(fluff) Let's talk about garages--if you live in a home

Our garage is built under the house. The driveway comes up the side of the house to the garage. We park in the garage and in the driveway. We rarely park in the street -- only if the driveway is blocked and I can't get in my garage bay.

It's just the opposite in most places around here - older homes are more likely to have alleys and detached garages that face those, behind the home. Sometimes a detached garage is behind the house but with a driveway that comes off the street to go around the house.

Newer homes tend to have front-facing attached garages on the street side of the house.

The homes with side-loading garages are usually very expensive homes on bigger lots so there is room for a driveway to go around to the side of the house.

Our garage is in the back. We are a 4 car family, so my husband and I park in the back but our 2 kids park in the front. Sometimes it is unavoidable to have to use street parking.  We have very wide streets (and alleys) so it doesn't create a huge issue for driving down the street.

My house was built in 1950.  Two car garage facing the street - we park both cars in the garage.  There are very few people who park in the street in my neighborhood.

We have an older, smaller home that has a 2 car garage that faces the street. Most houses are like that here, but they have started building new developments where they do the alley access. I think I would like that type of access over what we currently have.

The city recently installed a fire hydrant on our side of the street between our house and our neighbor's house, and neither of us ever parks on the street anyway. Across the street from us, the neighbors ALWAYS park in the street. They have no garage, it was converted into a living space addition, and it took up some of their one-car width drive way, so it now literally holds one car, and they have 3, plus their visitors. They always manage to park on their side of the street, at the end of our driveway, which makes it super hard to maneuver when it's time to park the extended-cab, full length bed pick up, and it drives me BANANAS.

I also don't like on-street parking because it's dangerous for pedestrians, and especially kids - we have no sidewalks here. I feel sorry for the school bus drivers, and anyone else who has to navigate all the on-street parking in a large vehicle, garbage trucks, the UPS guy who delivers my Amazon packages almost daily ... any type of service vehicle ... and it's the neighbors across the street who have weekly visits from the rescue squad because she has her elderly father living with her. I get that they are only able to work with what they've got, but it is still inconsiderate.

We have both. We have an older home that has an attached 2 car garage in the front, and in the back we have a 2 car garage that was added on before we bought it. We use the front garage for me and the kids cars and the back garage is my husbands for his truck, corvette and motorcycle.

my answer won't matter because i don't live in a neighborhood

but my garage is front facing

i never thought of the parking situations of garages that don't face a street

there are lots of trials and tribulations of living amoung people!

my driveway has it's own issues - if there are lots of people over we tend to get 'parked in'

so i sometimes move my car on up the driveway to make sure i can get out if i need to run to the store

or i ask for the keys of the last car in and take theirs

but i digress....

gina

My house was built in 1908, so my detached garage is in the back driving in from the alley. The "street" in front of my house is also a busy highway, so no one parks there. Is is not illegal to park there, but no one does as it is very busy. I get a semi parked in front occasionally for a few hours while the driver gets a nap, but that doesn't bother me as I would not want them driving while so tired. I'm on the edge of town not far from where the speed limit changes so the police pull a few people over in front of my house too.

I saw an old black and white photo once of my house showing the old carriage house where my garage is now.

Our 100+ year old house in the city didn’t come with a garage at all and there was no alley, although in many parts of the city there are alleys between the rows of houses. Because there was no alley we had a huge lot considering where we were located, so we built a 2.5 car detached garage facing the street, mostly to house DH’s tools and stuff. My car almost never saw the inside of that garage even in the wintertime.

The house we live in now in the semi rural suburbs has a four car attached garage that faces the street. I park my car in it. The house is set quite far back from the street so there is room for probably about 8-10 average cars to park there. DH parks his work truck outside as well as his old pickup truck that is rigged for a snowplow. He has been parking his new truck outside also for the time being because his parking space inside is full of crap we had to drag home from our lake cabin while it’s being remodeled, but I would imagine that things will be adjusted so he can park inside once winter officially hits.

Both of our neighbors have garages that face 90° from the street, so you pull into their driveway and would have to turn at a right angle to the house to pull into their garage. It definitely makes the house look nicer from the street, but it also makes it harder if you wanted to back your car up the driveway and into your garage stall.

I will add that parking inside an attached heated garage is pure bliss when you live where I do. Nothing like NOT having to scrape ice and snow off of car windows every time you want to go somewhere, or having to wait for the heater to kick in because your car is freezing cold from sitting outside overnight in below zero temperatures!

We have 2 garages. One attached and one free standing. The attached one is supposed to be a 2 car garage, but my big suv is the only one that fits. The free standing one that we built is a generous 2 car garage.

Jennifer

We live in a “new urban” neighborhood - our garages are all rear-loading and the fronts of the houses face central courtyards with walking paths, greenspace, etc. There are no streets to park on in front of the houses.

I live in an older part of town with many houses predating cars so there were no garages when the houses were built. Because of this the garages were added to the rear of the property off the allies. My parents and grandparents(lived next door) were both like this. My parents had a one car garage so one of their cars was parked in front of the house most times. I hated it on the few times I borrowed the car and needed to park it in the tiny little garage. The worst part was running from the dark alley to the house door. The other issue with the neighborhood is that the streets are very narrow because they didn't need streets to allow for vehicles. My Mom's car was totalled back in the day by a drunk driver while the car was parked in front of the house.

I live in a neighborhood with homes built in the 40's. Most on my street have single car garages in the front, next to the house except those who have replaced the old garages. All the new homes that are poppping up include 2 car garages in the front. AND no storm doors.

We have a single garage that faces the surface parking area for our development, with one assigned spot in the lot. There’s a ton of street parking as well on the street that connects the whole neighborhood, most people park one car in the lot and one in the street and use the garage for storage or motorcycles.

We live in a very dense neighborhood in a small city and this is a common setup in our area.

I live in a senior development where all houses have garages facing the street. My gripe is with the shortsighted developers who built 95% of the driveways too short to accommodate a car. Even with a double garage a lot of folks who are garage hoarders choose to park in the driveway. This leaves the rear of the car overhanging the sidewalk. I’d almost rather they did park in the street. At least then folks (sometimes with walkers) could walk safely on the sidewalk.