where rain can naturally drain away. If all green space is converted to parking space, it looks worse and possibly increases flooding risk. That’s perhaps why the management company won’t be able to do anything about creating extra parking, but they ought to be enforcing the parking that does exist.