Neighborhood Parking issues

[bcla]

Common courtesy is not parking in front of a mailbox or blocking a driveway.

Parking in front of a driveway can result in a legal tow nearly anywhere. If someone was completely blocking my driveway, I would immediately call for a tow. But a complaint about blocking a private home's mailbox would probably result in a "What exactly do you want me to do?"

 

[CF'er]

We live in the city but in a cul-de-sac. We started to notice a red SUV that would be parked in front of our house but blocking our mailbox. We never saw them come or go to be able to say something to them. (We have gotten nasty grams from the PO about access to the mailbox.) This continued for a couple months or so and now we see the car parking in a neighbors yard. I don't know if one of my kids put a note on the car as they had threatened. We have 5 or 6 cars at a time and park in our drive or side yard as needed. They could do the same. Luckily they now are.

Oh and neighbor can pound sand.

 

[tvguy]

Ah ok well I guess on that particular part we're in agreement regarding mailbox and driveway.

Mailbox wouldn't be an issue. I park my truck in front of my mailbox. That is perfectly acceptable and legal.

 

[North of Mouse]

Mailbox wouldn't be an issue. I park my truck in front of my mailbox. That is perfectly acceptable and legal.

Actually, according to postal regulations, they are 'not' required to exit their vehicles to put mail in your box. You would be so out of luck here!! I'm not getting into the whole 'legal or not' issue.

Can you imagine how much they would be slowed down if many people would do what you're doing? Do you by any chance have 'walkers', or just by truck deliveries?

 

[tvguy]

Actually, according to postal regulations, they are 'not' required to exit their vehicles to put mail in your box. You would be so out of luck here!! I'm not getting into the whole 'legal or not' issue.

Can you imagine how much they would be slowed down if many people would do what you're doing? Do you by any chance have 'walkers', or just by truck deliveries?

Not aware of that. They'd have to drive up on the sidewalk to do reach any mailbox on our street without exiting the vehicle. And, while most carriers drive, I think our route is supposed to be a walking route.

 

[mamacatnv]

It would be considered very rude to routinely park in front of a neighbors house where I'm from. Her boyfriend routinely parking in front of her house is irrelevant because it's in front of her house.

That being said, it's even more rude to go and yell at your neighbor, especially in the morning. Of course, I'm from the South, where we'd show up with a baked good and guilt you into not doing it again, bless your heart.

This made me laugh! I love the well placed use of Bless Your Heart, only having lived in Texas for 4 years, I realize it is an art to pull it off successfully!

I think common courtesy is not parking in front of a mailbox or blocking a driveway. I think the rest is ridiculous.

I came from the agree with you camp

Your response was all about you, not sure what the difference is? You shut the door in her face. Pretty much the same behavior in my opinion. Just saying.

Shutting the door (not slammed) to someone yelling and ranting on MY front porch IMO is NOT the same behavior. She could be a complete lunatic, my hubby and I were each holding onto a dog, her yelling woke my teenager who tends to sleep like the dead and her behavior has bugged me for days. I don't think closing the door to her was anywhere near the same level of reaction. It was self preserving.

The OP said her neighbor was yelling at them. Sorry, but that warrants a closed door in your face, and in no way is that behaving the same. That is called reacting, and that is what you get when you come to someone's home, knock on their door and start yelling at them.

Thank you

I agree that it is a reaction. I just think it is a bad one. They are adults, just because one is behaving badly doesn't mean the other should. I think attempting to have a conversation was warranted but she will never know; something productive could have come out of it.

Don't understand how closing the door on a ranting neighbor is behaving badly

I do think something productive did come out of it (even if it had nothing to do with the parking situation ) ranting neighbor learned that you can't knock on a door yelling and ranting about how she feels entitled to something and in return gets a reaction of what the OP did.
In the first post. OP says she let her rant for a couple minutes then shut the door as OP felt neighbor was not in a position to hold a conversation.

Exactly

Whether the door slam keeps that from happening again time will tell! I must have missed it but I don't see where she says she felt her neighbor was not in a position to hold a conversation other than her slamming the door in her face. I think an upfront conversation could have been had and hence there may not even be a thread because it was worked out.

First off, I never said I slammed the door, I just shut it. I did mention that she was obviously not in the mood to have a calm discussion.

Sabeking: perhaps time will tell, but the neighbor learned that day even for just that day that you can't act like a fool and not get a reaction from it.

