Since we're talking about bad neighbors..... (1 Viewer)

[Philip_T]

Must be something in the air lately bringing out the bad neighbors. While my situation is not near as bad as a threatening dog or a neighbor encroaching on my property, I'm feeling the need to vent about our current situation with the neighbors directly behind us.
We've lived in our current house for almost 2 years now and never have had a problem with our neighbors until recently. They have a couple of teenage sons that have never bothered anyone and I believe that they are good kids. However, the mother recently got a new boyfriend who decided it would be a good idea to build a half-pipe for the kids to skate on. Now I don't have anything against skateboarders, I use to board back in the day myself. But this thing is huge. And loud. The sound of the wheels going over the wood sounds like a constant thunder storm from inide our family room. Eating our dinner in peace while watching a little TV use to be enjoyable,,,not anymore. Now, I'm sure that their interest in it will diminish after awhile and it won't be the constant disruption that it is now, but recently, they went one step further and broke out the spray paint. Graffiti is now covering the entire half-pipe and very visible from the back of our house. The view from our master bedroom now is that of a typical bridge in your bad part of town. I have to think that this eyesore has to have some effect on our resale value of our home.
We've talked some other neighbors about it and they are not too pleased either, but no one is quite ready to take action as of yet. It turns out that the mother is pretty confrontational and once chewed out one of our adjacent neighbors for mowing his yard at 9:00 in the morning. This is actually an instance where I wish we actually did live in a covenant controlled neighborhood.
My wife has talked to the local zoning enforcement and they indicated that the half-pipe is more than likely a set-back violation as well as a non-compliant use.
I realize that this all relatively petty stuff, but I just had to vent to someone. Do we turn them into the zoning department, or just suck it up? [rant off]

 

[Garrett Lundy]

Turn it into zoning. Let your government do your confrontational work for you. Then call the cops and say there are underage kids drinking there (oh man, they left just before you got here!).

Eventually the entire town will know that the skatepark is nothing but trouble and when it "mysteriously" burns to the ground, not too many man-hours will be spent on the investigation.

 

[Kevin O]

If only you could convince them to take it down and rebuild it in my backyard, we would both be happy! If that doesn't work you can try to sabotage the relationship with the new boyfriend in hopes that he will destroy the half pipe in a fit of rage

 

[John Alvarez]

I would definetly turn it in and let the athorities handle it. You can remain unknown and when they get busted say "man who would do some shit like that".
I can tell you from experience when I skated on a team we never got tired of it. We went to a friends house daily and skated that ramp and made changes for about 8 years.

 

[MarcoBiscotti]

Call them up and speak to the mother, they should have been more considerate when making this decision. Explain to her that it's loud and disruptive and aesthetically unpleasing to look at from your window and ask if it could be moved elsewhere. I don't see why she'd give you a problem about it.


I sort of have the opposite situation as all of you...


I just moved into a new condo recently, and have the nicest neighbors in the world! Too nice! I haven't officially moved in yet, though it'll be any week now... but I'm hoping that they won't be as "involved" or "neighborly" once te novelty of the new place wears off because I'm quite a private person and while I am fairly social and a nice guy... I don't want them knocking on my door every other day to say good morning or ask me in for a cup of coffee. I hope I'm not sounding like an asshole, but the first couple of weeks during renovation when I had workers in my place every day, they'd sort of been taking it to extremes by stopping by every 15 minutes to check in and having long conversations in the hallway. I appreciate it to a degree... better than mean obnoxious neighbors, but I'd rather a smile in the morning, the occassional small talk and leave me alone. Also, they have a fairly large dog who they've explained is not yet accustommed to the new place and barks loudly whenever I'm entering or leaving my unit. Our condo doors our directly opposite one another and I guess this dog senses whenever I'm passing by and decides to bark. That's fine, but it better not be a permanent issue because I have a himalayan cat as well who I imagine will take the move extremely difficultly, she's not very good at all with adapting to new situations and is extremely scared around strangers... I don't want this dog barking all the time and scaring her half to death! Luckily, we have very thick concrete walls between our units and I don't really think the sounds pass through much if at all while inside with the door shut, but it's still disturbing. Last week, they even let the dog run straight into my unit while my door was open without asking if I minded. The place was an absolute wreck anyways, it needs to be repainted because of all the workers and people were doing installations, so I didn't mind at all... I love animals btw - BUT - I will mind very much if that happens again once my place is finnished and fully renovated! I don't want their huge dog tearing accross my African oak floors and rubbing up against my freshly painted cream-colored walls, scaring my cat and leaving hair everywhere. I just hope they recognize their boundaries and don't turn out to be annoying because they're actually extremely nice and funny people and I do enjoy their company... but as neighbors, not best friends!

 

[DaveF]

Hopefully you can explain your concerns to her in a way that she will empathize with, since she also is upset by intrusive noises.

 

[Joe Szott]

I'm going to take the opposite tack of the others here and say to talk to the neighbors first and not the authorities.

Why?

Well, it is a skateboard for a couple of teenage boys, so how much longer are they going to use it? 3 years, 4 years? Not all that big a deal compared to how long you might need to be a neighbor to this family.

I think I would rather go tell them how loud and disruptive it is to your family dinners and relaxation. Maybe ask that they don't use it on weeknights from 6-8pm (or whenever you eat.) They might be cool with that and then problem solved.

And if they are dicks about it, you can always choose to mow your grass and run your chainsaw every weekend day at 7 am

 

[John Alvarez]

We used my friends from 15-23 years old. If it had been in my yard it would have been longer.
The risk if you talk to her first is you look like a dick especially if the authorities get called later.

