What legal force do "No Ball Games" signs have?

Question

There is a campaign to bring down thousands of “no ball games” signs across London and the UK.

The examples discussed have been put up by a housing association, L&Q, in west London and others are at the Mursell estate in Stockwell. The area that the sign refers to appears to be a right of way outside of residential buildings.

What legal weight, if any, do such signs have?

It is not clear who the right of way is owned by in these specific examples. I do not understand land ownership myself, I think the likely options are the housing association, the local authority or possibly National Highways. If the ownership of the land matters then how it matters would be relevant to the answer.

As pointed out in the comments, the main question is what are the consequence of the presence of such a sign? I am sure it matters if damage is caused, so answers for both if there was no damage and separately if there was accidental damage caused by children playing football would be useful.

score 11 · Answer 1 · edited Mar 19 '25 at 07:17

germany

The land owner or their agents can ban certain uses.

A private owner can ban any use they don't want on their private land. They can tell his agents (such as employees) to enforce the ban. Anyone violating the ban would be a trespasser and could be ordered off the lot and/or removed by police.

Rental common areas are different

A sign purporting to ban playing football in common spaces like the courtyard of the rental or its grass in front does not have any power, unless there is special reasoning to ban such. While you can't ban playing ball in general, such as in the yard on the ground where acoustics do not create a massive noise echo, special circumstances and safety concerns can lead to a ban. As such, it would be allowed to ban playing ball in a rooftop yard that lacks high fences to retain the ball, because it would be dangerous to players and the general public that could be hit by balls falling from the roof here. Similarly, a narrow central court that echos a lot could be such special circumstances.

Enforcement is tricky, as most such signs are wholly unenforceable. Even where they would be, usually violators of such a ban at worst get a stern talk and/or are sent home.

Also note, that not every grass area is by default for common use: If the area is not designated to be allowed for use in the rental agreement, or designated to just be for decoration, then it is by default not allowed to be used for play and not a common area.

Cities control ordinances

Cities often can assign city owned land as a playground. Often enough those have zones where ball games are banned - and then the police can intervene and even leverage a fine of up to 25 €. The reasoning why such an ordinance is allowed is, that ball games can endanger smaller kids, and thus banning those games for more grown-up kids on smaller kids' playgrounds is in the interest of keeping the area safe for those smaller kids.

score 7 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 18 '25 at 19:56

The controller can restrict activities on their property

It’s more important in these circumstances to determine who has control of the land rather than who owns the land, noting that multiple people might be a controller.

Assuming that the sign was put up by a valid controller then ball games are a prohibited activity. People who break the rules here may be asked to stop or to leave as they have broken an explicit condition of the licence the controller has given them to be on the land. If they continue after being so asked, they are trespassing.

Unless the prohibition arises under a government ordinance that prescribes a fine, offenders cannot be subjected to any punishment. However, if their prohibited activities cause damage, they can be sued.

score 5 · Answer 3 · answered Mar 19 '25 at 09:10

Signs in themselves don't have legal force. If there's no legal order restricting the activities allowed, then the sign is merely a request.

That said, nuisance behaviour (disturbing occupants by hitting balls against their walls, particularly at night) can be dealt with by police regardless of whether or not the residents have made their polite request or not.