I never said that. I don’t know if you really can’t see what I’m saying through your blinders, or if you’re trying to provoke a specific response.
Try reading the words I wrote and not the ones in your head.
and…so?
And so… read it in context to the message I was responding to, which wasn’t yours.
Yes. In this neighborhood. There are generally no cars parked on the street. We’re not on the way to anywhere, except more houses.
Yes. How about if someone knocked on you door and asked what you were doing? That would be- none of their fucking business. (absent some obvious illegal act)
Car is parked on a public street- what are they doing? Same answer.
There is if you call 911, and if you don’t, they won’t get there in time to ask questions.
Do you want the police to collect that info on you when you are out and about on a public street?
What if they were a friend of one of your neighbors living a block or two away, and as they were leaving your neighborhood their engine light went on and so they called someone to help. You think someone wanting to break in is more common than engine trouble?
Someone else mentioned picking up someone who is dawdling at a party. My son did this to me a lot. I’d come to the neighborhood of his friend and park across the street from the house, text him that I was there and would wind up sitting there ten minutes waiting for him to come out, If anyone had given me attitude about being parked there I’d tell them to fuck off. The default reason for being on a public road is not “being up to no good”.
Back when I was a teen, I was dating someone who’s house had an alley with no easy way to park in it and on a busy street with no parking. I always ended up parking on the side street in front of the same person’s house and from time to time she’d come running out screaming at me*. And every time I’d yell back at her that I’m allowed to park there and that she was more than welcome to call the police on me if she’d like. Being a snotty teenager, I started honking my horn when I’d get there (just a few quick taps) to make sure she knew I was there, parked right in front of her house.
*It should be noted that she was one of those people that believed that her property extended all the way out into the road and that by parking there I was trespassing. So the situation is a bit different.
In a suburban neighborhood, the first three instances would most likely result in the car being in a driveway.
Being lost is becoming considerably more rare in the era of GPS.
But there are plenty of valid reasons for being parked on a residential street for a long time. For instance:
- you spilled extremely hot takeout coffee in your lap and need to self-administer first aid and call an attorney pronto
- you gave a ride to a person recently vaccinated against Covid-19, and have to get the car aired out to eliminate the spike proteins they shed all over the upholstery
- someone threw illicit drugs into your car through an open window and you must conceal them before the cops pull you over
- you’re having a panic attack and need to take your drugs
- an alt-right website has informed you that a Democratic pedophile sex ring may be operating in that seemingly normal-looking house, and you must park in front to monitor it for suspicious activity
There are a kazillion innocent reasons to sit in a parked car in front of someone’s house for extended periods no matter what the time of day, and people living in that house should just chill out.
Not in my suburban neighborhood. For some strange (to me) reason, people use their garage for storage, and the driveway for parking. There’s an average of 3 cars per driveway–one for each adult, and one or more for the teens/young adults. No room for the delivery driver/repairman.
There are a LOT of reasons why someone might park on a street and sit using a phone or tablet in a completely legal way. For example:
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you had a fight with your SO and walked out to cool off. So you drive some place quiet and sit.
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Your kid is at a friend’s and you are there to pick them up and they are late.
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You get an emergency call from work you have to deal with, so you pull into the nearest residential area, park, and have your meeting.
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One podcaster I listen to often has a lot of loud stuff going on in his house, so he gets in his car, parks somewhere and does his teleconference from there. Some workers might be doing this regularly if they live in a crazy loud house or apartment and have work meetings. This also selects for quiet residential neighborhoods rather than busy parking lots.
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You arrive at someone’s house early, so rather than inconvenience them you sit in your car and use your phone for a while.
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You are married but having an affair. You tell your wife you are going out for something, but just drive somewhere to call your girlfriend without your wife knowing.
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Someone important calls while you are driving, and being a responsible person you get off the road and park so you can talk with them.
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You dropped off your SO for a visit with someone and you didn’t want to be there, so you just drive arohnd the block, find a place to park, and surf the web.
I did this one a lot a few years ago. My wife met friends at a ‘girl’s group’ at a restaurant across the city every once in a while. It was a $40 cab ride, so I drove her instead. They would drink, so she didn’t want to drive. So, I would drive her there and drop her off, then drive a block or so to a residential area and park and surf the web on my iPad for an hour or two until she called me, then drive back and collect her.
