Looks like there is plenty of lawn room to make a parking area for two cars. If you spend time in the front yard, the best place is nearer to the street. Then add trees to the house side of the parking area to cover it from view.

For convenience, the parking area can be closer to the house, but, of course, that is not very pretty if you spend a lot of time on your front porch.

Another idea. How about a curved turnabout starting where the driveway starts and curving across the lawn and exiting on the other side of the lawn? Then put in a summer garden in the curve between turnabout and street and low bushes between turnabout and house.

Yes that is exactly what we were thinking of.

OMG then the whole front yard will look like a parking lot curved driveways that cross the front of a house only work with large homes I would park one car on the street to widen the driveway will affect the front porch you can’t in most places put a driveway right on the property line and you have only a one car garage . I have no idea about the apartment sign thing without a picture . BTW trees do not work well for noise control maybe try a very dense hedge for some help there. It would be helpful to see the whole house too.

There may be room for a parking pad for a second car. City rules on driveways, setbacks, fences and so on are often online. Pull out your house-buying paperwork that shows where the easements are, too. Copies of permits for the house can be obtained from City Hall. Then see how closely the site plan corresponds to what was actually built. Once you have all that info, you can contact a landscape architect who has worked in your area. Give the lanscape architect a budget range up front. You can do things in stages.

It’s a one car garage. And a small one car garage sized house. With a perfectly serviceable driveway that is proportionate and fits the house’s designed one car garage function. If you want larger and grander, it’s time for the move up house.

Not this.

Good advice to find out if there are zoning issues.

People need to understand that small lots require imagination.

Another idea, maybe just enough extra room to pass car a with car b so you don’t need to play ‘move the cars’ every work day.

Parking cars in tandem and having to move one is not really a hardship. In most cities, having a garage and off-street parking is a luxury. And it’s free and doesn’t require permitting.

Whatever its configuration,, make any additional parking or driving area a permeable and attractive surface. More like a courtyard or extension of the lawn. I saw so many variations of this recently in Beverly Hills, California. Pavers sunk in the lawn that you mow over would seem to work fine for you.

How many vehicles are you trying to park on your driveway?

It looks like you can park 2 vehicles on your current driveway now from the pic you show in the OP.

If you need more parking, then I agree with live_wire - it's time to move to a more suitable property that will meet your needs.

From a design perspective, the best idea is to make a two car parking area in the lawn. Then the driveway can be used for turning in and out and a possible third parking space if not set too close to the house. It's actual positioning in the yard would depend on your needs.

Yes you need to know town zoning rules, but you are in California and a two car parking space of permeable decomposed granite or gravel can easily act as the negative, open space of a garden that a lawn provides. Not being a constructed hardscape, the town rules may have a lot less to say about it. The garden planted around this space could be the plain old lawn or most anything California gardens can do.

Park the longest of your cars where you usually do for maximum convenience for exiting the vehicle nearest the sidewalk -- WITHOUT blocking the access to the sidewalk.

Two feet behind that vehicle create a parking space on the left side of your driveway at least as long as your longest car. Then on the right side of the driveway adjacent to the fence, widen the pavement from the beginning/road end of that parking parking spot all the way up the the front of that first car you parked.

Then, one car can come in and park in the parking slot whether or not the second car is already there and a second car can come in and park by the sidewalk to the porch whether or not there is a car already in the middle parking space on the left.

If paving the new parking area is not yet in your budget, you could go ahead and dig out the grass and dirt in the area you want for your parking spaces, outline that entire area (and for curb appeal, the rest of your driveway) with pavers and add gravel where you dug out the dirt and grass.

Hi all, thank you so much for all your inputs. I did not know about easements, I will check those. I made a drawing to avoid confusion regarding the curved driveway, I certainly don't intend to make it like large houses, but just a semi-circle extension of the current one like so:

How does this look?

We live in a really expensive housing market and I wish moving to a bigger house was a luxury we could afford :) Also public transportation is bad in this area so we both need our cars to commute to work. We can currently park two in tandem but that becomes an issue some mornings and evenings.

@Christopher CNC if time permits, can I request you to quickly sketch a rough drawing of what you were proposing. I am very curious about your solution but its hard to imagine entirely. Thanks a lot!

Also @kitasei if you could share a link to what you were proposing that will be great.

In general, what is a good resource to decide on pavers / trees for Northern California climate? Are there any community non profit groups that give you the know how on trees?

Thanks a lot everyone!

The Sunset books are an excellent resource. There are rules in many California cities about how much of your front yard you can pave or cover with semi-permeable things.

Some jurisdictions now have rules on total impermeable surface as a percentage of total land area. That would include your roof, patios, driveway, etc. Start by consulting a land-use expert for your area.

Once you know the possibilities for parking, landscaping should be much easier.

Inline and street parking is just a fact of urban life. Be glad you have off street parking at all.

Perhaps parking on the street will be more appealing for your family if you create a paved walkway from the sidewalk to the front door. It would add both curb appeal and function.

It is hard to tell what exactly is happening out in your street. It looks urban and complicated. Your curve of extra parking space into the lawn does just that. It gives you two parking spaces. Do you really want to have to back out on to the street?

Making a designated, permeable, two car parking area in the current lawn space, which looks plenty big enough, will make it much more functional for the cars and you. You will be able to turn around and leave facing forward. A nice California landscape that screens the parking area and the apartment signs across the street is not that complicated. Not parking a car directly in front of the tiny garage on a regular basis will make for even better curb and front entry appeal.

