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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

First blow struck in car parking wars, do I strike back or live the bigger person?

60 replies

reasonablypricedlove · 02/12/2021 12:34

Okay so I'm really really trying hard to resist this, because my nature is to dive right in but I know, from bitter experience, that sometimes it's better to seethe inside but not get involved!

So to the parking... on my street parking seems to work if everyone parks where they usually do, I think there's some people who live on the next street down who park on our street but obviously they can park where they like, even though it is very annoying.

Anyway, my ND neighbour disturbed the delicate balance yesterday when a workman they had blocked two drives for several hours, and then, when asked to move, took one of the other spaces normally parked in over night by another neighbour, that let to a catastrophic mixing of neighbours cars which seem to have led to one neighbour taking their car off their drive and parking it in front of our house where we normally park and leaving their drive empty. As we were not involved in the parking shenanigans (apart from waiting engine running in the empty space outside their house for about 5 mins whilst the workmen's van was moved so that our other ND neighbour could get off their drive I can only assume that they think it was our workman and are 'punishing us'. I have a car on my drive, that I could easily park anywhere, I could create havoc but I know I shouldn't - devil horns or angel halo folks, what do I do?

OP posts:
WulyJmpr · 02/12/2021 13:17

@0palescent

Stay out of it. Life's too short to worry about parking. The recent murders over parking spaces/cars have really changed my thoughts on these things.
I was thinking this, too :S
LublinToDublin · 02/12/2021 13:17

Were not we're

NerrSnerr · 02/12/2021 13:20

Why do you need to seethe inside though? What are you seething about?

DaisyNGO · 02/12/2021 13:20

@reasonablypricedlove

Well that took a turn! Was a bit lighthearted really, hopefully no-one will be murdered over it. I'm surprised that no-one else would be bothered though if someone deliberately took their car off their drive to park it in front of your house for no reason other than to make your life harder? There are about 10 nearer spaces they could park in front of, and around, their own house if they needed their drive.
tbh I don't even understand your post

but one of my friends had a dead rat left on her car by a neighbour who was annoyed that she parked on the street in his preferred space (a zone with permits).

it may seem minor but when you know people get killed over this stuff, why escalate it?

Well, I suppose if you want to, we can't stop you.

LookItsMeAgain · 02/12/2021 13:22

You know the rules @reasonablypricedlove - if it's a thread about parking, it must have a picture illustrating the issue you're encountering.

As you've replied a few times now and no picture, I'm going with YABVVVVVVU Grin

GeodesicDome · 02/12/2021 13:25

I'm surprised that no-one else would be bothered though if someone deliberately took their car off their drive to park it in front of your house for no reason other than to make your life harder?

a) You don't know this is what they've done.
b) On street parking doesn't belong to you.

diddl · 02/12/2021 13:28

@reasonablypricedlove

Well that took a turn! Was a bit lighthearted really, hopefully no-one will be murdered over it. I'm surprised that no-one else would be bothered though if someone deliberately took their car off their drive to park it in front of your house for no reason other than to make your life harder? There are about 10 nearer spaces they could park in front of, and around, their own house if they needed their drive.
How did it make your life harder?
CluelessHamster · 02/12/2021 13:29

I would think the neighbour moved their car off the drive to avoid being blocked in by the builders later and it just happened that the space in front of your house was empty at the time rather than it being anything personal.

So I wouldn't do anything.

vodkaredbullgirl · 02/12/2021 13:30

Don't even joke about no one was murdered over it.

Onatree · 02/12/2021 13:33

The joke about "nobody was murdered about it" - is in appallingly bad taste. I cannot believe i read that.

The road outside your house is not yours. Your indignation about it (however much you re-position it as "light-hearted") is entirely unwarranted. Posters are quite right to point this out.

LuneyTunes · 02/12/2021 13:33

A man smashed in our car window with his foot while my partner was in the car only last week because he had parked 'in his space' - i.e. legally parked on the road outside his house for a few hours for the first time ever. It was sickening and scary and if my partner had been the sort to react, he was about to be dragged out the car. So that, plus the murders last week, makes me think people are batshit and parking is not a reason for violence

BertramLacey · 02/12/2021 13:36

I'm surprised that no-one else would be bothered though if someone deliberately took their car off their drive to park it in front of your house for no reason other than to make your life harder?

I'd assume someone had got back only to find they couldn't access their drive so they'd parked outside my house temporarily. Then I'd find somewhere else to park and get on with my day. Right now there's a builder parked outside my house. He offered to move but I said it was fine to stay there. It's easier for him and makes no difference to me.

