When bylaws go by the way

It is easy for residents to ignore the rules, writes Jimmy Thomson in part three of a Herald series.

THEY are noisy, messy, inconsiderate, abusive and aggressive. Or, depending on how you look at them, they are uptight, controlling, intolerant and sneaky. Either way, bad neighbours in a house can make life tough for the people next door. But in strata blocks they can upset dozens of people at a time.

While loud music, yappy pets and illegal parking create most strife, the problem in apartments, townhouses and gated villages isn't that there are no rules - strata bylaws are there by default. It's that the rules are easy to ignore - if residents have seen the bylaws, let alone read and understood them.