Nuisance neighbour causing parking mayhem

SephirothX

I have decided that I will contact the estate management company and ask them to add road markings/signs to explain that parking on the shared accessway is forbidden and clearly label the visitor bay.

My drive was blocked by two different cars today in the space of three hours. I have 9 photographs dating back to October showing 9 different cars parking in this area, 7 of which are since December. There have been more cases and more different cars but I didn't photograph everything. Before December I was only taking photos if the cars were blocking me at a time I needed to get in/out. As my living room faces the other side of the house it's not really possible to log time of arrival/departure, but I am considering installing a CCTV device.

My biggest fear in all this is that I don't want to create a neighbour dispute because I will likely sell this house within the next 5-10 years and I don't want to have issues selling due to having a neighbour dispute on record. So I am going to take the approach of reminding the estate management of the covenants and ask them to improve the parking situation - rather than attribute blame to the neighbour causing the issue. I would send a letter to the neighbour but that constitutes a dispute so it's better to address the parking itself rather than blame.

I have done further research and found that covenants are very costly to get enforced legally and generally no one cares about them once the estate has been sold off by the builders. I'm pretty sure the builders of my street went out of business shortly after building it so I'm not sure how that works, all I know is that the street is managed by an estate management company now.

If contacting the estate management doesn't resolve the issue then I have a sign ready to stick up myself which my partner got for me. I will also have to start parking on the shared accessway instead of my drive.

I must thank everyone who has given me advice in this thread, and I will update with progress.

ProDave

I would make a prominent sign to put at the front of your parking spot "Do Not block access" etc.

Consider getting some red and white traffic cones and placing them on the shared road in front of your space. It is a dead end there so you won't be blocking the road.

Get some polite * notices made explaining they have blocked access to your space and put one on the windscreen of every car that obstructs you.

* make sure they are polite. When I was much younger I did this but my notices contained the F word. I had a visit from the police and was cautioned for "distributing obscene material" after someone complained.

SephirothX

Problem is these cars are one time visitors so putting a notice on the car won't matter as they're unlikely to return. Then again I only have 9 photos, it could be these cars do return but at times of day I'm not noticing.

I like the cones and sign idea. Problem with cones though is I'd have to move them every time I want to go out in the corner, get out the car and put them back before driving off and then reverse the process on the way in. Effectively blocking my own drive. It's bad enough when the bin men block access with my bin nevermind doing it to myself every day. I'll just try a sign to begin with - if contacting the management company doesn't work.