Parents standing on my front lawn

[Twizbe]

Trying to decide if I say something to the Head so thought I'd ask here first.

I live next to a 2 form entry junior school. Our house is the last of 3 down a single track private dead end road. The end of the road is a gate for the school. Our property boundaries the school.

When we moved in this gate was just emergency access / gardener access for the school. No kids used this entrance.

After covid the school use this gate for year 6. Since the schools went back after Xmas we have 60 kids using this gate morning and evening.

A few times now I've seen parents stood on our lawn or in sunny weather sat on it.

Today I came home and this bloke was stood almost at our front door playing with the leaves on a young tree in the lawn (it's about waist height)

He just gave me a dirty look at I turned my car into my drive.

AIBU to ask the school to remind parents that this is private property and not a place to sit / stand.

@daisypond

I wonder if they think you’re the CF - driving down the LEA private road and parking in a driveway to pick up and drop off your kids - hence the dirty looks.

Perhaps, but it's pretty clear I'm allowed to when I pull up to my house and go through my door lol

@SpringTides5

As I say *@dodobookends*, parents have very limited choice at the moment.

Playgrounds are often off limits which means there often isn't any other choice than to stand in drives, sit on walls or even hover in gardens on occasion at pick up and drop off.

There is plenty of room for the parents to stand. They don't need to sit on my lawn.

@SpringTides5

To be frank I would just suck it up. If you live next to a school, you just need to accept that there is going to be activity at pick up and drop off times.

Clearly it’s not ideal having people on your property but I can’t imagine they’re present for long.

Especially with social distancing, parents are often not allowed onto the school site at pick up. There therefore isn’t really much other option than to stand where you can.

I have no issue with the activity. Or parents having to stand socially distant while they wait. I mind them being on my front garden.

There is LOADS of room for them to stand.

I'd get the hose out and give your front garden a good watering twice a day. They won't want to sit there is it's wet - plus you can soak anyone that gives you a dirty look!

I feel your pain. I used to live near a secondary school and e parking and behaviour had to be seen to be believed. Once we had a big punch up over parking and we had to call the police.

Definitely email the school as well - they don't want to fall out with local residents.

The parents must be misunderstanding the layout, surely? I can’t imagine a bunch of adults thinking it was acceptable to hang about in someone else’s front garden - its just so clearly not the norm!

Either, point out : How funny, do you not realise that this is my front garden...? You need to leave, now.

Or (more entertaining and a permanent solution) “oh. I’m so glad to see you all, come on in and we can start our meeting, I wasn’t sure how many would attend no no, come on in, don’t be shy, more then merrier...” and usher them round the back and herd them into your garden shed, before starting a religious ceremony of some sort. You might want to get a few friends to stand at the roadside to sort of shepherd them along.

Timed water sprinkler?

Frankly OP I think you need to ask yourself whether it is worth getting so worked up over this. You seem to be getting yourself into a right lather with the standing at your window watching etc

Personally I would back away from the whole issue. Are the parents actually causing any issue by standing on ground that is technically your garden for a few minutes each day?

It's certainly not worth getting into confrontations with the school and parents imo.

Just tell them to get out of your garden or agree with pp and get the hose out for the garden (& them!)

Why won't your kids go to the school?

If considering a hedge, might I suggest you plant a row of Wild Edric. It’s a David Austen hedging rose with lethal thorns, but beautiful scented roses. When we bought our house, 3 doors down from a corner newsagent, I realised that kids were buying ice creams etc and sitting on our picket fence to eat them. The fence wasn’t that strong and so I planted these roses. It’s a stunning feature now, but also stops any one from trying to peer into our house etc.

This. Is. Not. On. Plus dirty looks?!!

I want to come over to yours and shake my umbrella at them! Maybe give the dirty look guy a swift slap with it, while I'm there.

Speak to the head.

@FuzzyPuffling

Land mines.

This. Its the only that will be 100% effective.

I favour motion activated sprinkers with cctv to capture all those delightful moments of twats getting soaked.

Being nice and civil will get you precisely nowhere with school parents. You need to go hard core.

@BryanAdamsLeftAnkle Me! Me! I did! 🐧🐧🐧(I think that’s a penguin emoji!)
Meanwhile, can’t believe the number of eejits suggesting the OP just suck it up, ffs! Riiiiiight!

How about you start handing out printed pamphlets with your new, whacky “Religious Manifesto”? That might get rid of them... 😉

@Twizbe

I'm glad I'm not being silly about this. I am thinking about putting up a small picket fence type thing. Though it is very clear that it's our garden and not just part of the road.

I can tell you from bitter experience that they will simply lean on the fence until it breaks, and let their little kids swing off it, and hang their bags on the pickets.

Sprinklers are the way to go, or just tell everyone to fuck off.

Sprinkler - turn it on.

Put up a fence and attach this to it.

Ebay.
"Private garden. Keep off the grass" metal sign.
10inches x 8 inches.
Nail to a post and stick in lawn.
Job done.

I do like the sprinkler idea, I have to say!
Timed, or motion sensor activated, either would do.

Is your home leasehold or freehold, if the road is owned by the LEA for the school? If it's leasehold you might have to check about fencing - but I can't imagine it would be any kind of problem.

Pointy fence AND spiky bushes right against it is the way to stop people leaning on the fence. Mahonia is another spiky-leaved plant - or you could just go with holly of course, except that come Christmas you'll get CFs stealing your holly bit by bit!

@SpringTides5

Frankly OP I think you need to ask yourself whether it is worth getting so worked up over this. You seem to be getting yourself into a right lather with the standing at your window watching etc

Personally I would back away from the whole issue. Are the parents actually causing any issue by standing on ground that is technically your garden for a few minutes each day?

It's certainly not worth getting into confrontations with the school and parents imo.

I'm not getting worked up about it, nor am I standing at my window watching them. The 2 incidents I mentioned where while I was coming home.

The other times have been observed when I happened to be in a room facing the road.

I wasn't sure if I was unreasonable to say anything about it

@IFionlyhadbrains

Why won't your kids go to the school?

Believe it or not we're actually just on the catchment boarder for the attached infant school lol.

It was our second choice though. Our son has some additional needs which we feel will be better served by another local smaller school.

@Twizbe

Instead of doing short term 'planting', why not just pop sprinklers on the parts of your lawn the parents stand on, and set the timer for school drop off and pick up times only ?
It'll get them off your lawn without you having to say anything

Ah, sorry, hadn't read the whole thread

Someone's already suggested it.

Turn the hose on them

A sprinkler system on a timer would be funny 😄

Why not just ask them to move really loudly so people hear and get the message? These are adults - why is this the schools job to sort out?

@Clymene

Follow them home with a deckchair in your boot and go and sit on their front lawn with a cup of tea and a copy of Take a Break

My neighbours’ parents did that. They lived by the Thames and somebody who’d hired a boat moored up on their garden and got out and had a picnic on their lawn.

He knew the rental company owner, so got the address and turned up to their house the following Sunday with all his family and some deckchairs.