I would have gone with cement barricades.

Yeah, a man would've built a moat.

FTFA "Sometimes her children or even the folks who hit the fence help her rebuild"

sometimes ?

ouch

// people suck (not her, or her kids)
/ at driving and personal responsibility

She needs those concrete planters designed to thwart car bombs.

I blame the Mexicans. Or the Muslims. Or the Mexican Muslims.

yeah, men wouldnt have crashed into the fence so many times.

/ unless theyre asian
// AMIRITE

Flappyhead: Yeah, a man would've built a moat.

I would have gone with a gravel trap.

Barricade with reactive armor

I think I'd just do away with the fence. Either it is strong enough to withstand the impact, likely killing the idiot motorist, or it just gets broken again.

I understand that the fence looks nice, but after a couple of times, fark that.

buwolverine: Flappyhead: Yeah, a man would've built a moat.

I would have gone with a gravel trap.

I'd have moved the road.

My dad was an artist. About the 5th time our mailbox was vandalized (it had been bashed with bats, and run over a few times) He had a guy come on over with an auger and drill down 12 feet. He put a 4" x4" x 15' square steel post in concrete and topped it with a welded on rural steel mailbox, that had the shell of a regular mailbox inside, encased in concrete. Then he trompe l'oeiled the post to look like a rotten old wooden post.

No more drive bys.

They had to be towed.

We had some friends that lived at the apex of a downhill turn that would wake up and find upside down cars, skid marks etc.. in their yard. So...they built a gigantic concrete wall to start bouncing cars back into the road.
good times

"All I ask is for drivers to slow down," she said.

HOW DARE SHE!!! I'M IMPORTANT AND HAVE TO BE SOMEWHERE! GET OUT OF MY WAY!!!11!!

Just put a car-sized ditch there.

She built a break-away fence. How is this different from what a man would do?

I mean real actual men, not sitcom stereotypes or university aged man-boys.

Vaguely Racist Lawn Ornament: buwolverine: Flappyhead: Yeah, a man would've built a moat.

I would have gone with a gravel trap.

I'd have moved the road,.
/ I refuse to live near a busy road

My guess is that someone will hit one of the stone pillars, be injured, and get a slimy lawyer (redundant??) to sue the woman.

I have a friend who got so tired of people running off the road and taking out his mailbox that he build one on a heavy timber...the TD came along and made him "weaken it" so it would break away.

Flappyhead: Yeah, a man would've built a moat.

Yep, my ditch has caught on average 2 cars a year. We're in a very similar setup to the woman in the story, 40mph state route (where people tend to go 50) with a greater than 90 degree curve.

vudukungfu: My dad was an artist. About the 5th time our mailbox was vandalized (it had been bashed with bats, and run over a few times) He had a guy come on over with an auger and drill down 12 feet. He put a 4" x4" x 15' square steel post in concrete and topped it with a welded on rural steel mailbox, that had the shell of a regular mailbox inside, encased in concrete. Then he trompe l'oeiled the post to look like a rotten old wooden post.

My friend's dad built racing roll cages his shop was in an area frequented by mailbox vandals, he covered his mailbox with a roll cage made from rebar he recovered many broken bats from his yard and hung them on the shop wall as trophies.

vudukungfu: My dad was an artist. About the 5th time our mailbox was vandalized (it had been bashed with bats, and run over a few times) He had a guy come on over with an auger and drill down 12 feet. He put a 4" x4" x 15' square steel post in concrete and topped it with a welded on rural steel mailbox, that had the shell of a regular mailbox inside, encased in concrete. Then he trompe l'oeiled the post to look like a rotten old wooden post.

No more drive bys.

They had to be towed.

Your dad could have been charged with attempted homocide, intentionally placing a dangerous object near the roadside is just dumb. I just put up a plastic mailbox on a 4x4 that sits in a spike in the ground, easy to put back up when a drunk or a snow plow knocks into it.

While the idea of an indestructible death-fence seems appealing, the whole going-to-prison thing that happens when it kills someone doesn't. I would be pressing the county (or state, depending on whose road it is) to put up a guardrail. Obviously it's a dangerous curve, there should be a barrier there to keep people on the damn road. Then the DOT can pull repair duty every time someone hits it.

robodog: Your dad could have been charged with attempted homocide

Every driver he stopped was charged w/ DUI.
Probably saved a life or two.

vudukungfu: My dad was an artist. About the 5th time our mailbox was vandalized (it had been bashed with bats, and run over a few times) He had a guy come on over with an auger and drill down 12 feet. He put a 4" x4" x 15' square steel post in concrete and topped it with a welded on rural steel mailbox, that had the shell of a regular mailbox inside, encased in concrete. Then he trompe l'oeiled the post to look like a rotten old wooden post.

