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Comment by mschuster91 | Hacker News Reader

> how you can landscape it, what kinds of cars you can keep in your own driveway

These two at least make some sense. The former, landscaping restrictions, can be used to prevent people from creating groundwater issues or flood risks, and the latter... no one wants a neighbor in a residential zone keeping broken-down trash cars out in the open.

Some things have to be regulated even in a relatively free society because otherwise the potential is too high for greedy or stupid people to ruin everyone else's life.

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It makes perfect sense to me to regulate things that could potentially have an adverse effect on others that they can't easily opt out of. Loud noise in the middle of the night? Sure. Anything that creates pollution? Sure. Unleashed pit bulls that devour the neighborhood children? Depends on which children, but otherwise banning this makes sense.

But rules based on "it doesn't look nice"? That seems both subjective and ridiculous. If someone has garbage on their property and it's blowing into yours, that gives you a right to complain. But if you just think their property is ugly for whatever reason, well, maybe don't look at it? What made people think they should have any say over the visual appearance of what someone else owns?

>no one wants a neighbor in a residential zone keeping broken-down trash cars out in the open.

Do those neighbors care what I want?

so let me ask from a point of trying to see it the other way, why do you want broken-down trash cars out in the open of your house? if you're just playing devil's advocate, then whatever, but if you truly want trash cars, I truly want to hear why

Because don't feel like I have to justify what i want to do on my own property to anybody except my wife.

but see, you're not being fair to the question. i'm not asking for justification. i'm asking why you want trash cars. it's no different than asking why your favorite food is what it might ever be. there's no judgement in my asking. i'm just trying to understand, you know, to get to know you. maybe you'll have a strong reason for it that convinces me to want trash cars in my yard too. but you'll never know because you take this immediate position of justification and non-answers

Not OP, but given enough time/money/land I'd probably have a dozen or so old trash cars on my property. It's fun to fix things, including buying a couple wrecked donor cars in order to (attempt to) build up one working one. It's one of my hobbies, although I don't have the time/money or room to go all out.

there's a difference between a parts car and a trash car. parts car implies what you are saying that there's a project car somewhere. trash car implies something else entirely.

How would a broken-down car on a driveway ruin everyone else's life?

Even so, today's trash car that does not look posh can be a tomorrow's restored historical car that does.

Today's broken down car sitting in my driveway is my son's future "hey dad what's that if I get it running can me and my buddies drive it around?" and 8 years later it's a mechanical engineering degree.

They can potentially become a blight. I'm not talking about a single classic car you're restoring, I'm talking about 3+ vehicles, some parked on driveway, others on the grass. They're homes for vermin and other animals, they're a disaster aesthetically and probably dangerous to kids in the neighborhood (sometimes they're on jack stands). They're often accompanied by stacks of tires and other debris.

I've lived off-grid in the desert, and I've seen certain people become 'garbage collectors' - a few cars turns into 20+, with all the associated junk. In the desert, nobody really cares - but you'd be crazy to move in next to one of those junk yards.

It's not going to ruin anyone's life, but it's definitely not nice. It depends on the community and circumstances I suppose.

There are some properties in a neighboring county where a guy has been running junk yards in residential neighborhoods. 50+ rusted junkers stacked in a suburban yard, against local law. When the law finally is about to seize the land, he's moved it all to other residential properties in the area. Lawsuits have been going on since the 90s. I believe he's lost at least one house and possibly spent some time in jail, but it keeps going.

If that trash car is in the garage to be worked on, noone is going to care. If it is a trash car in the laneway that is being worked on and being kept in reasonable cosmetic condition, some are going to oppose it and some are going to accept it. Once you start collecting auto carcasses, leaving your property in disarray, and not doing much about it ... well, don't be surprised if people start viewing your property as an undesirable dump in the middle of a residential community.

People have limits. While some people push those limits too far (in either direction), there are times when those limits are realistic.

No, they don't. These exact sorts of "well nobody likes" arguments are why the bureaucracy has the reach it does and CA has the problems it does.

Yes, society probably won't crumble if we cave to your whining and regulate your pet issue of the minute but regulating in this manner is like littering in the park, if everyone does it the park is ruined.

If people are poisoning the groundwater or creating other "off their property" problems then fine them accordingly. If they aren't then screw off. None of this "the thing you want to isn't already on the approved list so you have to go through an onerous and expensive process of proving it won't hurt anything" garbage.

>Yes, society probably won't crumble if we cave to your whining and regulate your pet issue of the minute

I disagree, and I think this sort of nonsense is a cornerstone of why society is crumbling. People don't look at their homes as homes they look at them as temporary investments that they hope to sell to somebody else for more money in the future. People don't end up investing (in the societal, emotional sense) into their communities and their homes because they recognize that they don't really own them.

Give the rights back to the people to own their homes and they start to care again. Tell property investors that I'm sorry, but actually you might have to deal with a guy who doesn't give a shit about weeds and likes to work on his car in the driveway next to your investment and maybe houses stop being such a safe speculative vehicle.

If housing ceases to be a relatively safe investment vehicle, what will become it?

I dislike the idea of home-as-investment as much as the next guy, but I'd like to think about some consequences of houses stopping to be an investment, Japan-style.

If houses were no longer an investment but rather just poaces to live, the result might be that more and better housing would be constantly being built. This is one of the points of this article that was posted here the other day: https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/actually-japan-has-changed...

That's fair and understandable.

I wonder where the investment of the "nest egg" investments would go.

> regulating in this manner is like littering in the park, if everyone does it the park is ruined

That's a pretty ironic comparison, because laws against littering are exactly the sort of quality-of-life regulation that you seem to oppose.

actually I don't care about what car my neighbor drives and would not like your views to increase my rent.

> The former, landscaping restrictions, can be used to prevent people from creating groundwater issues or flood risks

Hahaha the GP is misattributing the issue. These are usually HOA strictures, and HOA will require green lawns in the middle of a desert.

I said elsewhere so sorry for repeating, but: you should find your city's code and read it. Almost all cities at this point have adopted things that used to be exclusive to HOAs.

For instance, this is west des moines, Iowa: https://www.wdm.iowa.gov/government/public-services/communit...

Terms like "Junk and debris in the yard." get tortured to mean almost literally anything. Also 10" of weeds can grow in a matter of days after a rain.

> no one wants a neighbor in a residential zone keeping broken-down trash cars out in the open.

So free.

What justifiable reason is there for this?

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