More E-mail, Fewer Mailboxes

mikesd81 writes "Over at the Baltimore Sun there is an article about the post office removing those blue corner mail boxes because of e-mail. From the article: 'As more people send e-mails and pay bills online, the decline in first-class mail is forcing the U.S. Postal Service to remove tens of thousands of underused mailboxes from city streets.' The article goes on to say that the boxes were an American icon: 'You recognize them in Chicago, you recognize them in D.C., you recognize them in Florida, you recognize them in Montana,' Pope said. 'It's a piece of American iconography that has a wonderful history behind it.'" What the article forgets to mention: they're like an American TARDIS for children.

Comments

Mailbox Graveyard?

[gbulmash]

What TFA doesn't address is what they'll do with the mailboxes. Will they auction them off to collectors, recycle the metal, or will there just be a huge stack of retired mailboxes three rows over from the Ark of the Covenant in some warehouse somewhere?

Less mailboxes, more kiosks please

[rolfwind]

Of course 1st class letters are dropping, who sends letters these days besides junkmail and bills? Not many. I can only think of birthday/holiday/invitation cards being the only regular use these days.

But the sending of priority mail and boxes must be up with ebay and all that. I wish the post office opened more small kiosks around the place, in strip malls, supermarkets and such, every time I go into a main branch it is a long wait. It would be profitable for them, especially as they are cheaper than the competition.

Re:So what?

[ottothecow]

Not a pay-phone mind you...he said a pay phone booth which is quite a rarity these days.

About a year ago my roommate was interviewing for a job and one of the questions they gave him was "how many phone booths are in manhattan." I think they may have told him how many blocks tall and wide manhattan is but that was it. Being the very mathematical person he is he simply took the area and guessed at how many phone booths there would be per square block.

When he told me this though, my initial response was zero--they have gotten rid of them all since everyone has cell phones and its cheaper to maintain payphones that are not inside booths (like those in building lobbies). We did some quick research on it and found a site where soemone had documented the last remaining manhatten phone booths...there were 4 of them. 4 in the largest city in the country.