An attempt to thwart the vandals

The new mailbox is up. Actually I had it up tuesday, but the story's not that simple—as usual with me. (See my previous blog entry for the first part of this sordid tale.) For saturday and monday I had the mail carrier deliver my mail to the neighbors and if I had anything to send out, I just took it to the post office myself.

As the saying goes a pic is worth a thousand words, so if you want to skip the following thousand words (Note: exactly [!] one thousand beginning with the next paragraph according to MS Word) of longwinded explanation just click the thumbnail at left to view the larger image. Then you can skim the rest (or not) as you see fit.

The old post was still usable as (surprisingly) it did not get too damaged. The steel bracket on the top of the bottom part—the post is actually two pieces, the part in the ground and the part that mounts on top of that—had been bent when the vandals forced it out. I was able to hammer the bracket back into shape, so I didn't have to buy a new post, just an actual mailbox to sit on top.

Still, I didn't want to just put the thing right back where it was since obviously it's an attractive target (has been for years). I also didn't want to spend an enormous amount of money on one that's allegedly vandal-proof because I feel that no matter how strong it is, they'll still find something to do to it if they really want to go to the effort. If all else fails they could even simply steal it.

So I decided on a reasonably cheap box, but not the cheapest. I could have gotten one for as little as six bucks, but that would have been the minimum standard size and I wanted the next larger size (just like what was destroyed) because I find it's good for full letter-sized envelopes (and occasional packages).

Within the last year or two Verizon had replaced the telephone pole in front of the house. I figure since it's so new, it should be safe to place the mailbox right next to that for some protection. As an added bonus the new pole is bigger than the old one, so it provides a better vandal block.

The pole obviously can only provide protection from one direction though. I hope the pole will also discourage the jackasses from pushing the mailbox post with their vehicle in efforts to dislodge it, but it would still be open to attack by thrown objects. I would think the vandals should also be discouraged from that as well since any objects thrown might ricochet off the telephone pole and back at them, but on the other hand I can't give them that much credit in the brains department or they wouldn't be out causing mindless mayhem in the first place.

So I pondered what to do. I bought three 7' steel fence posts and lined them up alongside the new mailbox (the side opposite the telephone pole of course). I had a semi-plan floating around in my head for something I wanted to try to do, but until I could figure it out satisfactorily I rigged up a temporary "net." I wove a clothes line as best I could in and out of the three fence posts to create a barrier which I hoped would at least minimize the impact of thrown objects, all the while hoping it wouldn't be put to the test. Part of the problem with any improvised protection system is that the mailbox flag (and the house number on the post) must remain visible so there needs to be some measure of transparency to any barrier—either that or the front part of the mailbox must remain exposed and vulnerable.

Today I figured I was ready to take a stab at implementing my envisioned idea, so I removed the improvised net and installed my possibly crazy or useless "better" protection solution.

I had some old wire fencing on hand which had been previously used around flower beds once in a while, but not actually used in ages. I had two kinds... a newer better-looking green one or a not-so-hot looking older gray one. Despite the lack of aesthetic appeal the older one was made of the sturdier wire, so I went with that.

I had to cut two 5' fence sections and overlap them some because otherwise it just wasn't wide enough to span the length of the mailbox. I got three 2' metal crosspieces and mounted two of them across the three steel fence posts. The bottom one is mounted such that the fencing is between it and the posts and starts just below the bottom of the mailbox. The top crosspiece just provides a "corner/bend" for the fencing to wrap over and across the top of the mailbox.

On the other side, between the mailbox and the telephone pole, I placed two really old, but really sturdy 5.5' steel fence posts (rusted though they may be). I mounted the third metal crosspiece at the top of those two posts in such a way as to hold the wire fencing in place. The fencing then continues down a little bit on the outside of those two posts. I secured it down below on that side with some wire since the posts didn't have bolt holes down there. The telephone pole should block anything coming towards the mailbox anyway, so I didn't worry too much about super-securely fastening things on that side down low. I really just needed a way to secure the fencing over top of the mailbox in an effort to minimize blows from directly above.

The idea behind this "cage" was to try to find a good balance between vandal protection vs. implementation cost. As I say, I think that whatever I do the vandals will always be able to cause damage if they really want to go to the trouble. I'm hoping that this new position and the protective cage will just make the effort not worth it for them. On the other hand it could make them determined to do even more damage. Who knows?... But I had to try something, otherwise I may as well just paint a target on the box.

The cage is designed not necessarily to prevent damage altogether (although it would be nice), but instead to try to minimize damage so that repairs can be made more easily and cheaply.

There's still a chance that someone from the post office will declare my rig unacceptable for some reason, but I'm hoping there won't be any issues.