Am I being a complete git to smile? (parking)

[emmanana]

We live a few miles from central London, in a street 2 mins walk from the tube/station. We have a dropped kerb/driveway and a garage, but despite this we regularly get selfish people blocking the drive, then hopping on a tube, thereby making useless 2 spaces on our property for hours/overnight. There is no resident permit scheme, and the parking charge of £5 a day at the station is obviously too much for some..
The space between the parked cars on either side is small, meaning Supermarket delivery vans/parcel deliveries have to stop the traffic, when delivering our orders. Nightmare trying to get everyone/everything out of the car, then having to go park half a mile away, especially as my DM can drive, but only walk short distances. Coming home from work a few hours ago, although our drive was empty, but someone had blocked it again. I noticed they had left the interior light on.
Fast Forward 4 hours. They have been trying to start the car for the last 30 minutes......Karma......

Good - perhaps they'll think twice about being so thoughtless, selfish and ignorant in future.

Well done emmanana. That note says it all, gives a warning and the consequence. Just the way you should deal with children who think they are above the rules.

Well done emma!

Oh wonderful - there is a God.

We have this problem we have a dropped kerb for driveway and a white line - we have access to several cars put it that way - and when they knock at tea - time we always go smugly to the door - chewing - and say ' Oh dear are you blocked in ? - 'well now you know how we feel most days - I'll just finish my tea and then I'll move my car -

One rang the police on me one day cos I wouldnt move my car straight away

Sorry meant to say we have access to several other cars - brothers stepsons and mine or DHs if one is out on the road - so only one car is usually blocked in by these people- so we use the other cars to block in any culprits.

Suda, you're brave..
I'm rubbish, we have the only drive on our road and often the guys next door pull onto our drive and park.. Poor DH comes and goes at all hours (on call) and he has to knock their door in the middle of the night doesn't seem to bother them though!
Hope its gone now!

Is there trouble all times of day or just the commuter rush hour? May be worth getting hold of some police cones and plonking them either side of your drive. I had to do that before my street came residential parking as we are near town, a tube station and also have a school up the road.There was only one way in and out of our road. Worked a treat!!! It allowed transport to pick up my daughter and bring her home from school.

They do it all the time, (yesterday for instance) They don't seem to have any brains. We even had a skip once (left on the drive) and it was obvious it was full. I prayed that the skip lorry would come before the twat who blocked the drive that day. Sadly not.
I really don't know how they can drive, without brains.....
We do have a couple of police cones in the garage, and I do use them if we are having furniture delivered etc, but don't leave them there all the time.
Have an arrangement with next door (our drives are side by side), when we're on holiday, our neighbours DP's/Friends use our drive, and vice versa otherwise they would just block both...
Still - lucky that's all I got to complain about this arvo! :-)

its lack of consideration more than brains IMO - the majority know exactly what theyre doing.

actually sudo's post reminded me of when I did that

Live in a 4flat block, bit like a converted semi iyswim with the 4 numbered parking spaces next to it. Its a new street and the visiting builders would park in my space daily. I complained to site manager numerous times and one day when it was pissing it down and I mean moonsoon style!! I parked across the back of the car in my space across mine and neighbours space. I was cokking dinner when he buzzed me - so obviously knew whos space it was . I said give me ten minutes to cook and I'll be down.

No-one parked there again

I think it is only illegal to block a driveway with a car on it.

We have ours blocked regularly too. It is a huge pain.

Years ago, someone blocked me in completely and I was due to go out and see a patient. The police very kindly came and bumped the car out of the way - luckily there was room to move it forward.

Had the car gone after your note or did you call police?

OP - you poor thing, I wish continuous bad karma on the inconsiderent selfish gits.

We used to rent a house with allocated parking outside the house. The pikeys people that lived next door had a house with a frickin' Driveway at a 45 degree angle to our house. They also owned a caravan, a transit van and two flatbeds. They told us on our first day of moving in that they had an agreement with our landlord that they could also use our allocated space to accommodate their fleet of shit-heaps. The landlord owned a bike. We declined to honour this agreement as there was nothing in the rental contract about this. The pikey fuckers used to frequently park one of their big, stinky vans and block our car to make a point.
It backfired however, when they realised that both DH and I worked very unsociable hours and were not averse to ringing the doorbell at stupid o'clock and waking their shitty mutts dogs until they moved their vehicles to let us out.
[smug emoticon]

It was moved by the time I got back, but I did write the reg on the kitchen board, and will ring the police if they try it again.
On the absolute flip side - just had a knock at the door (they could see we were in as a window was open) A frazzled young mum with 2 DC's 'Do you mind if I park across your drive for 20 mins, as I've got to pop into Boots to pick up a prescription, and I've got 2 kids with me?'
'No problem love, we won't need the drive for an hour or so. THANKS for asking'
Now that's a good example to be showing the kids, rather than 'Oh feck 'em, we'll just park there as theres not a car in the drive'

Emmanana, glad the car was moved.

Yes, I don't mind people blocking my drive if they ask first - although, we have residents parking now so they take a risk doing that.

What really annoys me is when the road is totally empty 200 yards away (and no drives to block) but they just can't be bothered walking the extra distance!!

It is laziness a lot of the time. I live at the bottom of a very steep hill (mnetters in se London will know all about our hills!I struggle to stay upright pushing a loaded buggy up here!) And it probably does seem more attractive to block my driveway and avoid climbing the hill on return from the station, wherever...

i'm in south london and the over zealous traffic warden nazis round here gave me a ticket or parking next to a dropped curb, not even in front of it!! I parked so that I was not blocking anybody in and not blocking a driveway and was outraged.
I think the note is the right thing to do to start with. If a person is enough of an a-hole to block a driveway they will probably not take notice of a note and then you will be reasonably able to get the police/get them towed and that will be much more satisfying!

Your right it is laziness. As you say if they ask first it not normally a problem.

I was on another thread last week about parking/blocking driveways.

My mum had to pay to have gates put accross hers to stop parents parking on her drive when dropping their children off at school.

I live at the end of a cul-de-sac and get annoyed when we can't park/reverse on our drive because some one parked out the front of our house, is also our front garden.

It's not illegal to park in front of a dropped kerb if there is no car in the drive. Police wont be interested and cant do anything.