Methuen, MA Parking Rules: RV & Boat Parking (2026)

The rule is § 6.2(E)(4) of the Methuen Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance, the zoning law adopted by the Methuen City Council. It sits in subsection E, titled yard requirements for all districts, so it applies in every zoning district in the City of Methuen, residential or commercial. The sentence is flat: no front yard shall be used for the open storage of boats, vehicles, travel trailers or any other equipment. The closing words, any other equipment, reach beyond boats and travel trailers to anything stored in the open. The quoted sentence does not carve out driveways or set a time limit, so a question about a particular driveway goes to the Building Commissioner.

The same sentence adds a rule for Business and Industrial Districts. When a front yard is used for parking there, a fifteen-foot landscaped strip must be provided adjacent to the street right-of-way line. Subsection E(1) and E(2) also tie corner lots to the front yard: where a side yard or a rear yard is adjacent to a street, the requirement equals the distance specified for the front yard setback.

Trailers have their own section. Under § 5.5, trailers and mobile homes are not to be used as dwellings, places of business or places of storage, with exceptions. Trailers used on construction projects as offices or places of storage, and a trailer used as a temporary dwelling on the site of a single-family residence destroyed or made uninhabitable by fire or other catastrophe, need a permit from the Building Commissioner. They can stay only for the time limit stated on the permit, and a new permit is needed when that time expires. Legally existing trailers and mobile homes continue as a nonconforming use on the existing site.