DaisyNGO · 02/12/2021 13:46

@LuneyTunes

A man smashed in our car window with his foot while my partner was in the car only last week because he had parked 'in his space' - i.e. legally parked on the road outside his house for a few hours for the first time ever. It was sickening and scary and if my partner had been the sort to react, he was about to be dragged out the car. So that, plus the murders last week, makes me think people are batshit and parking is not a reason for violence
shit.

what did your partner do? That's terrifying.

mrsm43s · 02/12/2021 13:48

I can't even begin to understand why a neighbour deciding to park legally on the street, rather than in their drive causes you any concern whatsoever.

They probably did it for good reason (i.e. not being able to access their drive/not wanting to be blocked in/the space they chose being vacant), but even if they just did it because they felt like it, it is no concern of yours.

On street parking can be used by anyone with an appropriately tax and insured car. You do not have any rights to dictate who does and does not park in the space in front of, opposite or near to your house, or any other space, except your own private parking/driveway which you own.

Zilla1 · 02/12/2021 13:53

The street needs a parking administration with sub-committees and guidelines for parties and for work vans. When that fails, a parking czar. When that fails, all out war until the survivors retreat to their own drives, shell-shocked.

Presumably a house with one drive but two or three adults with cars need to use the road and people get emotionally attached to the road outside their own house where they can keep an eye on their car.

Except in London where they hear the sound of four Yorkshiremen saying 'luxury' and 'in my day, we'd have to lay the tarmac to park on ...'

Oblomov21 · 02/12/2021 13:54

Do nothing. It will resolve itself within a couple of days.

Dancingonmoonlight · 02/12/2021 13:55

@reasonablypricedlove

Well that took a turn! Was a bit lighthearted really, hopefully no-one will be murdered over it. I'm surprised that no-one else would be bothered though if someone deliberately took their car off their drive to park it in front of your house for no reason other than to make your life harder? There are about 10 nearer spaces they could park in front of, and around, their own house if they needed their drive.
How did they make your life harder? Did they block you in?
EventOfTheSeason · 02/12/2021 13:55

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Hoppinggreen · 02/12/2021 13:59

I’m sorry OP
I know you were being lighthearted and MN did used to love a parking thread but after that poor couple were murdered with their children in the house over parking (or more likely due to someone with MH issues) it’s just not as funny any more

LuneyTunes · 02/12/2021 14:00

He just drove off as quickly as possible. It was past midnight and the man ran out of one of the nearby houses in his dressing gown, having already blocked DP in with his work van and car, went round and tried all the car doors to get in & then booted the drivers window in. DP had luckily done enough mini turns to scrape out by then and just sped off. The police haven't done anything, despite having a witness and number plates of a company vehicle and a good idea of house number. Unfortunately it's a few doors down from a friend's house and he goes to that street quite regularly! And he wasnt blocking any drives, just had the audacity to park on the street for the.first time outside this lunatic's house. I'm just glad DP didn't get physically hurt, but it was horrible.

Andylion · 02/12/2021 14:00

Calm down folks, I haven't got involved. It was a lighthearted observation of neighbour politics.

I get the spirit in which you posted, OP.
It’s as if posters on this thread have never seen a parking thread on MN.

Chewbecca · 02/12/2021 14:01

Nah, it really doesn’t bother me if someone parks outside my house when my car has a drive to sit on.

DaisyNGO · 02/12/2021 14:03

@LuneyTunes

He just drove off as quickly as possible. It was past midnight and the man ran out of one of the nearby houses in his dressing gown, having already blocked DP in with his work van and car, went round and tried all the car doors to get in & then booted the drivers window in. DP had luckily done enough mini turns to scrape out by then and just sped off. The police haven't done anything, despite having a witness and number plates of a company vehicle and a good idea of house number. Unfortunately it's a few doors down from a friend's house and he goes to that street quite regularly! And he wasnt blocking any drives, just had the audacity to park on the street for the.first time outside this lunatic's house. I'm just glad DP didn't get physically hurt, but it was horrible.
oh poor him. I think it's like that round here too. I no longer have a car and though I really missed it at first, I am glad I haven't got to drive.

Re the couple who were murdered, there was another London murder over parking a few years ago, I'm pretty sure...a colleague said she worked with the lady who was killed. Maybe not London but just outside...Uxbridge?

Hilda40 · 02/12/2021 14:07

"My car idles when not moving forward"
So turn the fucking engine off then.

Mamamia7962 · 02/12/2021 14:20

I agree about parking threads now, they all just seem even more petty and pointless since that couple were murdered. I keep thinking about their poor children waking up and never seeing their parents again.