 

[MarkMel]

If it was me, I would point out to them that it doesn't look very nice from your side of the fence. Offer to help them sound proof it and then paint it. You know how, you're a home theater forum member. I bet that thing resonates like crazy. Find something cheap to dampen the panels, I bet heavy cheap carpet would work, or rubber mats.

See how it sounds after that and suggest the best time that they should use it. If that doesn't work, talk to the town.

Or if that doesn't work, at night chisel through all but the last layer of plywood underneath in a bunch of places. A wheel will eventually break through.

This coming from Mr. Encroaching neighbor.

Who can't wait to build one once his 5 week old son is old enough. Or earlier if his 5 yo daughter wants him to build one. I think I'll build a non-dampened, graffiti covered one in the spot my nice neighbor cleared out for me on my property.

 

[Colton]

MarkMel -

You're encroaching on this thread. Naughty boy! Didn't you see the pins?

- Colton

 

[DustinLC]

If you don't want your neighbor to hate you, just live with it.

I don't see how you can approach them and not get them upset from the sound of it. From their perspective, it's their backyard and there business. Some kids play basketball and other skate. That'll be how they see it.

If you go to the authority, they'll know it's you .

So, if you're not the confrontational type, leave it. If you can sleep at night knowing there's a chance that these teenage boys will trash your yards or poison your plants, or that your neighbor think of you as the scrooge, I say confront them. If that doesn't work, go to the city.

 

[Alf S]

How about some pix of this monstrosity?

 

[D. Scott MacDonald]

I recently built some skateboard ramps for my 6 year old son, although they are fairly small and in my garage. Nobody can see nor hear them.

I would recommend taking a more neighborly approach if at all possible. Offer to help, to buy paint, whatever. From what you say, there's a good chance that this won't work. On the other hand, how are a bunch of skateboarding teenagers and their friends going to react to having to tear down their skateboard ramp all because of you? (And you kidding yourself if you think they won't guess.)

 

[Micah Cohen]

GODDARN IT MEN! How come people are like this? How come the people who are this inconsiderate NEVER READ FORUMS LIKE THIS and SEE THEMSELVES and think, "Gee whiz, I guess this could be annoying and I wasn't really thinking about my neighbors and their formerly quiet dinner times... I guess I was being pretty selfish and inconsiderate! I'll make sure not to use this loud thing during dinner time."

There seems to be a certain kind of human who just doesn't think twice about the stuff they do!

NEIGHBORS, man! Loud noises! Annoying! And the silly thing is, if YOU built the skateboard thing and used it during THEIR dinner time, chances are they'd freaking call the cops on you or poison your azaleas anyway!

You can't win!

Neighbors three houses down play their pop radio station in their back yard, right into the alley behind our house, at top volume every day from about 4 to 6. Dinner time! WHAT THE HELL?!

These are the same folks who leave their three dogs out 24/7, barking in the wee hours, and they are militant about it, so, what do you do?! (If you get dogs for friendly companionship, why leave them outside?!)

I go out of my way to be considerate and nice and thoughtful. We're all living on top of one another here in the inner city. And still, I get this nonsense.

WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?! What are they thinking?!

Call the cops. Complain. Any noise they produce that annoys you is POLUTION. It needs to be cleaned up.



This burns me up.

MC

 

[Joe Szott]

Hey Micah, how many watts is the subwoofer amp in your HT setup? Yeah, mine is about 900 too

We all have our little inconsiderate quirks, best to tackle the ones that are truly annoying and tolerate the rest. Like my neighbors tolerate my SVS rattling our entire house (and likely theirs a bit) on the odd Fri/Sat night...

 

[Micah Cohen]

Ah, I see where you're going. I soundproofed. (And then I went next door to my GOOD NEIGHBORS and tested it out from their basement! No problem.)

I have been tempted, quite tempted, to turn the full force of my sound system -- I WORKED FOR A SPEAKER MAKER! -- against their pop station playing some crappy dance music. I'd blast BLACK SABBATH out the back of my house and shred the siding off of their house.

But no. I quietly suffer. Hoping someday something bad will happen to them and I will be blessed with hearing about it.

Or, that we will soon colonize the moon and all these inconsiderate sheep-like arseholes will clamber to be living on the moon, leaving the quiet earth all to me.

Ah, patience. I'm like Gandhi.

MC

 

[DustinLC]

Micah,

Can you teach me to express myself the way you do. Reading it makes me feel better. Imagine if I were saying it .

Wow! Powerful stuffs .

 

[Micah Cohen]

I'm really in touch with my inner demons. (Oooo, I'm touching one now. Feels good. )

MC

 

[Philip_T]

Did I mention that I'm also trying to quit smoking at the same time??? There have been some evenings, especially when they have the full crew over there, and the ghetto blaster going full blast (damn I sound old) that I have to show some good old fashioned Sheffield style restraint.


Funny, I've been thinking of throwing my old Cerwin's out on my back deck and whenever they start up, I would flip a switch and blast some Lawrence Welk, or something equally offensive to teenage boys. Problem is, I like most of my other neighbors too much to do this, except for the guy next door who painted his house pink

I think I'll just see what happens for now. If it gets any worse, I may try to rally the good neighbors and see if we can all make scheduled visit to convey our point. Either way, reading your guys posts has been therapeutic at least and made me laugh about the whole thing,,,,at least until the rain stops and they start at it again....

 

[John Alvarez]

Just fill them with your favorite cooking oils...