I’ll bet I could easily come up with a dozen more possible reasons, and maybe still miss the specifc reason this person did it. I certainly wouldn’t hassle them or call the cops on them unless I had positive evidence they were up to no good.
Yup. Here’s another one that’s very common on my residential street near a large healthcare institution that doesn’t have much on-site parking:
- You routinely leave your car parked on a residential street near your workplace, where the residents mostly park in their own off-street parking areas. Sometimes you have a lunch break or other extended break in your workday and you need a little privacy for making a phone call or taking your medications or doing your affirmations or whatever, so you simply walk back to your parked car and sit in it until you have to go back to work.
There are non-residents parked all up and down my street every single day. Yes, if I saw one of them doing something really suspicious-looking I would be wary, but just sitting in your parked car minding your own business is not automatically suspicious.
I won’t call the cops on someone I haven’t seen commit a crime. I don’t want innocent blood on my hands.
My takeaway is that it varies a lot by location. In my suburban neighborhood, I’ve never seen anyone just sit in a car for longer than it takes to realize that they don’t have a cell signal and that gps map won’t download.
A lot of the scenarios posted are things that could happen here. A husband dropping off his wife at a party and chilling. Someone picking up a kid. I guess none of the ones involving a surfing the web, zoom calls, etc. Would happen due to the cell-signal desert. But it’s rare enough that i might wonder if i noticed sometime doing it.
When there was an unmarked truck parked outside the neighbors, i called them to see if it was legit or robbers. (It was a delivery, but robbers in unmarked delivery-type vehicles are somewhat common here.) Robbers tend to come with a truck, not just a passenger vehicle in my town.
A friend worried about the parked cars near her house that were next to nothing, until she learned that the “nothing” (undeveloped land with high grasses, etc ) was a popular meeting area for gay men seeking anonymous sex. Then she stopped worrying. 
But anything that’s really out of the ordinary is potentially suspicious.
Yet, you fail to show what is really wrong. You describe paranoia about what could possibly be wrong.
I’ve had this scenario come up multiple times while driving. I have always been able to quickly find a gas station or business parking lot in which to stop and handle the call, or more often to do a callback. It typically takes under a minute to conclude whatever “emergency” business has come up (this includes medical situations encountered when on call). I’ve never been compelled to pull into a residential neighborhood and stop for a lengthy period in front of someone’s house. Nor has anyone ever called the cops to have me checked out.
Yeah, sorry but no.
The thing about most American suburban neighborhoods is that they are generally designed such that you shouldn’t be driving through them unless you have a purpose for being there. A stranger parked in his car on your street for 45 minutes is generally “suspicious”. At the very least, they might need assistance.
Yesterday someone came up to my car and asked if I needed assistance.
I had exited work, got in my car started it and sat there an hour on my phone taking care of emails and calls, time flew by. A knock on my window made me jump and there was Karen asking if I was okay. Lol!
She noticed the car idling for an hour and got concerned so she came out to check.
“Shouldn’t”? Unless we’re talking about a literal gated community here, a public street is still a public street.
Some suburban and exurban developments are indeed literally designed with roads that don’t go anywhere except within the development itself, plus the one access road, so you can’t go anywhere from within them except back where you came from. But other suburban neighborhoods are laid out normally with through streets and all.
You can be suspicious of anyone for anything if that’s how you roll, but a stranger sitting in a parked car on a suburban street for 45 minutes while not doing anything illegal is not automatically a valid object of suspicion by reasonable-person standards.
I guess it’s an urban/suburban thing. I’ve lived my whole life in US cities of 100,000+, and the ethic is very much that the street parking in front of your house is not part of your property, and unless you witness an actual crime, what people do in their cars while parked there is none of your business.
I live in a residential neighborhood, and I would think nothing of this if I saw it, because I would think the overwhelmingly likeliest explanation is that one of the other 200 or so people living on my block needed some space from their housemates. I can see how the equation would be different in a very sparsely populated area.
I would reword this as “some American neighborhoods” and “wouldn’t normally be driving through them”. My three siblings have houses in places where you would only drive past their house if you were:
- visiting one of their neighbor’s homes
- lost
- randomly driving around
None of these things are illegal, but doing one of them and then parking for 45 minutes outside a random person’s house, is at best unusual.