I agree. I am not the type to rant and rave, thus I don't know what she hoped would come from her actions but yelling at someone is not a way to begin a productive conversation if that is what she hoped to have. Her actions were not conducive to calm, adult conversation and the result is I really don't care what she thinks.

 

[Hikergirl]

I agree that it is a reaction. I just think it is a bad one. They are adults, just because one is behaving badly doesn't mean the other should. I think attempting to have a conversation was warranted but she will never know; something productive could have come out of it.

In my experience someone who is acting the way the neighbor was isn't going to be receptive to having a normal calm conversation. And you are right the OP will never know, but that isn't because she shut the door. Its because her neighbor came over acting like a lunatic.

 

[aprilgail]

It is common courtesy not to park in front of others houses where I live. People do get pissy when they do! Most everyone has a minimum of 2-3 cars per house- one fits in the driveway, and then 2 in front of your house- some people have taken away part of their lawn and made the driveway into a 2 car driveway if they have more than one kid living there that has a car. People on my block had the mom and dad plus three kids with cars- that third kids car was always an issue- they would have to put a car in the garage (not many people use a garage here for their cars!) then 2 in driveway and 2 in the street- but when the person with the car in the garage had to get out the other car had to move to let it out etc- it was a pain for them but they managed to only park in front of their own home.
We try to only park in front of our own home- when we were going away with a friend for the week when they came to my house to carpool I made sure to pull my car out of the driveway and have them leave theirs in there, no way was I going to have them park in front of a neighbors house for a week. One car was parked in front of a house on my block for an extended period of time, the guy ended up going out and taking the plates off the car one night and calling it in as an abandoned car and the town towed it away- I never did hear whose car it actually was.
There is no law saying you can't park in front of neighbors houses but common courtesy should tell you that you should not unless there is no other possible place to park.

 

[FlightlessDuck]

Mailbox wouldn't be an issue. I park my truck in front of my mailbox. That is perfectly acceptable and legal.

How do you get mail?

 

[PrncessA]

Our HOA is pretty strict about parking. We live in a townhouse community and each house has a two car garage and a two car driveway. There are a few guest parking areas, which are suppose to be only for guest and the HOA is constantly warning people from parking in them. The village restricts parking overnight, unless you call each night and get permission from the police department.

At our previous house parking was a huge issue. You could only park on one side of the street and all the houses had very narrow driveways with room for only one or two cars. People were always parking in front of other people's houses but we never heard a word about it from anyone.

I personally believe street parking is for everyone, as long as you aren't blocking a driveway, hydrant, or mailbox, it is free game.

 

[bcla]

Our HOA is pretty strict about parking. We live in a townhouse community and each house has a two car garage and a two car driveway. There are a few guest parking areas, which are suppose to be only for guest and the HOA is constantly warning people from parking in them. The village restricts parking overnight, unless you call each night and get permission from the police department.

I own a townhouse. I no longer live there, but I have to deal with the concerns of a very small HOA. There are limited guest parking spaces, but our HOA CC&R sets up the use of them to be less than 24 hours and generally for the use of guests or perhaps contractors. The rule is routinely ignored, and I've gotten an earful from someone who complained that my tenant was monopolizing one space. Of course at one of the meetings, others weren't complaining, but noting that another owner parked his vehicle more or less permanently in another space.

One of the odd things about the CC&R, which I read just a bit when I bought the house, is that it restricts certain vehicles. It says that except for short-term guests, motorcycles and anything larger than a half-ton pickup truck aren't allowed to be stored on the property, including in garages. I guess whoever wrote it thought that it would detract from home values for there to be work vehicles or motorcycles. However, nobody seems to care. I had a room share with a motorcycle and one group of tenants had several motorcycles. They were fairly quiet sport bikes though.

 

[tvguy]

How do you get mail?

The letter carrier puts it in my mail box. They get out of their vehicle and walk around the truck. But like I said earlier, there is no way they could reach the mailbox (or any mailbox on my street) from their vehicle without driving up on the sidewalk. Side walk is 42 inches wide. And the homes they built when they extended my street have cluster mailboxes, and the letter carrier opens from the back. EDIT: It could be a local rule, but there is nothing from the post office about parking in front of a mailbox. My street is made up houses built in the 1950's, where the mail box is on the house by the front door, my house which was built in 1979 where the mailboxes are on the edge of the sidewalk, and the houses built in 1985 where they have cluster mailboxes https://www.usps.com/manage/mailboxes.htm
This is my mailbox

 

[bcla]

How do you get mail?

