mxraptor149
08-05-2008, 06:43 PM
So here's the situation:
Over the past 12 years, I have gradually built a small practice track on about 2.5 acres on my parent's property. I have poured hundreds of dollars into renting equipment to build this track and have poured countless hours of sweat into maintaining it by raking, shoveling, weed-eating, mowing, discing, clearing brush and trees, digging drainage ditches, etc...
I have done all this on my own despite having an @$$hole neighbor nextdoor with a construction company whom I can't get to loan me his equipment. I have to pay to rent skid steers despite passing three of them each time I go back to ride. This relationship has deteriorated through no fault of my own, the guy is merely not a good neighbor.
In between the construction company and my parent's lot is a neighbor who lives far back from the road and near the front of the track. He's cool and I've developed a good relationship with him ... when to ride, when to stop due to dust, noise, time of day, etc.
Now, there is a 17 year old kid who's uncle is a foreman at the construction company. The foreman has been telling this kid and workers there they can ride all over on our property because it's 'his.' I caught the kid once and said, explicitly, "I'll cut you a break. You can ride, just you, if you call me and I'm here." Those were mine and my father's rules. Period.
The kid rode once without calling after that (I know because I had groomed the track only to find fresh tracks when I went to ride the next day).
He rode again after that, and my neighbor in the house close to the track asked him if he had permission to be back there. The kid said he did, but he didn't call me.
Today, my neighbor near the track called and told me the kid was riding. A third time he has ridden, with friends who were not wearing helmets two of the three times, without calling. My neighbor's 4 year old daughter was trying to sleep, so he told the kids to stop and call me. The kid called, and I told him I didn't want him riding back there anymore. He was carving turns the wrong way and creating ruts, riding after rains and rutting out faces of jumps, and just disrespecting me in general.
I hated to do it because I have been on his side of the coin, where I have ridden on property without permission and been forced to stop and lose a sweet riding place. But he couldn't simply pick up the phone before he went riding to call me and ask if he could and if I would join him, which I would have been more than happy to do.
So, I had considered calling him back after a week or so if I knew he hadn't been back there since I told him to stop to say he could ride again seeing that he listened, this time. But I'm not sure.
This is also a sketchy situation because I was hoping to develop a good relationship with this kid so I could begin to start using the construction equipment and save some cash. Previously, the son of the guy who owns the construction company has used equipment to level our jumps because he is a hunter and doesn't like us riding into September because it scares the deer away, even though he hunts on our property and the property of neighbors on the other side who all have told him expressly NOT to hunt on their property.
So, I'm not sure if I should give this kid a 4th chance or risk him or his uncle using a D9 to level our track completely because he couldn't have his cake and eat it too.
Any thoughts?
Over the past 12 years, I have gradually built a small practice track on about 2.5 acres on my parent's property. I have poured hundreds of dollars into renting equipment to build this track and have poured countless hours of sweat into maintaining it by raking, shoveling, weed-eating, mowing, discing, clearing brush and trees, digging drainage ditches, etc...
I have done all this on my own despite having an @$$hole neighbor nextdoor with a construction company whom I can't get to loan me his equipment. I have to pay to rent skid steers despite passing three of them each time I go back to ride. This relationship has deteriorated through no fault of my own, the guy is merely not a good neighbor.
In between the construction company and my parent's lot is a neighbor who lives far back from the road and near the front of the track. He's cool and I've developed a good relationship with him ... when to ride, when to stop due to dust, noise, time of day, etc.
Now, there is a 17 year old kid who's uncle is a foreman at the construction company. The foreman has been telling this kid and workers there they can ride all over on our property because it's 'his.' I caught the kid once and said, explicitly, "I'll cut you a break. You can ride, just you, if you call me and I'm here." Those were mine and my father's rules. Period.
The kid rode once without calling after that (I know because I had groomed the track only to find fresh tracks when I went to ride the next day).
He rode again after that, and my neighbor in the house close to the track asked him if he had permission to be back there. The kid said he did, but he didn't call me.
Today, my neighbor near the track called and told me the kid was riding. A third time he has ridden, with friends who were not wearing helmets two of the three times, without calling. My neighbor's 4 year old daughter was trying to sleep, so he told the kids to stop and call me. The kid called, and I told him I didn't want him riding back there anymore. He was carving turns the wrong way and creating ruts, riding after rains and rutting out faces of jumps, and just disrespecting me in general.
I hated to do it because I have been on his side of the coin, where I have ridden on property without permission and been forced to stop and lose a sweet riding place. But he couldn't simply pick up the phone before he went riding to call me and ask if he could and if I would join him, which I would have been more than happy to do.
So, I had considered calling him back after a week or so if I knew he hadn't been back there since I told him to stop to say he could ride again seeing that he listened, this time. But I'm not sure.
This is also a sketchy situation because I was hoping to develop a good relationship with this kid so I could begin to start using the construction equipment and save some cash. Previously, the son of the guy who owns the construction company has used equipment to level our jumps because he is a hunter and doesn't like us riding into September because it scares the deer away, even though he hunts on our property and the property of neighbors on the other side who all have told him expressly NOT to hunt on their property.
So, I'm not sure if I should give this kid a 4th chance or risk him or his uncle using a D9 to level our track completely because he couldn't have his cake and eat it too.
Any thoughts?