OK, I know for many, those two words say it all, but really, our HOA is generally not bad.
Except when they need to do things to the street we live on. Twice within 12 months.
See, this requires that EVERY SINGLE RESIDENT of 20+ houses move their cars for 36 hours. Only… there is quite literally no overflow parking anywhere near us. The main road allows no parking. The two streets on either side of ours have maybe 10 visitors’ spaces total. And chances are they’re getting paved at the same time anyway.
The HOA recognizes this - so they say “park in the community center”. Only… that’s over a mile away.
So they run a shuttle bus… for 2 hours in the morning and 2 in the afternoon.
So if you work late, too fucking bad. If you need to go to work early, too fucking bad. You didn’t need that job anyway, did you? If you need to take a kid to the doctor in the middle of the day, too fucking bad. If you want to, you can always walk to get your car, right? Oh wait, it’s rainy / the path is too rough to walk / you’re physically unable to walk? Too fucking bad. If you’ve got kids in car seats who can’t safely ride the shuttle bus? too fucking bad. Want to park your car in the community center the night before so you don’t have to be out the door at 6 AM to move your car? Too fucking bad.
I seriously wonder if this is legal - basically they’re denying us access to our own homes, or trapping us there.
We do have garages and driveways. But if we can’t leave the driveway, it doesn’t do us much good.
Other parts of the community are townhouse developments with no driveways. Same problem there (though all of those are a much smaller distance to alternatives).
Car in driveway. Need to go, say, to work. Road itself cannot be driven on because of paving equipment. Might as well not have car in driveway at all.
If we park the car elsewhere as directed, we can use the car, but that entails getting to where it’s parked - i.e. a mile or more away. And, while a mile isn’t that big a distance, the route there involves some uneven sidewalks and hills, and you wind up covered in sweat and/or mud - suboptimal if you’re going to work. If you’ve got a small child with you, that just adds to the “fun”. And forget about groceries or other items you might wish to transport in that car.
They could only work a block or two at a time, so that the distance to parking was less.
They could work on only one side of the street, allowing traffic on the other side.
I’m sure there are other options.
Of course, it’s going to be more expensive to do it that way.
I know that my town has been working on road repairs in various neighborhoods for the last several years. I guarantee you that residents have not been required to park a mile away from their homes. You would have heard the screaming.
I’d probably rent/borrow a Jeep and ignore their “under construction” rules.
Better access to the shuttle, for one thing. We live in an area where people work very long hours, often with irregular schedules. Working with surrounding neighborhoods to try to let people help each other out. Not scheduling multiple streets in the same section, to reduce competition for visitor spaces.
John Mace, that kind of outlook reminds me of one time when my husband was trying to put the best light on something I was stressing over. I snarled “what happy chirpy little bluebird flew up YOUR ass and died?”. But yeah, it’s good exercise, though not so good when you’re dealing with a whiny toddler or infant as several neighbors have to do, or when your co-workers have to deal with you smelling like you just came in from the gym.
Yea, if they never pave the road, its not going to be much good for driving on eventually anyways. I don’t live in an area with a HOA, but they still have to close the streets for repairs every once and a while. The only difference is that there’s no shuttle set up for us.
Closing the roads for 36 hours really doesn’t seem that major of a hardship. If your really disabled or something, I’m sure you can talk someone into giving you a ride.
I get the gripe, though I agree it’d be way worse if it was for an extended period of time. It’s only a day and a half?
But if it WERE longer, I’d encourage everyone to still park on their driveways… Then just drive down the front lawns to the end of the street. Then figure a way, through the HOA bylaws, to have the HOA pay for any landscape repairs they squawk about.
I originally read this as you had to move your car once every 36 hours and I could see that being a pain. But moving your car for one 36 hour period? Suck it up buttercup. We recently had a snow emergency here that lasted 4 days, with half our on-street parking unavailable. You deal with it.
Yes, they could run the shuttle for much longer but then you’re paying a lot of money for a few people. Maybe it’s worth it, maybe not. But aside from that what else makes sense for a brief inconvenience?
Wow, really? Y’all think this is fine and dandy? For the HOA to lock everyone’s cars out of the neighborhood, for their own convenience, and without providing adequate alternatives? Interesting.
Like I said, I can’t imagine the fits that would be thrown here if someone was required to leave their car a mile away due to street repairs. It simply would never happen.
Weather events are different - that’s not someone saying “fuck you, we’ll do whatever we want, suck it up”. (OK, maybe Mother Nature, but she’s a real bitch and does get to do whatever she wants.)
ETA: And I guarantee that numerous folks would either ignore the construction signs or drive through yards or something. (hey zweisamkeit, I thought that but didn’t want to post it :p).
At least they fucking told you. Where I live is surrounded by another complex. That place was getting paved, mine wasn’t. They put notices on all those people’s garages, didn’t tell us at all. It’s not convenient to not drive through the other place. I “could’ve” read the notices, but I’m not wont to walk up others’ driveways to read a 8.5x11". Got towed out the the main road, luckily I spotted it before freaking out too much.
They could apply to the City/County for a temporary allowance to park on the main road, for one thing. It’s usually not that hard to get a short-term allowance.
Another option would be more shuttle service, or negotiate a deal with local cab company for reduced fares.
That’s what our condo building would do if it needed to clean or repair the parking garage. They’d give us a letter saying “put this in the window of your car and the police won’t give you a ticket for parking on XYZ Street next Tuesday”.
Of course, both times we had to move our car we ended up getting a parking ticket, but we were able to get them cancelled later.
This is typically how it’s done outside of HOA-world. I can’t imagine the blowback if they decided to shut down my street completely for 36 hours and their solution was off-street parking a mile away.
For 36 hours so they could repair the street, with shuttle service and alternative parking available, to avoid longer delays and more expensive repairs? Sure. It’s not ideal but it may make the most sense. We don’t have enough details to know for sure but it’s not outrageous based on what we do know.
But yeah, it’s good exercise, though not so good when you’re dealing with a whiny toddler or infant as several neighbors have to do, or when your co-workers have to deal with you smelling like you just came in from the gym.