Workspace Threat

[Sam101]

I wasn't quite sure where to put this topic, so I went with ClubCJ talk because of its generality and it seemed appropriate. Up until now, I had been working on the car in my street, positioning the car somewhat as close to my driveway as possible so I did not block the occasional resident or passing car that enter the street from a central road off of my street. I've been doing this for a while now, about 7 months or so. A few days ago a highway pulled over in my street, and was somewhat both confused and not happy with me working on the car in the street. I was not doing anything major, just pulling out the wheels and checking the springs, bushings and stuff because the day before that I had hit a large pothole on the highway, so I wanted to be safe then sorry.

He told me I'm not allowed to work on the street, and I told him the car is as close to my property as possible, because my driveway is steep I cannot work on it. He proceeds to get angry and told me that If he is to catch me working on the car again in the street, I can be fined. So now I'm thinking, where do I work on the car? The driveway is steep, my backyard is all grass, I don't have enough money yet to put together a garage. Now, all I can think of is this semi-flat area where my driveway meets the road. Does anyone know if this would be both okay safety wise and public wise? Would I be blocking the pedestrian part of the council requirements?

This might be a bit more of a rant, but I'm so discouraged now to work on the car. I know sometime soon in the future I'll have my garage built, but until then I'm hesitant to work again. Has anyone had any similar issues to this? Please let me know.

https://imgur.com/a/4Ewv3k2

[bumblebee]

. A few days ago a highway pulled over in my street, and was somewhat both confused and not happy with me working on the car in the street. I was not doing anything major, just pulling out the wheels and checking the springs, bushings and stuff because the day before that I had hit a large pothole on the highway, so I wanted to be safe then sorry.

He told me I'm not allowed to work on the street, and I told him the car is as close to my property as possible, because my driveway is steep I cannot work on it. He proceeds to get angry and told me that If he is to catch me working on the car again in the street, I can be fined. So now I'm thinking, where do I work on the car?

You said a "highway" pulled over.
To me a highway is where you drive a car, truck , bus, or ride a motorcycle. So you need to clarify what a "highway" is in the instance.


Out of interest, are you in Australia? Or overseas?
What is the local laws stipulation on having vehicles parked on the street?

If you want to know if your breaking the council law , the best people to talk to is... The local council !!
Have a look with Google , I'm sure you can find who the local council is and find some contact details and have a chat to them.hopefully they have someone there who is reasonably familiar with their own laws who can give it to you in writing so next time someone give you a hard time you can show them what the laws entails in your area.

Out of interest, how wide is the street?
Is it a busy street?
Is it a one way street?
If you park your car on the street how much roadway is left for other road users?

[Sam101]

. A few days ago a highway pulled over in my street, and was somewhat both confused and not happy with me working on the car in the street. I was not doing anything major, just pulling out the wheels and checking the springs, bushings and stuff because the day before that I had hit a large pothole on the highway, so I wanted to be safe then sorry.

He told me I'm not allowed to work on the street, and I told him the car is as close to my property as possible, because my driveway is steep I cannot work on it. He proceeds to get angry and told me that If he is to catch me working on the car again in the street, I can be fined. So now I'm thinking, where do I work on the car?

You said a "highway" pulled over.
To me a highway is where you drive a car, truck , bus, or ride a motorcycle. So you need to clarify what a "highway" is in the instance.

Out of interest, are you in Australia? Or overseas?
What is the local laws stipulation on having vehicles parked on the street?

If you want to know if your breaking the council law , the best people to talk to is... The local council !!
Have a look with Google , I'm sure you can find who the local council is and find some contact details and have a chat to them.hopefully they have someone there who is reasonably familiar with their own laws who can give it to you in writing so next time someone give you a hard time you can show them what the laws entails in your area.


Out of interest, how wide is the street?
Is it a busy street?
Is it a one way street?
If you park your car on the street how much roadway is left for other road users?

Sorry, I forgot to detail what highway meant. In australia, usually a highway is the mention or go to word for highway police, which specifically target road users etc. Their coloured cars are different from the regular police. If your interested, look up "highway patrol nsw"

Australia, Sydney. There are no direct rules for working on my car in my street, but I did find this on the New South Wales RTA Website:

"General parking rules
You must not stop your vehicle (that is, bring it to a stop and either stay with the vehicle or leave it parked) in the following circumstances:
Double parked (that is in the road alongside a car that is parked)
On or across a driveway or footpath
On a median strip or traffic island
On motorways
In a clearway
On footpaths and nature strips"

This is a great idea, I'll actually give them a call when they open on thursday morning.