The mail carrier finds a place to park and gets out of the vehicle. Doing that is by the book. I've seen some stop in front of a driveway and deliver without locking the door. Takes only a few seconds. I noted my folks' place, but they do have signs on their side of the street saying no parking certain hours on "school days". That's always kind of interesting since the city doesn't seem to really care if there's school or not. They've handed out warnings on weekdays during summer when there is no school. But on Saturdays there's never been a problem if someone parked in front of their mailbox.

All homes in my neighborhood use mail slots or mailboxes placed on the house and our carriers end up walking, so I have no sympathy for one who won't get out of a vehicle.

 

[FlightlessDuck]

The letter carrier puts it in my mail box. They get out of their vehicle and walk around the truck. But like I said earlier, there is no way they could reach the mailbox (or any mailbox on my street) from their vehicle without driving up on the sidewalk. Side walk is 42 inches wide. And the homes they built when they extended my street have cluster mailboxes, and the letter carrier opens from the back.
This is my mailbox

Oooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Around here there's very specific rules for placement of the mailbox and distance from the road.

 

[tvguy]

Oooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Around here there's very specific rules for placement of the mailbox and distance from the road.

I think we posted replies at the same time. Yes, your's could be a local rule.

 

[bcla]

The letter carrier puts it in my mail box. They get out of their vehicle and walk around the truck. But like I said earlier, there is no way they could reach the mailbox (or any mailbox on my street) from their vehicle without driving up on the sidewalk. Side walk is 42 inches wide. And the homes they built when they extended my street have cluster mailboxes, and the letter carrier opens from the back. EDIT: It could be a local rule, but there is nothing from the post office about parking in front of a mailbox. https://www.usps.com/manage/mailboxes.htm
This is my mailbox

My parents got one almost like yours, but set up next to the road so it can be deposited without getting out of a vehicle. They had an occasional issue with mail theft. However, their neighborhood doesn't have sidewalks for the most part. They also can't leave mail for pickup any more.

 

[tvguy]

My parents got one almost like yours, but set up next to the road so it can be deposited without getting out of a vehicle. They had an occasional issue with mail theft. However, their neighborhood doesn't have sidewalks for the most part. They also can't leave mail for pickup any more.

I drop important outgoing mail at the post office. Anything with a check.

 

[bcla]

I think we posted replies at the same time. Yes, your's could be a local rule.

I think it's a rule for any new homes. Either that or clustered boxes in a new development that can be serviced together.

The USPS has some weird rules to avoid getting out of their vehicles. One I found recommended that carriers honk to get the attention of an express mail or package recipient, with a preference that the recipient come to the vehicle.

I found one forum where a bunch of mail carriers seemed to think that refusing to get out of the vehicle was stupid. However, they seem like they understand the concept of customer service rather than being automatons. They also seem to hate the idea of the paperwork needed when holding mail as "undeliverable".

https://forum.federalsoup.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=50349#post568390

 

[ImDMous]

Our cul-de-sac has 2 business-type mailboxes that have about 12 boxes in each one where the whole back opens. But if there's a package the mail person will walk it up to your door. I like it because it locks so you don't have to worry about mail thieves and there aren't mailboxes you have to dodge at every house when you're running. It's right across the street for us but a few people that are 3 houses away will drive to it. Can't make everyone happy I suppose.

 

[bethbuchall]

The mail carrier finds a place to park and gets out of the vehicle. Doing that is by the book. I've seen some stop in front of a driveway and deliver without locking the door. Takes only a few seconds. I noted my folks' place, but they do have signs on their side of the street saying no parking certain hours on "school days". That's always kind of interesting since the city doesn't seem to really care if there's school or not. They've handed out warnings on weekdays during summer when there is no school. But on Saturdays there's never been a problem if someone parked in front of their mailbox.

All homes in my neighborhood use mail slots or mailboxes placed on the house and our carriers end up walking, so I have no sympathy for one who won't get out of a vehicle.

But then the route is set up with the thought that the mail carrier is walking house to house to get to the mailboxes. Our mailboxes are all along the road at a specific height to be reached from the mail truck. The mail is all in the truck and the carrier does not have a mailbag to carry the letters in. The route is set up to be completely driven (with the exception of mail too large to fit into the box), and a carrier would have a route with many more stops than the walking route. If he/she has to get out and walk around a car to get to the mailbox more than a few times on the route, it is going to add a significant amount of time. It's not a matter of being lazier than a carrier that walks a route; it's a matter of it being a different job.