About letting dc practice basketball on the drive 5x a week?

[GCSquirrel]

The neighbour across the road has complained. This neighbour doesn’t actually live here full time, her and her dh come down 10 days a month as it’s their second home. She says that dc practicing is ruining her time here and that last time she was down she considered booking into a hotel 🙄.

Ds is 10 and is mad keen on basketball. He has one training session after school per week and a training session on either a Saturday or a Sunday. He doesn’t practice on the driveway on those days so he’s only out there 5 days a week. It always immediately after school on weekdays and never before 10am or after about 5pm at the weekend. I never let him stay out there for more than an hour. The driveway is across our front garden which has a 6 foot wall around it and a solid gate so the ball never bounces out. It’s just the noise of him bouncing that drives her mad.

I spoke to her and told her that I’m not going to stop dc from practicing. If she’d been slightly more reasonable about it I offer have asked her if there were times that it particularly bothered her and got dc to work around that. Instead she came marching across the road, banging on the door and telling me how much she’d paid for her house and how my family was ruining the one place that she came to relax. I’m on really good terms with all my other neighbours and they all know dc well enough to feel comfortable to go out and tell him to pack it in if it’s annoying them for whatever reason.

AIBU not to reduce dc practicing when neighbours are down?

It's one hour a day and not at unsociable times. Perfectly ok. Yes, basketballs are annoying (and we live next to a basketball court) but it comes under normal enjoyment of your property. It's no worse than my downstairs neighbour singing for an hour or the child in the neighbouring block of flats learning to play the violin. It's one of those things you have to accept if you live near people.

@Frankensteinisamonster yes, pretty much. Telling me to stop my son playing in the drive full stop is completely unreasonable, IMO. She didn’t ask he we could limit it to 30 minutes, not do it at a certain time/ certain days, just told me that I was making her life miserable and she was considering having to book into a hotel and then telling me how much she’d bought her house for 🤷‍♀️. She’s here 10 days a months. Drives all the way down from Birmingham for some peace and quiet but bought a house on a cul de sac full of families and, instead of going out/ putting in headphones/ playing music/ generally accepting that the people who lived here long before she chose to buy here are continuing to exist don g completely normal activities she tells me that it will stop. So, no, I’m not going to ask dc to stop when I probably would have otherwise.

1 hour a day for 5 days is definitely not unreasonable! Let him practice, it’s your home too!

OP at 19.26 - I don’t consider either my son playing basketball or any of the other things listed above as anything other than reasonable (if irritating at times) behaviour.

OP at 21.02 - I’m not disagreeing whether I’m reasonable or not.

The majority seem to think YABU and ought to reduce DS's home practice, yet you don't seem to take on board anything they are saying 🤷🏻‍♀️ if there are no other real solutions (parks, grass, foam ball etc) then the only other option is to reduce his practice time at home yet you don't seem willing to consider this. Because you are unwilling to accept that for others it is an unreasonable amount/frequency of noise. The YABU gang do not seem to be of the children must be silent brigade. Most would want them outside playing and interested in hobbies. But an hour every day except Saturdays with the type of noise it creates is annoying (repetitive ball bouncing is infinitely worse than a musical instrument or the sound of DCs playing).

It's like a dri pping tap listening to the repetitive thud thud thud.

Good for you. Exactly how I would react if my neighbour was being so bloody precious. Its not anti-social, it's a kid playing basketball.

I'd rather hear the ball bouncing knowing the bairn is safe in his yard, minding his own buisness, practising something that could potentially mould his future than think he's stuck in gaming 24/7 or causing trouble out in the streets....

YANBU however I am one of those people that can tune sounds out ie ball thumping, car alarm, dog barking...

Your house, your son, 1 hour a day. Even 5 a day wouldn't be unreasonable to me, but I accept it's tolerance. I say carry on as you are.

@Mars27 I truly despair at reading comprehension levels on here sometimes.

He has a match/training on either Saturday OR Sunday and the other day of the weekend when that isn't happening, he will be practising on his drive.

Is that clear enough for you?

