so apparently I will soon have to mow my own berm.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11133160

This is interesting to me. I have never done it before as I was under the impression that the council owned the land and was therefore responsible for the maintenance.  I don't mow the lawns on one tree hill or the domain.
This issue of ownership was reinforced recently when I got a parking ticket for parking my car up on the berm.

So why should I mow the berm outside my house if I do not own the land?  And where does my berm end and my neighbours begin?  what about the person who lives on the rear section? should we take it in turns?

what about berms outside apartment blocks? should the body corproate pay for it? or the residents?

If I owner the land I could understand, but I definitely don't or I wouldn't have been fined.


I wouldn't mind too much about doing this, but my rates have gone up 10% this year, and will go up again 10% again next year (and the year after that), so the penny pinching by the council to avoid doing maintanence on land it owns seems bit rich.

What do you guys think?