to think that it should be permissable to park transit vans and similar sized commercial vehicles anywhere that cars can be parked?

[bibbitybobbityyhat]

Given that transit vans are not much smaller than some of the 4x4 monsters that people are perfectly happy to drive down to Asda and not much else?

Yes or no answers much appreciated.

That's a shame for your neighbour. Works vans that block your light are a mammoth PITA - nothing that can be done about them though, sadly.

How big is it, Baby?

I'd much rather look at a well maintained, clean van out of the window from time to time than the shagged out rusting red Vauxhall corsa with the exhaust that sounds like a heavily amplified lawnmower. If the parking is unrestricted on street parking then anything can park there. If you are so picky about not having neighbours then you should move to an isolated plot in the countryside. I sometimes drive a van at work but it lives at the unit. I have 2 cars and my own drive. I can accept that sometimes the man down the road has to park his van not quite outside his own house because another taxed and insured vehicle has legally parked outside his house.

2 of them cycle, another drives and parks up for the day and the owner drives one himself. To be fair there's more available parking on a working day so less of a problem if vehicles are left. I agree every business has to start somewhere but it does cause problems especially if we have visitors as it's such a struggle to park.

He is considerate though and they do their best to park them well

Depends on the street, some have covenants some don't. But they're a burglary target.

Am I alone in not giving a shit as long as I can get out of my drive? I regularly have people rock up in vans or trucks and park outside my house as it's convenient. I also have trees that block the light to my bedroom but there's not much I can do about that.

well who knew people could be such snobs about vans, an eyesore indeed!

A fleet being parked on your residential street I can understand being pissed off about but being annoyed because your neighbours a sparky and drives his van home?

It is big but he has to carry large equipment.

We've got a large drive so he parks on the outside of the drive so as not to block light, he was leaving it on the road not by any houses, but then we've had the problem of it getting broken into. Now he has the added joy of carting as much of his stuff in and out each day as he can sometimes before a 5am start off. Can't win really.

We've got a Transit in the family of vehicles. We don't have a drive, so on street parking is the only option for overnight. DP will actively choose to park a bit further off to avoid blocking someone else's front window etc, but sometimes it's not possible.

Do you want your stuff delivered, your plumbing and building and electrics and painting and decorating done? Then accept that strangely enough, most small tradespeople can't afford to run a little car just so they can commute to where they've parked their van, and would actually quite like to park reasonably close to their home.

Your neighbour sounds very silly then, Baby.

AlpacaLypse
Do you want your stuff delivered, your plumbing and building and electrics and painting and decorating done?

None of that excuses parking in an inconsiderate manner.

The thread title isn't about inconsiderate parking BonyBack. It is purely about where commercial vehicles like this should be allowed to park. It seems quite a lot of Mumsnetters feel they should be parked "away" somewhere, just because they don't like to see them on their street.

I am learning new things about the MN demographic. I've never lived anywhere that had its own drive, as I'm fairly urban and not super loaded. It never occurred to me that vans wouldn't be parked on the street. Where else do they go?

I think this is definitely an issue for the very well to do.

Bibbity

IMO, most people don't mind seeing vans parked in the street. People get arsy about them when they are parked in an inconsiderate manner. So I do consider them linked.

I also believe that there is a big difference between having work done with a vehicle parked for a day or two and having the next door neighbours van parked outside your window every night.

We live in an inner city area where all the housing is terraced and no one has a drive- and it isn't unusual to have vans parked outside our house. In an area like ours, everyone just parks wherever they can, no one would expect to get to park in the space outside their house, or to have any say in who that space is used by. Its a public road.

I am finding this totally alien.

And I'm obviously massively inconsiderate without even realising it.

I live on a street of terraced houses. There are no drives. Parking is very much every man for himself and you snooze, you lose.

That is just how it is.

As for vans - well I don't think I've ever paid any attention at all. I have had to look out of my window to check and yes - there are 2 on the street at the moment. I've no idea if they are usually there because I've clearly never noticed enough to give a damn.

As for being unsightly... They are vehicles. I don't think they are any uglier than any other vehicle. Yes they are bigger and don't have Windows, but I have never noticed or considered it a problem.

So...obviously I don't have a van...but if I did, I would be deemed inconsiderate, because I wouldn't really give a second thought to where it was parked more than I do with my car - so is it somewhere safe and legal and not obstructing anyone or on a corner or blocking a driveway? No. Then fine.

I am struggling with how many people this is apparently an issue for. What other massive bugbears do people have that I am blissfully unaware of?

Not fussed about vans.

I am fussed about one of my neighbours parking between 15 and 20 cars on our street all the time - some which don't move for weeks. He runs a car sales business from home. He doesn't have prices or for sale signs on them but he is running a business. Apparently it's completely legal for him to do this. It means I really struggle to park and often have to put my car two streets down. I have space for a drive but resent having to shell out 3k to put one in because my neighbour is too tight to pay for a business premises.

If it's a single van used by someone who lives within a reasonable vacinity of the space and they're not deliberately parking away from their own home to avoid looking at it then absolutely fine.
Less so people saying their neighbours have several vans one street, that's pretty inconsiderate.

I can't help but think a lot of this van hatred is pure snobbery TBH...

I live in a terrace, but fairly rural. We have a drive plus garage at the back plus can bagsy the road at the front if we get there first, as that's not where people's gardens and drives are. 2 near neighbours with vans - one parks at the road in fron and, if he doesn't get the space directly outside his house, moves when he can. Other parks in another neighbour's never used and uncultivated garden space (by agreement, of course!) They're less of a nuisance than another neighbours' daughter and her friends, all with matching Ford bloody Fiestas, parked nose to tail, spanning 3 or 4 houses, most weekend evenings.

We discounted a house, when we bought this one, not because it was far more of a do-er upper than we could manage, but because a nearby garage had half a dozen heaps of shit parked up in the vicinity of the house.

Of course vans should be allowed to park as cars would. Had a lot of work done on my house recently...er...where else would they park but on the road near my house? (Bloody huge skip on the drive so couldn't park there.) People have to earn a living; and for many that includes owning a van to transport tools etc. Cannot see a problem.

I think people here are forgetting why vans exist.

A van is a vehicle for moving stuff. Most people's vans are their livelihood (plumbers etc) for very small one-person businesses, and you prefer to park them near your house where you can see them or at least hear them having the back door crow-barred off. When you live in a street with roadside parking you are lucky if the space outside your house is free when you get home. And for various reasons they or their partner might need to have a non-van vehicle in their life too so they become a "multi-car household".

The other thing is that many cities have height restricted all of the city centre car parks (e.g. Leicester) so delivery drivers, tradesmen, market traders etc have to improvise to find somewhere to park their van during the day whilst they work.

A lot of city housing was built before there were even cars let alone vans, there is only on-street parking, off street parking costs a fortune, and really it is not ideal but I think unavoidable.

We always park our van legally, tidily and as near home/work as possible, believe me, inconsiderate parking isn't limited to vans by any means.

Minifingerz that sounds awful.

Our streets are packed and there's not much off street parking. Houses have been turned into flats -so now one not large building might have six vehicles in the street.

It all adds up to a much less safe community. Vans aren't great - you just can't see round them- there's no way my kids can play in the street.

On my street we sometimes (regularly) get artic lorries parked up for the night. A van is the least of your worries.