Wide enough for two cars to pass each other if there are no parked cars near the kurb.

When I'm studying, I usually can hear around 20-30 cars pass every few hours??

Two ways.

If I park on the street, only one lane, but that doesn't count if my opposite neighbour parks his Range rover on the curb opposite my driveway.

[bumblebee]

Talk to the council First see what they have to say .
Have a look thru local traffic Law as well and see what it says about the parking on the street.
Failing all of that, have a chat to a lawyer / solicitor , get them to help you out , surely they might have a fighting chance of understanding the local laws

[Sam101]

Talk to the council First see what they have to say .
Have a look thru local traffic Law as well and see what it says about the parking on the street.
Failing all of that, have a chat to a lawyer / solicitor , get them to help you out , surely they might have a fighting chance of understanding the local laws

Definetly will be talking to my local council. I wasn't aware of any such laws. Local traffic laws don't say anything about personal work on owned cars, but I'm going to ring up my friend who's a mechanic and see what he says. Not too sure about the lawyer lol, I know consultations and bookings here in Aus can cost around 150-200 $ an hour haha.

If this doesn't work, I might just have to wait 6-7 months for the garage to be built before resuming work, won't be happy but won't be in trouble with the law.

[Quismiff]

any flat empty carpark on a weekend. What about where you work? Is there a loading zone outback you could talk to the boss about using on weekends? It's a pain dragging tools around, but a mate with a ute could come in handy there. And you'd have help.

[bumblebee]

Don't be surprised if you're at a Empty car park with a car and a lot of tools and the constabulary pull along side and ask what's going on

[Sam101]

any flat empty carpark on a weekend. What about where you work? Is there a loading zone outback you could talk to the boss about using on weekends? It's a pain dragging tools around, but a mate with a ute could come in handy there. And you'd have help.

working on it in the carpark would be worse probably then working in my street if its a public car space. I don't work unfortunately, university student, and no friends with utes haha we're all in the same university. I'll see what I can do.

[Sam101]

Don't be surprised if you're at a Empty car park with a car and a lot of tools and the constabulary pull along side and ask what's going on

My thoughts exactly tbh

[Sam101]

So i finally got around to cutting the grass today. Thought I would try and position the car on the flattest part of the driveway. Honestly, I think its somewhat okay? I'm just worried the jack stands could tilt if placed near the edged decline where the road and driveway start. Can I get some second thoughts on this? https://imgur.com/a/U0R9pjb

[lancerdarryl]

Just be very careful....you should only use stands on level ground.If you do use your driveway give the car a good shaking when it is on the stands to see if it moves. Also some back up packing under the sills is a good idea.A spare wheel is good DO NOT use bricks or concrete blocks as these will shatter if any weight comes onto them

[Sam101]

Just be very careful....you should only use stands on level ground.If you do use your driveway give the car a good shaking when it is on the stands to see if it moves. Also some back up packing under the sills is a good idea.A spare wheel is good DO NOT use bricks or concrete blocks as these will shatter if any weight comes onto them

Yeah will do. By backup padding do you mean between the jack stands surface and the cars under area where the jack stands will sit?

[Lancer1993]

Hope you find a space, luckily I have the garage but that's about it as a suitable space to jack up the car. The drive is not very steep but unsuitable where jacks are involved and the back yard is gravel and grass, when its not mud.

Best bet is if the law is level then maybe some wooden blocks will help to stop the jack dig into the lawn?

[Sam101]

Hope you find a space, luckily I have the garage but that's about it as a suitable space to jack up the car. The drive is not very steep but unsuitable where jacks are involved and the back yard is gravel and grass, when its not mud.

Best bet is if the law is level then maybe some wooden blocks will help to stop the jack dig into the lawn?

Thought about the grass, but when it rains the next day or two the grass becomes really mushy, a bit sketch to place jack stands. Plus my dads old story of his friend working on his car that proceeded to slip from the jacks unbalanced upright and nearly cutting him in half gives me the shivers everytime i think of working on grass :/

[lancerdarryl]

The backup packing I meant was extra to the jack stands. It's job is stop the car falling to the ground if the jack stand fails.