Neighbour using my drop kerb!

[mykerb]

A new family have moved in next door - not attached we are a row of two semi's each and so on..
I have a driveway and a dropped kerb. So it goes my drive, pavement and then the dropped kerb.

My next door neighbours have a make shift drive (from previous tenants) but NO dropped kerb, it doesn't help that their neighbours have 4 cars and two permanently parked outside their garden so the new neighbours have nowhere to park except down the road because of it but again not my problem!

They have started driving over my drop kerb to park in the make shift drive, I have started parking on my dropped kerb to make a point of it and I did block them in, to which the woman politely asked if I could move my car so she could reverse out, I told her I don't appreciate her using the kerb to park in, to which she replied that she is going to be getting the curb outside hers dropped but it will take a while due to getting planning permission etc and it's hard to walk down the road with 3 kids and a newborn so it's just been more convenient, but she won't do it again if it bothers me.

Tbh she hasn't had a chance to park there again as I have started parking in front of my drive, on my dropped kerb but my sister has said I'm being petty for no reason and making her life harder and it's not a big deal! And it's really irked me because now I don't know if I'm being unreasonable or not!

Different threads would elicit different responses based on their particular circumstances. Judgment and reasonableness is applied to each situation. In this situation, the vast majority believe the OP is being petty - I agree. I’ve taken the contrary view on various threads in the past, like you have in this one, but not this time.

No. It’s been pointed out by you. Our home was fronted by a wide pavement. When we applied for access to the drive, the works clearly stated a charge for reinforcing the part of the pavement directly adjacent to our driveway, which we would have to drive over to access the property via the dropped kerb. I’ve copied and pasted the regulations around it upthread somewhere.

@Rosscameasdoody

You seem to have a concern about reinforced pavements… but how many installations of dropped kerbs require the associated pavement to be reinforced? I don’t believe they do. It’s cars not HGVs that are passing over the pavement after all.

Sorry, I missed that post. The practice of reinforcing pavements seems far from universal though. Maybe it depends on the type and age of the pavement.

But as always with MN, the first couple of posts set the tone and the sheeple follow. Here, once it was picked up that the neighbour had young children the whole tone changed

Stop with the "sheeple" nonsense. It's rude.

If the first posts "set the tone" how can the tone then change when people realise the neighbour has children? Especially as it is said in the first post that she has children.

I know you aren't meant to drive over the pavement in this way. However, given the neighbour is getting one installed and this makes her life easier I wouldn't care. Because I'm not a selfish twat.

It has nothing to do with the children, I would feel the same about anyone who had a reason that parking on their "drive" made their life easier. Someone with mobility problems for example, someone with an elderly parent who lives with them... If they are waiting for the dropped kerb to be installed and it doesn't actually affect me why would it bother me?

I would feel differently if it was some lazy fucker who can't be arsed to get their own dropped kerb installed.

I see awful, entitled behaviour from parents every day. Because they have children.

No, you see awful entitled behaviour from entitled people who happen to be parents. Not really surprising given it's a school which will be rammed with parents twice a day. They are probably entitled in other aspects of their life too, not just because they have children. Entitled people become entitled parents.

Yes, sorry. Just worded it as 'your rules' as a shorthand for that aspect of the overall conversation. Finding out about the regulations has been interesting but not entirely helpful, because they vary from council to council and are woefully enforced.

Anyway OP isn't the police and didn't ask about the rules, but about whether her sister is right to accuse her of being mean.

Her passive aggressive parking leads to three negatives - a wasted space on her drive, increased risk of damage to her own car, and one less wheelchair crossing point. So that a minor council rule (that was being broken throughout the last thirty years) can now be obeyed, and so that new neighbour is massively inconvenienced. I think that is mean.

And I wonder why the different attitude to old guy (whom I am imagining as the old guy in Up!). Having his car mounting the raised kerb must have been really noisy and much more likely to cause damage.

I can see why it may annoy you to begin with because they didn't have the respect to speak to you first. People just do what they like and think it's their right.
HOWEVER now you've spoken and she's been polite and respectful, I wouldn't be deliberately parking so as to stop her because it's arse holeish and makes you really look like one. Everyone in your street will realise also and think the same. Doing it once so she comes and speaks to you is one thing. Blocking it when you don't need to and she's already offered not to drive over it, is another.

It’s not “your” dropped curb. You don’t own it. And by parking on the pavement and over a dropped curb you are causing a hazard for disabled people, people with prams, people with sight loss etc.
give your head a wobble

People just do what they like and think it's their right.

