I live directly across the street from an elementary school. Since the school has limited space in their parking lot, it’s the norm for parents to park on the street while they’re dropping off and picking up their kids. Once a week when garbage collection day comes around everyone in the neighborhood leaves their garbage cans on the street for collection, and they take up space that could be used for parking on other days.
Now, when I’m working from home I try to bring the garbage cans in as soon as I notice they’ve been emptied, but sometimes I’m busy, or am stuck in a meeting, or just don’t notice they’ve been emptied right away. And of course if I have to go to the office I can’t bring them in until I get home in the evening.
So on a few occasions I’ve discovered someone had taken it upon themselves to move my garbage cans out of the street so they can park there. It’s always after they’ve been emptied, so it doesn’t interfere with garbage collection in any way, but it still kind bothers me for some reason. I think it’s mostly a visceral reaction of not liking having a random stranger messing with my things. But also the guy who did it yesterday simply pushed the cans up unto the sidewalk, so in creating room for him to park he in turn blocked the sidewalk for anyone who was, say, pushing a stroller.
So, is it reasonable for me to be annoyed by people moving my garbage cans? Or are people perfectly within their rights to move them in order to create more space to park? I don’t really do anything in reaction to people moving them other than quietly seethe to myself.
Not at all, if the cans were moved respectfully to a convenient location for me to retrieve them. In my case, the cans are on the strip between sidewalk and street, so might block a parent from opening the door for their 1st grader to get out. It’s OK to move the can, just be sure it’s upright, near my house, and the lid is still on.
Not in the least. In my neighborhood it’s considered polite to move emptied cans from the street to the (lightly traveled) sidewalk if the people aren’t home. I’ve done it for others, others have done it for me. No worries either way.
This happens to us frequently. We put the can at the end of our driveway the night before pickup and attempt to retrieve it early the next day after the garbage truck has made its run. However if we don’t it pulled back up to the house by 0730 or so a neighbor often moves the can from the street into the driveway so they can park there. As long as they don’t block our access to our own driveway with our own can I have no problem. I am a bit miffed that they park in “our” space, but since it’s street parking its legally everyone’s space so there isn’t much I can do about it. Since I don’t need it, I’ve tried to not let it bother me, without much success.
No problem, sorry for my stuff being in your way and thanks for not stealing it. However, the incident where the sidewalk was blocked with MY container, making ME look like a dick, would be irritating.
Like a lot of questions, my answer to this one is, “it depends.” Specifically on where they move the cans. Where I live, we leave the cans on the parking strip or blocking the end of our own driveway. But sometimes the garbage company leaves them in the street after emptying them. Someone moving them to the parking strip would be fine. Someone moving them to block my driveway or the sidewalk, that would bother me.
This is the thing that bothers me, which I try to let go of. It’s been bothering me more lately because we have relatively new across-the-street neighbors, and I do use one of the spots in front of my house. The new neighbors have been taking both spots in front of my house, while leaving the spots in front of their own house empty. I know it isn’t “my” spot, and they’re allowed to park there, but I do hope they start to do the neighborly thing and at least leave me one of the street spots in front of my house. It’s definitely the habit in my neighborhood to park in front of your own house if possible.
I’ve had this happen exactly once where I live currently. I forgot to take the cans in on Thursday and Friday, and on Saturday I found them in my driveway, situated in a way I couldn’t possibly hit them backing out. I figured a neighbor - no idea which - thought I might have gone on vacation and didn’t want it obvious that I was out of town so they did me a solid. I guess I was grateful but a little mortified I put someone to that trouble.
It wouldn’t bother me - but then again, I’m not supposed to put my cans in the street to begin with, so if they are there, either that’s where sanitation left them (rather than putting them back on the sidewalk) or they got knocked/blown over after being emptied.
Here, that’s exactly where the city wants them for pickup. They used to want them on the sidewalk, now they want them at the curb. The city does not say they must be put away immediately.
Remember, those cans belong to the City. I would not have a problem with someone moving them in order to park, but yeah, leaving them blocking the sidewalk makes you look bad. IDK what the answer is.
Tangential: when you notice someone has not retrieved their cans for a few days after pick-up, do you kindly push them up toward their house or toward their side gate? I do this on my street when it’s clear no one’s home (I do not put them behind the gate) - I suspect burglars look for signs like that. If I did that for the OP, would that bother you?
Hmm, I’m honestly not sure. In reality it’s not a situation that’s likely to happen, because when I go out of town I have someone come over every day to care for my cat, and I ask her to put out and bring in the garbage cans when she’s there.
Someone moving my garbage cans wouldn’t bother me, as long as they didn’t move them into their garage…
What did bother me some years back - we had a cheapskate neighbor who used to dump her trash in our cans so she wouldn’t have to pay for pickup. We left for work really early, so we didn’t even know she was doing it till one day my husband stayed home on trash day. It’s not like she just put one bag in the can, either. She dragged over all manner of packaging from some stuff she’d ordered. And when she came home, all of her garbage was in her driveway.
Funny how she had money for her smokes, but she couldn’t swing the $10/month for trash pickup…
Continuing this tangent, the trash cans in the local park all have placards that read “no household trash”. That always made me wonder if there are people who are so cheap they would haul their trash to the park to avoid paying to have it picked up. I guess there are.
There are people even cheaper than that. I live in NYC, where we do not pay separately for trash collection. I have known multiple people who do not live in NYC and would have to pay separately for trash collection who either 1) Carry their trash to work and dump it into their employer’s dumpster or 2) have their NYC resident parents drive the NJ/Connecticut resident child’s trash back to NYC after a visit.
I’d be royally pissed off if someone moved our garbage can. They’d have to enter our home or garage to do so. I take garbage to work with me and deposit it on my dumpster. Before that, it’s indoors.
I frequently have to go searching for at least one of the cans. Not necessarily because somebody intentionally moved it, but because we’re on a hill, stuff rolls, and the garbage men tend to just throw emptied cans willy-nilly in the general direction of the house. I’m certain me and the neighbors have all swapped cans multiple times.
Our trash bins were provided by the city to use with their trucks with the robot arms. The drivers are generally pretty careless when putting the bins back down on the ground. So if mine is lying on it’s side out in the street, I’d have no problem if someone moved it.
On the other hand, we have next door neighbors who, when they have friends or family visit, they always park in front of someone else’s house. So if someone moved my trash bin just to make room for them to park in front of my house, yeah that would piss me off.
