Neighbouring /bordering unadopted road issues

MoneySeeker1

Great minds think alike - I was just wondering whether to "turn the problem on its head" and ask what OP might be able to do in their own garden to mitigate things.

So my mind was turning towards wondering whether OP's garden is big enough to allow for planting a row of trees along the adjoining fence and they would "screen out" the dust from coming through into the garden. I'm picturing a row of nice (ie NOT leylandii obviously then!) trees. Maybe buying a set of pretty large well grown-on pleached trees (think pleached is the word I want - for trees that have been trained to be bare trunk for about the first 6' of the trunk and then the "branches" start). It's a modern solution I've seen people using to deal with our late 20th/early 21st century back gardens that miss the privacy back gardens are supposed to have - but might be a solution in this case for this problem (if the garden is big enough).

NinjaTune

MoneySeeker1 said:

I'm not convinced a wood chippings idea would help. AFAIK they are just meant for covering soil in gardens and not for driving on (even with an ordinary car - and there are bound to be houses that need modernising in that road and therefore the chance that a house-owner in one of them might actually do that work and then there'd be lots of rather bigger/heavier traffic going up that road in the course of that).

I know this isn't the same as the OP's situation, but wood chips (not the bark chippings for gardens) can be used as a surface for vehicles.  This is a farm in America showing their wood chip road/path after a year of use by vehicles (including a tractor) and pedestrians.  Could be worth a try if OP can't find an alternative, especially if the wood chips can be got free or cheaply?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NRK7VtAj3o

Jeepers_Creepers

I think Adrian has it covered in his post above.

It's obviously impossible for us to know from this side of the screen just how bad this dust can be, but I can imagine it could be a bludy nuisance at times - quite unpleasant, and unreasonable to have to contend with. And I think that would be the issue used in trying to resolve it - certainly the repeated 'nuisance', and possibly even a potential detriment to 'health' (no-one in your family suffers from asthma or similar, do they?)

You'd have to make a good case, tho', and for this you'd need solid evidence. Is the dust visible enough to be caught on a camera aimed along the fence top when a car passes? If so, that's step one. Step 2 is to catalogue the number of times this happens in a normal day. If the cars do throw up plumes of fine and gritty dust on a regular basis - and cars from 20 households will surely do this a lot - then I think you have a reasonable case. By 'reasonable' I mean I think your case is reasonable, but whether a stretched council could find the time or inclination to act is another matter.

Tarmac is not the only solution, tho' - there are better hardcore coverings than the existing one that'll compact down more firmly and should reduce the dust throw-off. At some point the road will need some upkeep, and that could be the time to suggest a better surface even if they won't stretch to tarmac. And there's also the option of planting thick hedging along the annoying stretch - laurel should catch most of this, and it wouldn't have to be too high - perhaps 8'?

With 20 houses, you'd think they'd want a better road?! 

Do you have Legal Protection on your house insurance? If so call them up for advice. If you are brave enough and if you can collate evidence of actual nuisance - visible clouds of dust coupled with similar dust covering your windows and cills, for example - I'd love to see what would happen if you (after putting the car owners on notice) began submitting fortnightly window-cleaning bills followed up by a moneyclaim.gov when they 'pfffft'...

I fear that is fantasy land, tho'... :-(

 

GraceD_17

I agree with a fence/hedge/trees solution. 
OP is there any way you could post a photograph or google maps link so that we're able to see the exact scale of the road and the garden, that way we may be able to advise you more on something you could possibly do? 

I live in a corner house and have the same situation as you, we're residents of the road our front door sits on but the side road which is where our garden is, we aren't residents of. It can be annoying, any work that gets done on that side road very much effects our house but we, like you - have no say on what goes on. 

House_on_the_corner

MoneySeeker1 said:

Great minds think alike - I was just wondering whether to "turn the problem on its head" and ask what OP might be able to do in their own garden to mitigate things.

So my mind was turning towards wondering whether OP's garden is big enough to allow for planting a row of trees along the adjoining fence and they would "screen out" the dust from coming through into the garden. I'm picturing a row of nice (ie NOT leylandii obviously then!) trees. Maybe buying a set of pretty large well grown-on pleached trees (think pleached is the word I want - for trees that have been trained to be bare trunk for about the first 6' of the trunk and then the "branches" start). It's a modern solution I've seen people using to deal with our late 20th/early 21st century back gardens that miss the privacy back gardens are supposed to have - but might be a solution in this case for this problem (if the garden is big enough).

Thank you. Yes we have planted a hedge on our side of the fence for this reason but, owing to huge tree roots from a very tall mature tree in our garden with a TPO on it and other mature trees on the other side of the fence (that sadly don’t stop the dust)  they are are not growing well. We are however still looking at this as a way to help but they would have to be extremely tall hedges which means cutting back the trees with TPO’s on them 🤯🙈. 

ace33

Does it have to be tarmac? What surface is on there at the moment? We have just topped our drive up with 40 tons of ragstone chippings @ £24/ton +vat, look nice and compact down and give a good surface. A cheaper option would be road planings.

NinjaTune

ace33 said:

Does it have to be tarmac? What surface is on there at the moment? We have just topped our drive up with 40 tons of ragstone chippings @ £24/ton +vat, look nice and compact down and give a good surface. A cheaper option would be road planings.

The neighbours who have responsibility for the unadopted road have refused to have tarmac laid.  The OP has already been hit by flying stones so I'm not sure that adding more stones would be useful.

Soot2006

Can you help the situation by growing some decent evergreen hedges alongside and over the fence? Should at least stop some of the dust pollution from coming into your area?

ETA: apologies, I had only seen page 1 for some reason ... My post is supraceded!

House_on_the_corner

Wood chip road video

This is brilliant. Thank you

Davesnave

Can one throw wood chips (or any other substance) all over a neighbouring road owned by someone else and not expect some kind of negative reaction? I thought the other residents who manage it want it to stay as it is?