Council enforcement action against me!!

[bobg]

Because a shrub in my front garden hangs over my front wall by about 12"
I received a letter yesterday requesting me to get it trimmed within 7 days. Do they really have staff wandering the streets in this weather taking pictures of plants that infringe bylaws!!! Good use of available resources or what. Last week I e mailed them suggesting that a bus stop they'd sited about 2 car lengths from the brow of a hill just behind a pedestrian crossing point on a narrow busy road was possibly unwise, smacks of revenge to me..........

 

[summerdays]

Might not be them but a complaint from a pedestrian? I know there is a couple of hedges I always got really annoyed about but didn't do anything about - but they projected over the path by a considerable amount - making it so that it is single file. Would your email have contained enough information to know your address?

Or would any of your neighbours have a wee grudge about you?

I hope they don't come looking at my wall - there are several plants that go over it though not by much.

I guess you will have to do it - rather than presumably the alternative is some large bill by the council?

 

[Crankarm]

If you ignore the notice the council send two blokes around with a flat bed transit and tools. They then muller the offending piece of vegetation which will take several years to grow back to anything that is respectable. In the meantime you are seething and reminded everyday when you look out your window that you should have cut it yourself!

I would take a pic, cut it, and take another pic pronto.

 

[upsidedown]

How annoying's that ? I've complained i don't know how many times about cars parked on the pavement, completely blocking it so that kids and people with pushchairs have to go in the road. Sod all response, makes you wonder.

 

[summerdays]

How annoying's that ? I've complained i don't know how many times about cars parked on the pavement, completely blocking it so that kids and people with pushchairs have to go in the road. Sod all response, makes you wonder.

I must admit that is much more annoying, common - and correct in how much notice is taken about it.

 

[Crankarm]

No telling what a 4 year old in strop with a stick can do when they are out of sight or learning to ride their new bike. They have no real concept of brakes .

 

[bobg]

Could have been a pedestrian complaint I suppose especially as the neighbours seem to especially like the bit of pavement outside my house to park their bloody great 4x4's. I've just been out and looked at the shrub more closely and most of the minimal overhang is well over 6 feet above the pavement so whoever it is, if he's that big I think I'll do what he wants.
What sticks in my craw are the damned great tree roots causing paving slab hillocks all down the road, no mention of doing that I see. God, I'm getting such an old misery!!! Mind you a couple of people fell over on the ice this morning, that cheered me up

 

[Davidc]

Had the same a few years ago when I lived in Hove. I found out it was a complaint from a pedestrian that caused it. It was a pyracantha - a plant which fights back and eats intruders, the plant kingdom equivalent of a ferocious rotweiller - which had strayed a few inches over the front wall.

Crankarm's right - it's much better to cut your plant back yourself than let the council near it. He also missed out that they will send you a bill for butchering it.

 

[marinyork]

Hedge wars are quite common in some places.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Not the best time of year, or weather, for pruning. But you'll have to do it or pay mega cash for the cr&p council job.

Somewhile ago (up in the Lakes) I saw a council notice by a tree on private land declaring that it was unsafe and should be cut down by the owner (who they couldn't trace) or else. Not sure how "or else" was to be enforced other than by the council cutting it down as any bill wouldn't have had a delivery point.

 

[Stig-OT-Dump]

Hedge wars are quite common in some places.

These types of war are very expensive - many participants have to set up a hedge fund in order to finance it. Hedge fund managers are held in high regard, earn millions, and because they are armed to the teeth with dangerous plants like privet, beech and leylandii, customs and excise don't even charge them any taxes.
(it's a jungle out there!)

 

[ChrisKH]

Just cut it back. I've had this a couple of times, being the only house in our street with trees and green things growing in our garden.

Don't even joke about hedge wars. Am currently suing neighbour over 100 foot retaining wall which he built and is now collapsing into my garden. Current replacement value £20-£30k and he won't answer calls, accept liability, etc.

 

[Davidc]

Just cut it back. I've had this a couple of times, being the only house in our street with trees and green things growing in our garden.

Don't even joke about hedge wars. Am currently suing neighbour over 100 foot retaining wall which he built and is now collapsing into my garden. Current replacement value £20-£30k and he won't answer calls, accept liability, etc.

Nasty. It ends up with a court order, bailiffs, and a huge bill for the court loser.

 

[marinyork]

Don't even joke about hedge wars. Am currently suing neighbour over 100 foot retaining wall which he built and is now collapsing into my garden. Current replacement value £20-£30k and he won't answer calls, accept liability, etc.

I'm not joking, I'm just saying - I've seen some of the complaints for places half a mile or a mile down the road, I'm glad they aren't my neighbours.

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Last week I e mailed them suggesting that a bus stop they'd sited about 2 car lengths from the brow of a hill just behind a pedestrian crossing point on a narrow busy road was possibly unwise, smacks of revenge to me..........

Wouldn't be that because that'd mean two different council departments talking to each other - it's never gonna happen!