At this point there are too many unknowns about the site to get specific. It is an idea that would have to be adjusted to conditions that exist.

Thanks @Christopher CNC It is a one way street, yes. It is a very low traffic street though typically. However using your design does give us the nice turn and leave facing front feature. and leaves plenty of space for landscaping and the cars are not immediately visible from the front door, we can plant tall hedges around the parking perimeter, how will that look? It's an unconventional design but definitely more functional. My hope is that it does not affect the resale value of the house.

Also what do you mean by unpaved permeable? That I don't make a driveway there but just add mulch? Thanks

Tall hedges sound dull and boring. A mixed planting of small trees, shrubs, perennial flowers and groundcovers would be a lot more attractive. Well done it would increase the resale value. More concrete slapped onto an existing driveway would be far more likely to hurt the value.

Permeable means rain water can be absorbed into the ground. There are a lot of ways to do that. Unless you are planning some million dollar makeover that includes replacing the existing concrete driveway, a paved surface of any kind for this new parking area would seem unnecessary and more likely to get the city and state involved.

https://www.google.com/search?q=parking+pavers+with+grass&rlz=1CDGOYI_enUS703US704&oq=parking+pavers&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0l3.6924j0j4&hl=en-US&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8

this is my first attempt to post a link. Hope it’s right!

With tall hedges, you risk impairing visibility. If you want to outline your driveway/parking space, simple paving stones and/or low growing plants (think .... liriope) would be well worth considering.

Rather than a hedge that can outgrow the space between fence and driveway, there you might consider a row of rectangle box planters, each with a trellis.

You could do a permeable driveway. See how much your area allows. I would think California would like to have mostly water friendly landscaping.

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If your lot is large/wide enough, you could consider creating a half circle beside your driveway that resembles parallel stepping stones. You'd create a half circle planting area in the middle.

This would be the least complicated way to increase the parking potential of your driveway -- just add the space on the left and more centered in the length of your driveway:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8th2J3c88mU

How wide is your lot? Based on photos provided it really doesn't look big enough for two cars.

If I were you I would redo the driveway with beautiful paving stones and focus on landscaping. The idea of fruit trees is great but don't forget they won't stay green year round. I wonder if mixing in a few evergreens would help to keep things looking good?

In terms of the building across the street you could find out how high of a fence you can build or where on your lot line the a row of shrubs could be planted.

The simplest, cheapest way to get an additional parking space would be to do as follows:

You wouldn't get a dedicated turnaround space, but it's less paving and not broadside to. the house.

This or what Christopher did are your best options. However, cities can be very particular about drives and parking in front yards. You need to check with them before designing in order to know what is allowed.

Another option would be to widen the drive all the way to the street. You'd need to cut the curb in order to make the apron wider. But this would be much easier for drivers to use.

It would be a mistake to surround the parking area with shrubs. They would obscure view to the house, especially the entrance and make the parking seem confined and tight. Even low plants would seem like a trip hazard. The best bet would be to run grass lawn to the edge of the drive. Since no one would be walking beyond the right side of drive, you could make that strip bordering the property line into a planting bed, so long as plant growth doesn't extend into the drive area. There is also an opportunity to plant at the house foundation and near the left side property line. An "island" could be at the left side, fore portion of the drive if that is worked out in the planting scheme.

Or this.

A lot of people are saying no shrubs which o find super interesting. Almost every house on my street has a row of shrubs near the edge of their lot for privacy. We and one neighbour are basically the only two houses without. People do it to have more privacy in their front yard without a fence. Super common

This is not a no shrubs in the larger landscape, it is no shrubs lining the parking space. Getting in and out of cars is not enhanced by shrub sized plants close by or pretty much anything that can't be stepped on. It is about designing for a parking lot, for function first.

Ah gotcha. I was suggesting shrubs along width of lot to create a visual barrier from the building

As long as you trim the shrubs so they're not scratching the car paint and/or limiting walking/parking area, they're a good idea.

If you want a finished driveway right away, decide on the size and shape you want and contact a pro. Or spend a lot of time watching You Tube vids until you have a good idea what you're doing. There are things you can do do minimize your cost ... digging out the place to pour the concrete yourself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cttBwkR-FK0

If you dig yourself and end up creating a raised curb on the fence side with cap blocks outlining the driveway and soil you remove from the yard, put a barrier against the bottom of the fence and any sod you add beside the fence to guard against fence rust and erosion of the sod through the fence.

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Suncast-Dig-In-40-Ft-Resin-Edging-Black-Plastic-Landscape-Edging-Roll/1000573709?cm_mmc=shp--c--prd--lwn--google--lia--236--landscapefabricandlawnedging--1000573709-_-0&placeholder=null&ds_rl=1286981&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI4sH1z7bH8AIVAY3ICh25lg2aEAQYASABEgKjovD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

If you decide to add gravel where you dug out the sod rather than pouring concrete), driving on the gravel will pack it down over time and you can make a point of driving over all of it and packing all of it down (not just one row of tracks), then add more gravel as you pack it down.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cttBwkR-FK0

Just what I needed, to read this discussion. I have a similar driveway, i usually reverse into driveway,  am leaning towards reinforcing a triangle shaped section with honeycomb plastic + stepping stone pavers with a raised bed between house and new space, so view from house less of the cars.