And it’s not a fly-in community.
In a nutshell: The guy lost his medical (at least temporarily), he’s going through a divorce, and he can’t afford to park his plane at the airport. So he parked it in his driveway. Neighbours complained, and the town is fining him.
Oh, please. It’s OK to park a boat or an RV in your driveway, but an airplane is an ‘eyesore’? :rolleyes: I think it would be great if someone parked a plane in my neighbourhood!
He should get a big ugly day glo orange and green van, paint “free candy” on the side of it, and park it there instead.
How did he get it there?
If he took the wings and prop off would it be okay then? (Of course, at that point it might just fit in his garage).
Is there actually a law that says he can’t keep it in his driveway (not counting any HOA rules that might be the actual problem)?
If nothing else, it would fall under the “Attractive Nuisance” rule (Tort, not (usually) a crime).
It is going to attract kids and possible injure one.
I would think that, after a while, the question of airworthiness would come into play.
I saw two circa 1948 'Cub-like" planes in garages in the middle of the Mojave desert.
I wouldn’t get in one with intent of flight.
The $150/mo he can’t scrape up for tie down or hangar is nothing compared to the insurance and the costs of keeping it in annual. It’s just going to rot in his driveway.
The intelligent thing to do would be to sell it while it is still airworthy (if it is in annual) and buy a LSA.
He’s probably not going to get his medical back if he is to the point of scrimping on tie-down, and LSA’s do not require medicals. And frankly, they are better planes than the C152.
It’s a sad point when he still clings to his plane despite not being able to fly it (gas alone will run $30+ an hour).
It’s his business, and the neighbours are whining little sods.
Which seems standard.
HIGHLY debatable - I’ve flown the small Cessnas and several varieties of LSA. Some are good, some are not.
And if the guy is going through a divorce and financially strapped maybe he shouldn’t fly until all that gets sorted out, being distracted isn’t a good combo with aviation.
“He’s doing something different from what we do, sic 'im!!!”
Two things -
Should he have his plane in his suburban driveway? Gawd no - stupid, counter-productive false economy.
Should the neighbors be upset? To a large extent, yes - it looks ridiculous, out of proportion, and is certain to be a kid magnet.
Other motives? You Betcha! More than a few are upset by “different” and “more money than we have, we wanted a plane too, but got kids instead”.
All said - it shouldn’t be there, and the motives of the crowd are suspect.
I don’t know if this town has one, but ordinances saying that driveways can only be used for storing registered motor vehicles are reasonably common.
Like a boat?
As he said, if he loses his case everyone is going to have to move their boats out of their driveways too.
I assume it’s what tort means, but IIRC, Attractive Nuisance would only come up if someone actually got hurt on it, right? He did say it has an “alarm with a PA” on it to keep people from playing with it.
My suggestion is still to take the prop and wings off of it. That would make it a lot less dangerous and less “attractive” to passers-by. I hope he at least took the sparkplugs out so if someone tries to spin the prop by hand, just for fun, it doesn’t go around on it’s own. (Not that it’s going to spin up, but if you push an engine cylinder into compression and can spin a bit when it gets past that stroke, that’s why you should always take the plug out of your lawnmower when you’re removing the blade). Or maybe find a way to lock it in place.
Again, though, how’d he get it there? He didn’t fly it to his house. I doubt he taxied it down the streets. The only thing I can think of is that he got someone to put it on a flatbed and delivered it.
All I know is if I pulled in my driveway and saw my neighbor had a plane in his, I would think it would be cool as fuck. I’m not sure how cool fuck is, but its up (down) there.
Restrictions on where you can park boats (or even any type of trailer) are reasonably common too. Not necessarily the norm but not some weird unique thing either.
The plane is a vehicle.
It has a motor.
And it is registered.
Plus, it’s cool!
Me, I want a neighbor like that.
You’d think old Wilford Brimley could afford to keep his plane at the airfield.
How much did he pay to have it delivered?
I’ve never seen a plane on the road with wings attached. That is simply insane - a chunk of gravel (or crushed rock) could make a mess of it.
The common practice is to remove the wings and load the fuse and wings on a long flatbed.
If they had enough sense to do that, why did they put the damned wings back on?
This story is just so wrong on so many levels.
Every summer, my street fills up with RV trailers of the sort that might as well be hotel rooms. The street looks like an RV park.
I’d welcome a plane parked in a driveway. It would change things up a little.
Taking just the prop off should be enough, that and pulling the spark plugs. You wouldn’t be able to start it after that, and that’s the big danger.
Actually, under some circumstances pulling the prop CAN start the airplane/“spin it up”. That is, after all, what hand-propping a plane entails. There are safety features that are supposed to prevent that but if it’s out in the open in a suburban area it’s better to err on the side of caution.
There are “prop locks” but the ones I’ve seen could be defeated by a bolt-cutter.
I’ve seen it - but then, I got my start on turf fields with guys who weren’t afraid of an off-field landing. It would not be the preferred method, but who knows?
Frankly, I’d worry less about gravel and more about things alongside the road like mailboxes, trees, shrubs… airplane wings are typically wider than your typical 2-lane road, roadside obstacles are an issue if taxiing one on streets.
This is what it actually looks like. It’s smaller than an SUV. Though a bit wider.