That’s cute! Reminds me of what the pizza delivery guys used to ride in New York City back in the 60’s. And maybe they still do.
I forgot to mention the all-on-one-side rule. On almost every street with curbside boxes, all the boxes are on the same side of the street. The folks who live on the other side have to cross the street to get the mail. On a busy street, this is probably a hassle.
I live in the middle of a city, which is in the middle of a buncha other cities.
Urban life can be pretty cool too. 
And no mad bombers.
That didn’t make any difference to the Unabomber’s victims. They lived in cities.
Did they? Most worked in cities IIRC, but I have no idea where they lived.
Some folks where I work (oil company) are still a little jumpy about opening their mail. I’m not sure why.
I yakked about this thread with my mail carrier this PM. He once worked rural in central CA. He said he preferred city because there are more people to talk to.
Unabomber victims
- 1978: Chicago area.
- 1979: Chicago area.
- 1979: American Airlines flight, Chicago to New York.
- 1980: Chicago area.
- 1981: Salt Lake City, Utah.
- 1982: Nashville, Tennessee.
- 1982: Berkeley, California.
- 1985: Berkeley, California.
- 1985: Seattle area.
- 1985: Ann Arbor, Michigan.
- 1985: Sacramento, California.
- 1987: Salt Lake City.
- 1993: San Francisco area.
- 1993: New Haven, Connecticut.
- 1994: Newark, NJ area.
- 1995: Sacramento.
Jeeze, Walloon, all this because the unabomber was a ruralite?
I realize that not all people who live out in the “country”, away from cities, are weirdos.
Did I somehow insult you? We’re mostly talking about mailboxes, right? You’re annoyed because my mailman, as is typical of city dwellers, is friendly, huh.
No, I was just puzzled why you assumed that living in a city somehow removed you from being affected by mad bombers. Whether or not “mad bombers” (i.e., Ted K., al-Qaeda) live in rural areas or not, their victims lived and worked in large cities.
None here, either. In fact, I don’t think there’s ever been a mail bomb, truck bomb, or car bomb within at least a hundred miles of here. There was some Unabomber twit that lived in this state, but he was a long way away.
Yes, carriers can take outgoing mail. That’s what the little red flag is for on curbside boxes, to alert them that you have an outgoing item in the box.
But they are not REQUIRED to, isn’t that the case?
The way I understand it is that carriers who drive their routes will pick up outgoing mail (these mailboxes are the ones that have the flag to indicate outgoing mail). Carriers who walk their routes are not required to pick up outgoing mail, and usually doorside boxes (like mine) don’t have the flags anyway. This makes sense because a walking carrier is not as easily able to pick up and carry everyone’s outgoing mail as someone with a truck. I don’t know if the ones who drive are actually required to pick up mail but I have never heard of one who didn’t.
My walking carrier is kind and will pick up outgoing mail, I will leave an envelope or 2 in the box and I just stand them upright so he can tell they are to go out. However I try not to take advantage and don’t do this if I have a bulky item or a bunch of cards or invitations or something; then I drop them at the nearest corner mailbox. We also make sure to clear a path for him in the winter, my husband will snowblow a path through the yard from the neighbor’s so he doesn’t have to return to the sidewalk and back up the driveway in between.
Um, yes, that’s true, but not relevant to the situation. At all.
I was speaking of a multiunit set of boxes in the lobby of an apartment building. Like this, or, in an older version, this - no little red flags for us, and no obvious place to put outgoing mail at all. I suspect the answer is that we’re just supposed to put in a blue box on the street, which is fine when it’s your own mail you’re sending, but I don’t think most people will take that effort for some stranger’s mail that’s been misdelivered.
Like Exano, I delivered mail one summer, 1974, in Springfield Gardens, Queens. The carrier has a key that opens the apartment style boxes. I don’t remember ever picking up mail from an aprtment - I did from houses all the time. We have a slot that goes to a box in our garage, the carrier picks up mail we leave in the slot. I never thought that we had the option not to pick up the mail.
I don’t remember ever delivering to a curbside box. I didn’t have a cute truck, though.
Personally I like mailslots. The boxes I hated looked like this Any decent amount of mail was hard to cram in the little slot, and it was hard to cram a lot of magazines in the holder.
The prohibition against putting flyers in mailboxes is longstanding. When I was in the Boy Scouts we delivered flyers for our sponsoring organization, and we were strongly instructed not to put them in mailboxes. I have never gotten a flyer in my mail slot, either now or at the house I grew up in.
