Holding up for fashion

In the suburban fashion stakes the aspidistra in the front window and a neatly clipped privet hedge is a distant memory these days. We have had the block paved drive craze then came the imposing front walls with iron railings which any burglar with an IQ stretching to double figures could walk around, and now we have the ornate wrought iron gates opening silently by remote control operated from an approaching car.

Now, don't get me wrong, if flaunting your wealth floats your hand crafted bateau then that's fine by me but why do so many of the security gate brigade make no concession whatsoever to road safety?

Time after time you are behind a car which indicates it is turning into a drive, starts to turn then stops suddenly when you are expecting it to vanish from sight causing cars behind to brake at an unexpected obstruction.

There the car stays with its derrière sticking out in the road holding up traffic while what appears to be a motor running on a set of AA batteries painfully slowly does the open sesame bit. Does it never dawn on people that setting the gates back far enough to allow a car to wait off-road in the approach for them to open, considerably reduces that chance of being rammed up the rear and keeps traffic moving freely?

It seems to have something to do with enclosing every inch of land. You see the same principle at work with boundary walls and fences on the very edge of property even though it means those who live there cannot see to drive out of their entrance until the front of their car is six feet into the road. Fences, it seems, come before safety.