Because it is. The pavement is public property.

@Rosscameasdoody mine didn't 🤷‍♀️!

I think new neighbour's actions are more understandable now. The guy she bought the house from had been driving over the pavement for thirty years, and she probably thought it would be ok for a bit longer while she was waiting for an additional dropped kerb to be installed. It must have been a shock when next door deliberately blocked her in.

Also, if the other neighbours were leaving a gap for the old guy, why don't they for new neighbour? She really has moved into a viper's nest, hasn't she!

I dont think there are a lot of property owners responding on this thread, at least none with dropped kerbs for which they had to shell out ££££s for in order to give access to their own drives - yes, their 'own' drives, and, from my recollection of when we had ours done a few years ago, it wasn't cheap. So to have a new neighbour come along and start driving across it (and presumably part of your driveway? which would cause extra wear and tear if not stopped) wouldn't be acceptable in most people's point of view, especially without first checking with the neighbour whose drive it is attached to whether it was o.k or not.

Here on Mumsnet it appears that the first couple of commentators took a moral high ground and set the tone for the rest, as pointed out quite astutely by Roscameasdoody. The OP appears to have retained a civil relationship with their new neighbour whilst establishing the boundaries, which I'm pleased to hear. I don't think all the vile insults on this thread hurled at the OP was really necessary, but I've seen the type before on here so not really surprised, bit sad that people need to resort to insulting invisible strangers to get their angst out really or just to get their kicks. OP did well not to rise to their OTT ignorant comments.

Property owner here, two properties! Paid for dropped kerbs to both.

Nothing to say that the neighbour was crossing the actual drive of OP, so that's whataboutery.

And the OP deserves to be called out in her petty behaviour.

She does not own the kerb or the pavement.

No. There is no way this is genuine. This has got to be a bored person who gets a kick out of winding people up online.
However - if it possibly is, it actually makes me sad that there are people out there in the world who would make an issue out of this. There’s just no hope for humanity. We are screwed as a human race.

The psychological divide here is baffling. I've owned lots of properties with a dropped kerb outside, and never thought of them as 'mine' - they belong to the council, and form part of the street scene for everyone.

If my neighbour came to me and said 'My frontage is blocked: do you mind if I bypass the blockage via the dropped kerb next to your house?', I'd think they were being a bit overpunctilious. I mean, how is it harming me?

You sound like the neighbour from hell; your poor neighbour having to live next to such a petty, selfish and utterly unreasonable individual like you.

Fair play OP. I I like your replies. It's good you are chatting with your neighbour. Getting on with your neighbours is so important.

On reflection, I concur!

Exactly. It seems to be the difference between those of us who were taught to share as children and those who weren’t. And who understand that anything beyond the boundary lines of a property doesn’t belong to the owner of that property.

But there's a couple of crucial points that you've missed.

Firstly, despite what the OP has paid for she doesn't own it. It's part of a public highway and is owned and maintained by the local council.

Secondly, from everything the OP has posted the neighbour isn't encroaching on the OP's property whatsoever.

So the OP can stamp her feet as much as she likes but she has absolutely no say in the matter.

It's really quite simple. The dropped kerb DOES NOT belong to the OP, it's part of a public highway and is owned by the local council. Therefore, she has no say whatsoever as to who can or cannot use it. And exactly the same applies to the dropped kerb outside your property, as long as nobody is encroaching onto your property there is absolutely nothing you can do about it because it doesn't belong to you.

She doesn’t own dropped curb, but council does. It is illegal for her neighbours, or her to park on the dropped curb. Simple.

Except that the issue was not the neighbour parking on the dropped kerb, it was driving onto it and then across the pavement to access her own makeshift driveway which does not have a dropped kerb. This is illegal from the point of view of having to drive across the pavement. OP has paid for the facility to access her own drive, and everyone on this thread knows full well that it’s only there to give access to the property directly in front of it. If everyone did this there would be cars driving all over the pavement, it’s ridiculous. I copied and pasted from YouGov on the law surrounding this upthread. It’s perfectly clear.

The OP has no say in it but the council does. One dropped kerb gives access to one property. If the neighbours have applied for their own, then fair enough, they use it while they are waiting. If they’re using it as a cheap way of avoiding paying, then the OP is within her rights to report them to the council.

I didn’t at any point say that the OP owned the dropped kerb. But anyone with half a brain knows the law. One dropped kerb to provide access to the property directly in front of it. Not one dropped kerb paid for by one resident, so that every tom dick and harry in the road can jump on board.