Are WE the CFs here or neighbours??

[TigersRoll]

3 houses share our driveway (including ours). So you get the 1st house and then ours next to each other and then at the end you get the 3rd house. 3rd house is a big house and has a double driveway (prob enough room for 3 cars anyway). 1st and 2nd house have a tiny section of driveway each, ours been the smallest, barely big enough for one car.

Anyway, DH likes to faff with his car, our driveway is too small to do anything on so during the day when everyone is at work he pulls it into the shared bit. Occasionally he parks his work van on the shared bit but basically, if anything is on the shared bit, 3rd house can’t get to their driveway which is why DH does it when everyone is at work.

This worked well for ages, occasionally woman next door would come home early but would park at the top on the street and walk down. One time all of a sudden she came home at 11am (!) came storming down the driveway carrying a number of bags (she’s a nurse) and muttered something about so much for buying a house with a driveway”. DH was confused as she’s never mentioned it before but he moved his car straight away anyway.
A week or so later we had workmen at the house and they parked on the shared drive. She came home from worked, marched up to the workmen and told them they had to move. This meant packing up tools, ladders and various other stuff before reversing out of the drive just so she could park next to her house. As soon as she was in they moved everything back, low and behold they came out almost immediately and said they had to move as she was going out. They did, she went out and reappeared 15 minutes later again telling the workmen they had to move everything!!! Surely if she knew she was going back out she could have just parked at top of drive where there is tons of room??

Anyway she appears to be making a point of doing this now everytime DH has something on the shared driveway but has never actually spoken to him about it!

Last night we got an angry knock on the door. Her husband was stood there and he looked at our car and said “can you move it” in a really snappy tone. It’s a big car (Land Rover) and as our driveway is so small the arse of it sometimes sticks out into the shared bit. Unfortunately neighbour also has a Land Rover making getting past a bit of a squeeze. DH looked at the car and the space (as it was on our driveway) and the bloke snapped “I’m not scratching my car again trying to get past. Move it”. DH then had to move the car so it was practically touching our garage door. This bloke has always been very pleasant before so it seems so out of character!

AIBU to think his wife has started some kind of vendetta against us and roped him into it or is it our fault??

Your fault you are preventing access for her.

Another vote for it being your fault.

Obviously, as everyone has pointed out, you are in fact the CFers.

It hasn't come about "all of a sudden" that they're pissed off - clearly they have been doing the terribly British but unhelpful thing of simmering with annoyance and letting it get to boiling point. They clearly thought you and your DH would absolutely realise that you were indeed CFers inconveniencing them all the time ... and that didn't work. So now they're super duper pissed off.

Check yourselves, go and apologise, only ever park right up to your garage and only use the "shared" driveway for access, which is the point of it.

It's not "shared parking". It's their access to their own private parking and you are preventing them.

You are such a CF I'm amazed you don't know that already!

You’re blocking access to your neighbour’s property, vastly unreasonable. Hire a garage or something if your husband wants to play with his car regularly instead of antagonising your neighbours - it sounds like they’ve put up with it up until now and have have enough. If they raise a dispute it could make it difficult to sell your house.

The only part of the access road/driveway that it is OK for you to park on, to tinker with your cars on, or for you to direct your workmen to park on is your own private driveway. And fully on it, not hanging over at that. Anything else and you are a CF.

Most neighbours would be OK as a matter of goodwill, with polite notice, for occasional (say once a year) works or large deliveries. But consistently blocking the access road by tinkering with the car in it, or by parking your car so it overhangs will have been winding them up, and they probably don't have any goodwill left.

This worked well for ages, occasionally woman next door would come home early but would park at the top on the street and walk down. One time all of a sudden she came home at 11am (!) came storming down the driveway carrying a number of bags (she’s a nurse) and muttered something about so much for buying a house with a driveway”.

Can you not see you've clearly just pushed her to her limits?! She's repeatedly had to park at the top and walk which 'worked well' for you - and she obviously didn't want the confrontation initially but now it's happened too often and she's snapped!

No, you shouldn't block the drive. And if you absolutely need to on occasion- workmen or whatever- you should have spoken to your neighbours first to see if it would be ok.

With the workmen - you were explicitly told that where they parked was blocking her access, and after letting her through, you moved them right back into the same place?

Astonishing behaviour.

It’s shared access by the looks of it. Not a shared drive.

So YABU by blocking access.

We have a drive with shared access, nothing worse than coming back because your neighbour had decided to parks so you can’t access your own drive.

Happened several times a week, was once blocked into the drive and the deckers had gone to work, they’d just pulled their vehicle forward enough to stop access.

Thankfully they’ve moved and we’ve now got lovely neighbours who are going to work with us to get the best design for the drive so both households can have better access.

You have a car that is too big for your driveway?

Yep, you're in the wrong. Your neighbours have bought (or pay rent) to live in a house where they can access their drive at any point. Just because they mostly work during the day doesn't mean your DH should be blocking their driveway access. I would get royally pissed off if my neighbour was doing that. I expect to drive onto my driveway at any time of the day or night.

I expect they've just got majorly fed up with you. Maybe if it was once in a blue moon, they might be more tolerant, but it sounds like it's been a regular occurrence.

YABU.
Sounds like they're been more than accommodating parking up the road when you've blocked THEIR drive.
I'd have blocked you in the first time.
As others have said apologise and don't do it again

It’s your fault .

Also this poor woman is coming home from a shift as a nurse, tired off her arse, and having to deal with this shit.

It's so obviously you that this can't be a real question.

If you were having work done & wanted to block the access, why wouldn't you talk to the neighbours & see if a solution/compromise could be found?

Unless this is a reverse you are massively CF-ish.

If I was the neighbour and having to park on the road and walk with bags to my house, I'd be fuming. Particularly if it's a repeating need.

It's unreasonable think it's okay because she can ask and the driveway blocking car will be moved. The car shouldn't be parked blocking or partially block at all.

Sorry, but you did ask.

It’s one shared drive way which terminates into 3 private driveways

That's not a shared driveway, it's shared access to 3 private driveways

It is so obvious, even to me, who doesn't own or even want to own a car, that you and your husband are in the wrong.

To be honest yes I can see why they're annoyed, you shouldn't be parking on their bit of the drive. But equally, they didn't really need to be so arsey about it - just a knock on the door or a note to ask you not to park there would probably have been better. But yeah, I'd stop parking on their bit of the drive, and maybe apologise or pop a note through apologising (if you're bothered about having a good relationship with them - if you're not fussed, then don't bother with this bit)

I haven't read the full thread yet but I can tell you from reading the first post that you are absolutely in the wrong. Massively. And it's absolutely baffling to me that you wouldn't even think so. How entitled? I always wonder about people who think like you.

Just for fun I've redone the op's crap diagram.

Op lives at house 2, annoyed neighbours are at house 3.

Your welcome.

Op isn’t coming back. Or she will and it’ll be a reverse. Sigh.

Surely you know you're being CFs.

Totally your fault and you are being very rude about it. How would you feel if someone made it difficult for you to get in and out of your drive and you had to go and knock on doors to get them to move their car. You chose to buy a house with a small drive and a big car that doesn't fit in it. Why should they be constantly inconvenienced because of it?

You need to apologise and ensure you stop blocking them from now on.