Homeowner sparks backlash after complaining about petty act outside his house

An angry homeowner has divided Aussies by lashing out at a driver for touching the edge of his nature strip when parking outside his house. 

The Melbourne tradesman filmed the vehicle, which had part of its front and back wheels barely touching the grass. 

‘Here we go again, it’s a double wheel mount. Thanks very much mate, I appreciate it, exactly what the lawn needed,’ he said in the clip. 

‘Thanks very much for parking in the middle too so I couldn’t park my van. 

‘You’re a thinker. You’ve got an IQ of a five watt lightbulb by the looks of things but I’ll still mow the lawns in your honour. 

‘I usually wait for these random cars to move on before I flick dirt and s*** all over the car but today we’ll keep moving and I’ll do as I please.’

The tradie was then seen mowing the lawn beside the offending car before he parked his own vehicle just centimetres behind it. 

‘We’ll just give him a little bit of a message here and for banter I’ll park right up his a*** and get him thinking,’ he said. 

‘You’d be an absolute f***ing idiot to park on a lawn like this regardless of who owns it – stick that up your a***.’ 

The complaint sparked backlash from hundreds of viewers, who said the driver was entitled to park in the spot as a nature strip is considered public land and not part of the property. 

‘Why do [people] like you think you own the council nature strip and the parking on a public road?’ one person wrote. 

‘You are complaining about grass that’s owned by the government,’ another said. 

‘Mate you don’t own the nature strip,’ a third agreed. 

Others disagreed, saying homeowners usually take care of the nature strip outside their home regardless of it being public land, so drivers should not park there.

‘Common courtesy some people don’t understand… only people who care for their grass,’ one person wrote. 

‘People don’t have common courtesy. I’m with you bro,’ another person wrote. 

‘Even if you don’t own the nature strip, seeing a lawn like that – common sense would prevail not to park on it would it not?’ a third said. 

Others suggested the driver had done the right thing by edging onto the nature strip on a narrow road to make it easier for other vehicles to get past.

‘If the road is narrow and I’m able to park my car up on the gutter to minimise the chance of it getting hit, I’m going to do that every single time. My car is far more important than a lawn,’ one person wrote. 

‘Isn’t that what rolled curbs is for?’ another person wrote. 

‘Those gutters are designed to be mounted for parking,’ a third added. 

Motorists in Victoria are not permitted to park on nature strips according to rule 197 of the Victoria’s Road Safety Rules Act 2017. 

The offence carries a fine worth $576.93. Parking on a nature strip is also illegal in other states and territories in Australia. 

Drivers are also not permitted to park on a bicycle path, footpath or a divided strip. 

Motorists will be exempt from the rule if the local council permits drivers to park on a nature strip or if parking control signs say motorists can park on the grass.