We used to have a neighbour who would let his kid play out every day for an hour or two thumping the football against the wall. It’s the repetitive sound which is super annoying (unlike kids shouting/playing/running around). It also made our dog super anxious and jumpy (lots of dogs don’t like loud bangs). I think now and then is fine, but every day (or 5 days a week) is too much, honestly. We got to the point that was actually a factor in us moving out. It’s really antisocial, sorry @GCSquirrel

There is nothing more annoy than the sound of a basketball resonating after hitting a hard surface.

It would literally drive me insane.

Imagine this for at least an hour on many occasions during the day. 5 days a week.

I would be rocking back and forward and to be honest I am a tolerant person.

I feel so sorry for your neighbour.

To be fair, I'm like this too. I'm not noise sensitive and can cheerfully tune most things out...except for maybe a leaf blower, they are a fucking menace.
I'm the one who goes to bed at a festival and is lulled to sleep by the distant thumping of the dance tent.

You are definitely not being unreasonable. How ridiculous that a kid playing basketball for an hour shouldn't be allowed in his own garden.

What if OP decided she doesn't like the sound of someone cutting their grass? Should they just not do that?

I tell you I'd be pretty pleased if the worst the kids in the street were doing was playing a bit of basketball

It is an annoying sound but I would still let my kid do it if is their passion.

@Loopyloooooo can you believe it? 😄

I would have said YANBU then I lived next door to a basketballer. Good god I wanted to rip my ears off! I'm not normally someone who is sensitive to noise but there's something about that relentless thwack thwack that makes me feel like I'm losing my mind.
And it he did it whilst I'm trying to get the baby to sleep I think I'd steal his ball! 😂

Don't change a thing.
If she doesn't like it she can sell up, and hopefully a local person can move in rather than a second home owner.

*They probably do get annoyed by it. We’ve all lived next to each other for years though and still get on well. We’ve had, at various stages, the teenager who had 3 hour practices in their parent’s garage every weekend. The mum who did 11+ tutoring a few nights a week and all the parents would wait parked across the drives. The entire house renovation done by a single bloke who listened to Magic FM on full blast every hour of the day.

It’s a little cul-de-sac of 7 houses. We’re all good neighbours (apart from the complainers) and they all know my son well enough to tell him to go in if he’s being a nuisance. It’s just part of living in an area with other people. I don’t consider either my son playing basketball or any of the other things listed above as anything other than reasonable (if irritating at times) behaviour.*

If you really feel the way you do (above) then why are you even posting asking for opinions.
Children are completely entitled to play, but the dink dink dink of a basketball for an hour 5 days a week would drive anyone insane. It would be all you'd hear. YABVU, an hour twice a week would be fair but not 5 days. That's selfish

There is very little she can do.

My neighbours have friends over in there garden, laughing and getting pissed every weekend in the summer months there is nothing I can do about this.

Basically let your dc practise.

Hopefully from several replies here you can see now how irritating a bouncing ball can be to those living nearby. Do you plan to change anything?

This is a tough one OP. Legally you're not in the wrong but jeez, I would not want to be your neighbour. Whilst you say it's only for a hour, they say it's a whole hour nearly every night.
I don't think it'll work asking them is there a particular time you'd like your son to avoid any more than if they asked your son what time he will be out playing.
You've got to live together though so could the basket be relocated or would it drive you mad hearing it at the back of the house? Is there really nowhere nesrbyvthst you could set up a basket? School playground, farm?
I'd say once or twice a week was fair.

An hour of a ball repetitively smacking against the floor every couple of seconds would irritate the hell out of me, too.
Is there a club they can join?

@elfd I’ll ask my other neighbours again if they want him to stop/ decrease length of time/ do it at different times again and sort it out with them. I’m more than happy to do that if it’s bothering them. Other than one of their teenage son’s I don’t think anyone else is normally back before 5.30ish during the week so I think it should be ok. I’ll double check about the weekend session but as I said earlier I’m going to speak to the church hall to see if he can use that with a couple of his friends if possible once a week.

@MrsSkylerWhite as I said in my OP he is part of a team that trains one weekday night a week and then another training session or a match on either Saturday or Sunday.

@JudgeRudy theres a car park that’s closed during the winter about a 15 minute drive away that could work if the travellers aren’t on there atm. I wouldn’t be able to do this during the week but I could take him there at the weekend. School is locked outside of school/ after school club hours and the only nearby park that has a ring is on grass so no good.