City Says NO Sunflowers for YOU!...#54

#cityordinance #sunflowers #neighbors

Intro : City of Austin says the Sunflower rows must come down

A homeowner in Austin decided to grow sunflowers along a sidewalk. The city says they are a violation of two ordinances, one for right of way mobility concerns and another that prohibits weeds and grasses over 12 inches tall from growing on a property.

Thoughts/Questions

No HOA in this story. This is the municipality.

1. What do you think about having sunflowers along a sidewalk of a property in the city?
2. We don’t have sidewalks in my subdivision. If someone wanted to plant sunflowers in their front yard in a line obstructing the view of the house, that would be considered strange.
3. Should an allowance be made because of coronavirus? Where does that end?
4. The city is looking into the situation…in the sense that the house is on a corner of a 4 way stop…the speed limit is 30 mph. In theory, there is a blind corner.
5. The owner says they will remove the sunflowers rather than fight the city.
6. Would you want to live next to someone with sunflowers in their front yard? There’s a house off Mathilda where I live where the sunflowers are in a garden on the side of the house. Every year they grow super high…like 20 feet or more it seems. I think it’s amazing to see them. But, they are on the side of the house….they aren’t on a sidewalk.
7. We’ve seen this argument: The flowers are good for the environment…there are places where flowers aren’t allowed to be cut down in a city…
a. No one would argue that flowers are bad for the environment
b. There’s a difference between growing tall flowers along a sidewalk in a residential area and a park.
8. Is it a neighborly thing to do to grow sunflowers along your sidewalk that attract attention to your yard…bringing more people to the neighborhood?
9. This is a simple thing…the homeowner planted sunflowers along the sidewalk. I’m pretty sure they didn’t do it to cause anyone any issues…this wasn’t done in spite or anything.
10. I was listing a house in a neighborhood…everything was really nice…the lawns were well kept. Then there was one house where the yard in front had been ripped up and there were all these shrubs, trees, flowers….and it was very unkept and looked terrible. So, in this case, I can see why there are ordinances about this sort of thing…those neighbors would be really annoyed by that house…as it is an eyesore.

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Source: https://www.kxan.com/news/local/austin/icon-in-our-neighborhood-city-citation-issued-against-south-austin-sunflower-patch/

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