HawthorneVillager.com

Don't get me wrong, I know we need sidewalks, but,,,,

I live in the old part of town on a quiet crescent where there is currently no sidewalk on either side of the street.

The town, in a few weeks is starting construction on the street and they will be putting in a sidewalk with a wide boulevard on my side of the street.

The neighbors ( all of us ) including myself had to come to terms with this sidewalk on our side of the street but we all signed a petition to reduce the size of the 2 meter wide boulevard between the sidewalk and the road. Even though our petition was hand delivered to the Mayor, we were ignored.

This sidewalk will reduce the number of cars I and many neighbours can park in our driveways. Personally, I had to remove a large tree in front of my home to accommodate a new wider driveway and so the front of my house would not look stupid, I also replaced the concrete walk in front of my home to suit the new width of the driveway.

I'm writing this now because I just got my new "higher" municipal tax bill and it's our opinion that homes with sidewalks are less desirable than home without sidewalks.

What do you think?

_________________
For Home Inspection services call Andy Shaw at Halton Home Inspection Service. 905 876 4761

Sorry to hear your plight Andy. That's a raw deal for sure.

I can't stand having a sidewalk and luckily I've only lived in one house that had one in my lifetime. Hopefully never again.

I think this is really personal preference. I have had a house without a sidewalk in front of it and now have a sidewalk. There are pros and cons to both, which I am sure you are aware of. The one thing I love about the sidewalk with my little kids is that they do not have to cross the road in order to walk around the block or practice riding their bikes. I realize that I can park fewer cars, but with a double drive and double car garage ... I would never sacrifice the safety factor in order to park 6 cars, IMHO.

I agree that with little kids a sidewalk would be best.

What bothers us on our street is -

1) that our concerns were ignored during the consultation process. I mean why bother with a consultation if you are just going to be told nothing will be changed anyways. They could have just sent us a letter saying they are doing the work, end of story.

2) because of our neighborhood petition, we were told we would have a chance to speak at council but we did not.

3) we have been told that the boulevard must be 2 meters wide yet other recent and similar street improvements have smaller boulevards.

4) we have been told to suck it up that we will love it.

_________________
For Home Inspection services call Andy Shaw at Halton Home Inspection Service. 905 876 4761

Parking spots are worth hundreds of dollars per year in value. Each. Having a sidewalk gets rid of 2 spots (2 car garage) definitely a raw deal. I would definitely choose a no sidewalk house over a comparable one with a sidewalk. When we have guests over, I have 4 spots for people to park before I even need to think of calling for a consideration.

Agree with Dan. Sidewalks are great for my young ones to ride bikes.

Oops,

I just realized that option 2 and 5 in the poll are pretty well the same?

_________________
For Home Inspection services call Andy Shaw at Halton Home Inspection Service. 905 876 4761

The only consolation to my setup is my boulevard is literally long enough to fit another car comfortably with not much overhang on the road nor sidewalk. It's like another driveway so I can fit 4 cars easily without impeding anything.

_________________
I Fell Into A Burning Ring Of Fire
I Went Down, Down, Down And The Flames Went Higher
And It Burns, Burns, Burns
The Ring Of Fire, The Ring Of Fire!

No sidewalk... and no parking on our side of the street. Its one of the reasons we bought the house we did.

We went from a house with no sidewalk to a house with a sidewalk (even though I said I'd never buy once with)! I agree with most people that it is great for kids (and we are expecting our first baby next month) so I like the safety factor and the additional space for kids to play. I hate having to shovel the snow and keep it salted during the winter, and it would be nice every now and then to have additional 2 car parking. Overall, it doesn't REALLY bother me either way (except when people let their dogs pee on my front lawn attached to house and not the boulevard). Like some people have already said, there are pros and cons. I can see how it would be frustrating though to have one put in after the fact.

_________________

I’ve never lived in a house without a sidewalk.
Doesn’t really bother me, except when kids like to camp out on it right in front of our house for hours….that gets annoying.

Good point.

Right now on my street you can park on both sides of the road. Once the construction is done, there will only be parking on my side of the street with the new sidewalk.

Well, I guess that's fare, , my side will get the sidewalk, the increased litter, the abandoned dog poop, the sidewalk clearing of snow, the reduced driveway parking, and the other side of the street will get the no parking signs.

_________________
For Home Inspection services call Andy Shaw at Halton Home Inspection Service. 905 876 4761

Same with me, I can fit 4 cars on the driveway comfortably with a sidewalk...
But to answer the OP, we bought the house on the condition that there are 4 parking spaces...so yeah it would definitely be a deal breaker if that sidewalk reduced the number of parking spaces.

Sorry, it is the stuff that is supposed to be safe for animals (we have 2 dogs). We've actually been diligent with our lawn so fingers crossed we don't have any dandelions in the front! lol I'd welcome them in the back with ours though because we live behind a wood lot and have plenty of weeds along the fence!

_________________

I would rather have the yellow flowers than the piss burn mark.

_________________
This post is subliminal, yet you don't think so.