Neighbours walking on our driveway

[Mumof3andlab]

Hello,

I will try to add a pic if it’s helpful. We are a semi detached end house, we have 3 parking spaces outside our house which is our driveway. Next door has a side path and massive drive to the SIDE of their house, they fit 4 cars on there.

however, they keep walking on our drive to cross to the neighbours opposite, or just stand and have a chat. For starters I think it’s just rude and secondly my dog is very territorial and it sets him off barking as he can see someone is there through the glass.

Previously we have told their friends/visitors it’s not their drive as they used to park on it! Now to stop that we park closer to their side of the house and leave our other side free (I get a lot of parcels, Asda van, my own visitors ect) we used to have 2 cars but only one at the moment. I’m sure if we have more cars they wouldn’t do it but just feel like they think we only have one so we don’t ‘need’ all that space.

I wondered if I could decorate the outside of our driveway with plants, or something else? To stop them crossing over or am I just being petty.

Why are they even coming out on your drive? They should go out and turn right to their drive. No reason to come your way at all.

Def block it with planters or picket fence as per pp.

The design is terrible, they are just standing outside their door!
yes your dog is territorial, but come on! They are in front of their house, which by a terrible design includes your drive
yes do get a small fence or planters, but you’ll be “that neighbour”
fair enough asking them not to park there, but not to stand with that design is a major over-reaction

Excellent point

I would pull on your drive not reverse so that I was parked as close to edge as possible. Might help

The design is appalling, very little thought went into that configuration. It's no wonder it's used as a shortcut by the neighbours, it's right outside their front door.

Are you really so upset by someone standing on a patch of tarmac that you own (check that though)? There is no harm. The dog barks, but it must do every time they go in and out anyway, your front doors are very close together.

Do you rent OP? Why have you not seen the title plan?

I have a very similar problem. Neighbours drive is right next to ours with no fence/wall and no room to even put pots. They constantly walk across our drive and use our drive as an extension to theirs because their car takes up all the space. It annoys the fuck out of me. I’ve tried to block access using my bin but often they just move it out of the way.

I would never have bought a proper with such ambiguous boundaries. Even though you say it’s your drive it’s easy to see why they do stand on it, given that it’s in front of their house.

That said though, I would park my car constantly right up to that edge of your parking space so that they can’t use it. I don’t think putting pots down would help. You’d only be doing your own legs if you did that, as it would reduce the amount of space you have.

I think Op needs to clarify who is actually entitled to use that space and who it belongs to before deciding on further action. It will be clearly set out in her TP1 when she purchased.

That said though, I would park my car constantly right up to that edge of your parking space so that they can’t use it. I don’t think putting pots down would help. You’d only be doing your own legs if you did that, as it would reduce the amount of space you have.

Why inconvenience yourself just to inconvenience a neighbour?! Leave them be they're not doing any harm, they're standing in front of their own house from time to time.

This is not a battle worth fighting.

Train your dog not to bark and maintain a good relationship with your neighbours.

If you get into a spat with them, it could make your house unsellable

A thread like this on Mumsnet warms the cockles of my heart, just knowing that, whatever shit is happening in the wider world, the everyday issues of British life reassuringly carry on and consistently wind us up.
Im not trivialising the issue by the way, it would infuriate me also.

Jesus, is this really that big of a deal?
Who cares that they are standing there, it's not hurting anyone.
I'd be more irritated by your dog yapping away.
Feels very pedantic.

Maybe they're bitching about the yappy dog?

I have a similar arrangement.

There is a dividing strip with a bush, which I own.

The neighbour doesn't like the bush much and wants it gone, but I keep it because I suspect if the bush was to go there would be "driveway creep" as their drive is only just big enough to fit their two cars on.

Not the most attractive looking option but we had this with our neighbours so we put our bins there. Did work tbf

What an odd design though for a new house, thats an argument waiting to happen (apart from the fact it looks so odd) Does it not annoy you every time you look at it?

You know what's sad? At no point in any of this is there the mention of kids playing out there

I agree

TidyDancer · Today 12:20
Wow I can see how this has developed, really poor design. I'm surprised that area is your driveway and not just general parking spaces. That would make much more sense given the layout!”

Agree, it’s very poor. I’d feel rude parking directly outside their front door, actually.

At lunchtime I caught our neighbour cycling (at reasonable speed) across our drive. He’s too lazy to get off his bike and carry it across his gravel drive and instead uses our block weave drive. We had already taken action to stop him walking across our drive from his adjacent drive and put planters along the edge butting up to the public footpath (keeping a gap large enough for access for two cars), but we are now going to have to have a rethink as he is using the gap. Any barrier method of ‘fencing off’ is going to be costly. Having a word will only work when he thinks no one is here, although today we were at home and saw him as he flew past the kitchen window.

I’d go for massive trough planters with mature plants along the border. Blame the reactive dog if asked :)

What an utter bastard.

Having you logged it with the police?

Proper lol at this.

Yeah, it's really sad that kids don't want to play on a patch of tarmac with the neighbours talking on it and a dog yapping at the door.

I have exactly the same problem and it's been like that for years. It irritates me but every solution you think of has a drawback or a cost in some way. Sometimes there is no really satisfactory way of dealing with a thing like that and on it goes.