Parking outside my garage - AIBU?

[SewingMum46]

We live in a terraced house on a narrow street, which is next to a school in a busy town with lots of people who drive big cars. We don’t drive a big car but we do own a garage which is one of a row of four a little further along from our house. It’s really handy when the street is congested with cars from the school - there is a dropped kerb in front of it and a big sign that says “No Parking” on the garage door. We don’t often keep our car in the garage, but it does mean that when the spot in front of our house gets taken, we have a parking space in front of it.

I had to take dd for a hospital appointment 15 miles away this morning. She’s 23 and has hurt her leg badly - has been in an articulated leg brace for 6 weeks, had an MRI last week and this was results day. She can’t drive. Got back from the hospital and found a car had parked halfway across our garage and halfway across our neighbour’s garage. Neighbour had left her car in front of her garage and this car has not only taken our parking space, but parked so close to our neighbours car that she couldn’t get it out. She’s a nurse working at the local vaccination clinic and had to take her husband’s car. I had to park a good 200m up the road and my daughter had to limp back.

I’m furious and have left a note in red sharpie on the windscreen - what would the rest of you do?

Put marmite on the door handles.

Your neighbour can call the police as she is blocked from getting out. Unfortunately they won't help you as you are out. I'd have stopped in the middle of the road however to get your daughter out if she can't walk that far - traffic can wait...

That’s one I haven’t heard before🤣

Was it a paper note or did you literally write on the windscreen in red sharpie?

Faevern it was on paper. But the windscreen was slightly damp.

Parallel park super close to unknown car so they can't leave.

Get back in the car and go block them in OP.

Lamplighter the street is too narrow for that unfortunately - there’s just space for a car to get past the ones parked. Then a massive high wall.

Sounds like a road by us. Narrow windy road with the primary school on the corner and the infant's school further round that corner and another corner.

Plus the garages are also by the busy main road end with a little supermarket that has no parking and attracts folks to park badly while someone pops in.

Arseholes.

Yanbu - it’s a completely unacceptable thing to do

Can you park really close on the other side of the car so that they cannot get in the doors. I know you will be blocking another neighbours garage but you could put a note through their door to apologise and say that you will happily move your car for them but you don't want to let twatface out.

Standard response is to park in a way that prevents them from leaving and rapidly get some alcohol on board.

Take photo and forward to school , tell them to tell
Parents that it will be clamped if they do it again .

Couldn't you have dropped your daughter outside the house before going off to park?

Good for you and your sign should work but would it be better to have one saying private parking only? You parking infront sort of sets a president as they may see it as an old obsolete sign >grasps at straws<
I'd be bloody livid though, what did you write on the note?

@Faevern

Was it a paper note or did you literally write on the windscreen in red sharpie?

I hope there was no paper involved !

They’ve parallel parked across half of our garage and half of the neighbours (who have 3 garages) - there’s half a car space behind them then cars parked alongside the kerb. They’re right up against my neighbour’s bumper so she can’t get out. But they can get out easily. Not an option to block them in as I’d block the road completely. Stopping to let dd out wasn’t an option at the time, thought we’d be able to park around the corner 20m away but couldn’t…

Note asked them not to park outside garage as they were obstructing access to my property and to read the sign!

@BriansTail

Put marmite on the door handles.

Dog sh*t would probably be more effective 🤣

Very simple, I'd use a trolley jack or two to move the offending vehicle.

Once the wheels are off the ground it doesn't take much effort to move a car. In your situation the best thing would be to move the car so you can get into your garage, ideally leaving it somewhere unsafe in the hope that the police get called or someone collides with it and it gets damaged.

The sort of thing I'm talking about starts at about £50, which may or may not be worth it for you, depending on how often this sort of thing happens.

The good thing about this idea is that it's more-or-less legal, it's not as if you're stealing the car, you're not even damaging it.

Take photo and forward to school , tell them to tell
Parents that it will be clamped if they do it again .

They’re not going to threaten parents with a criminal act!

I’ve called the school - I doubt it’s parents (secondary school and wasn’t there at 9.15 am when we left) and all the staff have stickers in their cars, so it’s not one of them. It may be a sixth former. It has been there over 2 hours now.
As for not parking in front of the garage in case it sets a precedent - we literally only park there when there are no other spaces and we move our car as soon as we can. One of the reasons being that the road is two-way but actually too narrow for three cars side by side - so where cars are parked there is no passing space. We leave outside the garages free when we can so that cars that meet in the middle of the road can actually get past each other without backing up! But when there is nowhere else to park, we do have a right to park outside our garages, and I can’t see how it would set any more of a precedent than someone parking in their own driveway.

Come on op, you know the score.

Diagram please.

It’s finally gone - 4pm, almost 6 hours. It was a sixth form girl. My lovely ndn saw her and had a stern chat.
Bit late for a diagram. Just try to imagine a narrow lane, just wide enough for two cars to pass. One side has houses all the way down with doors that open onto the pavement - no front gardens - and there are 4 garages halfway along. The other side has a high stone wall. First garage is mine, the others being to ndn. It’s possible to parallel park alongside mine and ndn’s garage but we try not to as it means there isn’t anywhere for cars to go if they meet halfway along the lane. Ndn hadn’t been able to park anywhere except outside her garage last night. Another car parked directly in front of her and then the girl parked so close behind that she couldn’t get out - but halfway across the front of my garage so I couldn’t get in or out either, and left it there for about 6 hours.

I bet she won't do that again!

Never too late for a diagram though!