Unable to use allocated parking space

[henrygregory]

Hi there, I am looking for some advice on what my options are...

This has been an ongoing matter for well over 6 months.
I am a housing association tenant paying full rent for my two bed property with one allocated parking space. The housing development is poorly designed with inadequate parking facilities and as a consequence, I have been finding that almost every time I go out in my car, when I return, my space is taken as are all of the visitor bays in our street, leaving me unable to park my vehicle in the space I am paying for. I have no option but to park a five minute walk away and walk to my house, sometimes with heavy shopping. I have scheuermann's disease in my spine and find it very difficult to walk long distances at times.

I have contacted my landlord; the housing association no-less than four times about this issue, and I don't seem to be getting anywhere. In my last correspondence, I suggested we should re-negotiate the monthly rental charge I am paying as I no longer felt it was good value for money as I was simply unable to use the space I was paying as part of my rent for. My suggestions were ignored.

I have been told that all residents were sent a letter and the housing association contacted every resident to ascertain what their registration numbers were so they could get to the bottom of who is parking where. I have heard nothing, and the situation does not appear to have improved.

I am really fed up with it, both for myself but also for visitors, who seldom come as there is never anywhere to park.

Can anyone give me advice on what my next steps should be? I really feel like telling them I will be canceling the direct debit for the rent until I have a whole month where I am able to park in my space, but I am not sure if this is the best option legally.

[Kati]

ostell R0b jaguarsuk ??

[jaguarsuk]

Do not cancel the rent payment, you would leave yourself open to eviction.

I live in a development where when our houses were built there was inadequate parking, the management company have since installed parking restrictions and as we don't have a car (I live 10 mins walk from the town and station) our neighbours took it upon themselves just allow their visitors to park in our space at their leisure meaning our visitors had to do similar to you.

I now have in place a traffic cone, with a laminated notice saying:

NO PARKING
Allocated parking space of <<My ADDRESS>>.


It's not a legal solution, but since I have deployed it only our visitors or those neighbours whom are polite enough to ask our permission have ever parked in our space.

[henrygregory]

Do not cancel the rent payment, you would leave yourself open to eviction.

I live in a development where when our houses were built there was inadequate parking, the management company have since installed parking restrictions and as we don't have a car (I live 10 mins walk from the town and station) our neighbours took it upon themselves just allow their visitors to park in our space at their leisure meaning our visitors had to do similar to you.

I now have in place a traffic cone, with a laminated notice saying:

NO PARKING
Allocated parking space of <<My ADDRESS>>.


It's not a legal solution, but since I have deployed it only our visitors or those neighbours whom are polite enough to ask our permission have ever parked in our space.

Thanks very much for your helpful reply. That is a good idea.
I had suggested to the housing association on several occasions that it would be sensible to print in paint, the plot numbers on each space. Thus a burglar will not know if you are out (if house numbers were painted), but any tenant, can look at their tenancy documents and very quickly identify which parking space goes with their plot. It would also mean that visitors could quickly differentiate between a private parking space and visitor ones.

Sadly, the housing association don't appear to have gone with my suggestion.

[jaguarsuk]

Thanks very much for your helpful reply. That is a good idea.
I had suggested to the housing association on several occasions that it would be sensible to print in paint, the plot numbers on each space. Thus a burglar will not know if you are out (if house numbers were painted), but any tenant, can look at their tenancy documents and very quickly identify which parking space goes with their plot. It would also mean that visitors could quickly differentiate between a private parking space and visitor ones.

Sadly, the housing association don't appear to have gone with my suggestion.

We have numbered bays to correspond with the number on issued passes, but the visitor bays are marked with a "V" and so it's clear where people should be parking. Our bay is 90 and house door 82, we'd occasionally get visitors to number 90 move the cone by mistake and I obviously just educated them on return to their car. They were always apologetic when it was a mistake, but I just decided to add the notice to stop it.

[R0b]

Afternoon,

Even if the housing association painted numbers on the parking spaces that does not guarantee that someone wouldn't park there - might help somewhat but not 100% effective. I agree that a notice of some sort might be a deterrent and therefore allow you to use your space and in all honesty, I am not sure the council has any specific obligation to you in terms of other people taking up your space. Assuming the rental agreement just states that they allocate you a parking space and providing they have done that then that would be as far as their obligations go - but without seeing the tenancy agreement its difficult to know where they are accountable.

From a legal perspective, you could enforce your parking rights by bringing claims against those who park in your allocated space. You would need to put up a sign that is clear and legible stating that no unauthorised parking and setting out a charge if in breach i.e. £50. The difficulty you've got is that you would need to find out who the driver was and if there are multiple drivers that might prove difficult.

You could in theory hold the registered keeper liable for any driver actions but you would then need to comply with the relevant parking laws, which is set out in Schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012. I'm sure a few court claims against the registered keepers would soon stop them parking there. The downside to that is you won't be everyone's favourite neighbour but probably an easy money maker if you ask me. This is of course the other end of the scale and perhaps it may be the only option if the council are not willing to do anything.

[Chetan]

I live with vivid housing assoction tenent we have about 20 parking spaces I get back in the evening and there is no parking for me I have secured tenancy with vivid pay full rent the problem occurs the people who reside with vivid they tell the families and friends to park there and they stay for 3 days etc so there is no parking for perment residents I have to park 20 minutes away this is
Wrong what can be done to stop these. Tks

[PallasAthena]

Chetan please start your own thread. If you post on a thread that has been unused for over 5 years and isn't even about the same landlord you are unlikely to get many helpful responses. When you repost on your own thread please tell us whether you have com;aind to the HA and what they have said to you.