Nah, no assumption here. I was only stating that we also get pretty good mail service, right here in the city. Many people make the mistaken assumption that everyone in the city is an old grouch, who won’t do anything nice. I’m here to pop that little bubble.
The “Mad Bomber” thing was meant as a little joke, and made no clain regarding bombing victims. I only made an observation regarding bombers, who don’t seem to like city life.
Remember, suburb = rural. 
Let’s give this back to the mailbox folks, whaddya say?
My old house here in New England had a mail slot. Most houses here have a ‘storm door’, A thin outside door that you can put either glass or a screen in depending on the season. There was a small draft from the mail slot but nothing major.
When I had a mail slot the carrier would take outgoing mail if we left it hanging out the mail slot but I am not sure if it was something the carrier had to do.
Now I have a communal mailbox 
I made a plug, out of dense foam, that I use in cold weather in my mail slot. It works fine.
I cut a piece of thin walnut about 1/2 in. larger on all sides than the slot, rounded the edges, sanded and polyied it, then glued it to the snug fitting foam which is about as thich as the door. Looks pretty good, actually. I only have to remember to take it out in the am, and to put it back after the mail comes. If I do forget, the carrier can push it out (in, actually) from the outside.
I’m so proud. 
Patent pending, BTW.
Having served in the USPS and now living in New Zealand, I’d like to say that NZ’s got it right. Admail is virtually all delivered by independent contractors (local kids and stay-at-home moms mostly). If you don’t want it, you put a sign on your receptacle saying so. Unfortunately, the USPS is too addicted to the revenue generated by admail to let this happen. We get 3-4 pieces of mail a week here, I used to get 5-10 a day in the States.
The “Posties” deliver mostly by bicycle here, and all receptacles have to be within arm’s reach of the footpath (out by the road) so they don’t have to dismount.
I used to hate delivering to those CBUs (we called 'em NBUs - Neighborhood Box Units). Yeah, faster and more efficient, but no interaction with customers, and you lost your thermal inertia in winter standing there for so long. Plus there’s never enough parcel lockers. One route I was subbing on had been covered by different people for a week or so. I noticed the parcel lockers hadn’t been opened in a couple of days and started looking through the mailboxes. Sure enough, one resident had gone on holiday without filling out a hold form. Wedged under five Wall Street Journals were three parcel locker keys.
If I had more parcels than lockers, I would attempt house delivery, then notify for office pickup. In certain neighborhoods I’d leave it if it wasn’t “accountable” mail.
I would always pick up reasonable amounts of outgoing mail from any residence or business. But I drew the line at heavy parcels marked “refused”, almost always book clubs. Hey, you didn’t send the card in on time, you hump it to the Post Office!
Johnny LA, if your carrier is not attempting delivery, notify the carrier supervisor. This is just slack. Unless, like Podkayne, your landlord hasn’t plowed the drive.
kunilou, I rather enjoyed cutting through yards - sod is easier on the knees than concrete. It was some patrons who had a problem with this - the same suspender-wearing guys who yell “You kids get off my lawn!” We had orange cards to stick in the mail for the subs so we didn’t get yelled at. Also, at route-inspection time, when the supervisors followed each carrier timing every move, the staunch union guys would slow down and cross no lawns. Coming in under time meant more area added to your route.
Doorslots behind storm doors were the bane of my existence. As another poster pointed out, fighting the storm door from one side and the mailbag on the other , holding a bundle of mail in one hand and trying to slide 8 letters, five catalogs and a magazine through a one inch by five inch slot with the other - ARGH.
capn
My current flat block was built shortly after the war, and all the doors have (now disused) mailboxes right next to them; all mail is delivered to a central mailbox reef.
My house in Virginia was 1/2 mile from its mailbox – and then 20 miles, as we ended up renting a PO Box in town because the rural route postmen were becoming increasingly flaky and unreliable (that particular route was 80 miles long, and they couldn’t keep drivers very long.), plus people would steal stuff all the time.
I actualy like my CBU. The CBU is on the same side of the street and only one lawn away. (My street has boxes on both sides. There are some single dwelling boxes and some CBUs)
The think I like is that my mail is locked. The CBU has an outgoing slot (tho I usually mail from work). If I get a package too big, the mailmain puts it on my front porch. (tho most of my packages are UPS/FedEx)
I liked my single dwelling boxes tho too. One we had was only 4 buildings from “downtown” but considered a rural route (tho we had an actual address, not a RR #). One could do things like buy stamps from the mailbox (not sure how) (tho it was silly since the post office was 1/2 mile away)
Brian