Parked up on public highway.

About six weeks ago an 'N' reg PVC parked up on a residential street about half a mile from our house. It's parked on a bus route, but tucked away under overhanging trees, close to the kerb and opposite a primary school. The road is very broad at that point and the van is causing no obstruction, there are no parking restrictions in force
I walk or drive past it most days and it's obvious someone is living in it. The occupant sleeps there at night, curtains drawn, but it's vacated during the day, curtains open.
The van is perfectly legal, taxed and tested even though a bit ragged round the edges.
I assume no laws are being broken.
Does anyone know any different?
Al.

You should see the side streets in Bristol, vans parked up even caravans. I expect there are other towns also, not been down there since lock down.

Saying that, there seems to be wild camping on Hayling beach on the grass area.

Also saw several vans in residential streets and a couple were parked up down the lane to the Church on Sunday. 

The Council seem to be powerless.
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Richard

If they are deemed to be 'residing' in the vehicle, rather than just spending one or two nights, then Section 77 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 seems to apply:

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rogerblack wrote:If they are deemed to be 'residing' in the vehicle, rather than just spending one or two nights, then Section 77 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 seems to apply:

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Interesting Roger, I wonder if there is a parallel law that applies in Scotland? A large RV type motorhome parked for over a week on a quiet service road near our local Tesco. The occupants had a small car in tow which the occupants seemed to be using. Given how long they were parked, I was less interested in the legality of their parking and more in where there were getting water from and where the waste was going

rogerblack wrote:If they are deemed to be 'residing' in the vehicle, rather than just spending one or two nights, then Section 77 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 seems to apply:

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It doesn't seem to work or indeed be applied in Bristol city and its surrounding streets!

Doesn't seem to be applied here either. 
It's since been pointed out to me that we have another van parked up in town, this time it's on a street adjacent to the town's main park and children's playground.
Apparently it's been there 3 months, and the occupant only leaves it to walk around the park.
The properties he's parked in front of are very prestigious houses worth a fortune. If I lived there I wouldn't be very happy.
Looking at the law Roger found, a get out clause mentions an emergency, maybe the pandemic counts as that..
Al.

Well if the diddies & pikies can get away with it???

bikeralw wrote:Doesn't seem to be applied here either. 
It's since been pointed out to me that we have another van parked up in town, this time it's on a street adjacent to the town's main park and children's playground.
Apparently it's been there 3 months, and the occupant only leaves it to walk around the park.
The properties he's parked in front of are very prestigious houses worth a fortune. If I lived there I wouldn't be very happy.
Looking at the law Roger found, a get out clause mentions an emergency, maybe the pandemic counts as that..
Al.

It has been parked up there for well over a year but once in a while "disappears". When I walked past yesterday noticed a motorbike crash helmet on the dashboard, perhaps you know him! Must admit it irks me because as you know parking is at a premium in our town(often struggle to park outside our house which is nearby) and yet he seems to have a permanent spot. Perhaps I should have posted this in the grumpy old mens section.

While I am ambivalent to this issue it will undermine any efforts among leisure motorhomers who are campaigning for Aires to be established in the UK.
Rich..

I find it difficult to decide on what stance to take. We look at these types of situation through the eyes of people who Motorhome for leisure and probably have a home to base ourselves from. Certainly there are those who full time through choice, but my understanding is that they move about to fulfil their lifestyle choice in a similar manner to us part timers.
There does seem to be a growing number of people who for what ever reason cannot get housing and with the ongoing and huge shortage of public sector housing a Motorhome, van or caravan seems like the only viable solution, particularly with the high levels of rent in places like London. The Bristol situation seems to be the most prominent case in point with vans clustered in residential streets.
In my opinion government (central and local) needs to recognise this issue and either provide housing, and goodness knows there is now a huge ability to manufacture units in factories for assembly both rapidly and cheaply, and craned onto preprepared concrete slabs with services. Or
In the interim it is the duty of the authorities to at least provide temporary serviced parking for these people. I believe the local authorities are required to provide such facilities to ethnic travellers, however lack of leadership and direction by any political party places us in the situation we find ourselves.
Who knows, if the government and local authorities got its act together to deal with this we might see height barriers removed but then pigs might fly.

Davy

There was a van in our area that got complaints. Turned out they were health workers needing temporary accommodation. People are so quick to judge.

TeamRienza wrote:
In the interim it is the duty of the authorities to at least provide temporary serviced parking for these people. 

Davy

Bristol council did exactly that and on the nearest available space they created a fully serviced site to the west, about 1.5/2 miles from the city centre. But none of the community would move there and argued that it was too far out and they wanted to be near the centre of town. 
Well, I would love to live in or near the centre of Bristol but I can't afford the £1M - £2M price tag that goes with those houses!
I believe the only people to use the site were some travellers and last I heard was that the site had been wrecked and was now full of rubbish!