No more drive bys.

They had to be towed.

Haha, yeah, his inconvenience at having to fix the original, easily-broken mailbox totally outweighs the fact that the new one increases the chances of someone being seriously injured or killed. I mean, they were stupid vandalizing kids! Or people who stopped paying attention for a minute! They deserve that.

/known a few people who built such mailboxes
//disliked them all

I probably would have just taken the fence down and left it down. What's the point of a yard fence that's constantly being broken anyway? WHAT IS SHE TRYING TO HIDE IN HER SECRET COMPOUND??!?!

yeah, a man would have stopped rebuilding the damn fence after the 3rd time

what a waste of time and effort

mod3072: While the idea of an indestructible death-fence seems appealing, the whole going-to-prison thing that happens when it kills someone doesn't. I would be pressing the county (or state, depending on whose road it is) to put up a guardrail. Obviously it's a dangerous curve, there should be a barrier there to keep people on the damn road. Then the DOT can pull repair duty every time someone hits it.

You know how I know you did not RTFA? Yeah, DOT said bouncing cars back into oncoming traffic was bad so they would not put one in.

Sounds like a fun Photoshop contest- "Design Kathy's Fence"

legion_of_doo: I blame the Mexicans. Or the Muslims. Or the Mexican Muslims.

They have those??!!??

I use to live on a corner. Trash trucks and others continually cut the corner short and drove through my yard. They left 8" deep ruts that I had to level out each time. I drove angle iron in the ground in that spot and created a tire killer phalanx. It was fun watching them phone in for assistance. It stopped after a while. Boo, ha, ha.......

robodog: vudukungfu: My dad was an artist. About the 5th time our mailbox was vandalized (it had been bashed with bats, and run over a few times) He had a guy come on over with an auger and drill down 12 feet. He put a 4" x4" x 15' square steel post in concrete and topped it with a welded on rural steel mailbox, that had the shell of a regular mailbox inside, encased in concrete. Then he trompe l'oeiled the post to look like a rotten old wooden post.

No more drive bys.

They had to be towed.

Your dad could have been charged with attempted homocide, intentionally placing a dangerous object near the roadside is just dumb. I just put up a plastic mailbox on a 4x4 that sits in a spike in the ground, easy to put back up when a drunk or a snow plow knocks into it.

My dad had the idea once of mounting a mailbox on a playground spring (like they put the rideable horses or fighter jets on) so that when hit it would just spring back but wouldn't kill someone who ran into it. Never put it in action though because our road isn't conducive to baseball bat vandalism. Honestly though, those Rubbermaid mailboxes work fine for being hit. 1 solid piece of nigh unbreakable plastic that's easy to hammer back into place.



But for her case, a shallow moat would actually work great for catching cars with minimal injury to the passengers. Dig it just deep enough that they get stuck when they go off the road.

sounds like she needs a sand barrier. One that the state should pay for.

Better to be rebuilding a fence thirty times than to have a score and a half of cars dropping in on your living room. I have to say I like the gravel pit idea. I wonder if it could be made more decorative somehow.

GORDON: legion_of_doo: I blame the Mexicans. Or the Muslims. Or the Mexican Muslims.

They have those??!!??

You betcha!

ftfa: Shuck said her family has talked to the Kansas Department of Transportation about putting up a guardrail. But the state agency told her the guardrail would be too dangerous because it could throw cars back into the flow of traffic.

Yeah, it's dangerous to deflect the cars back towards the road. Let's have them continue flying towards the house of some old lady instead.

I'll be sad when one of the cars kills the old lady, but I'll be comforted by the massive amount of money her family will get from the state in the lawsuit.

Forget the moat - I'm thinking ramp/pond combo.

Remote Kittens:
Haha, yeah, his inconvenience at having to fix the original, easily-broken mailbox totally outweighs the fact that the new one increases the chances of someone being seriously injured or killed. I mean, they were stupid vandalizing kids!

I have no problem with stupid, vandalizing kids being killed because they were stupid and vandalizing. Especially if they are teens.

GORDON: legion_of_doo: I blame the Mexicans. Or the Muslims. Or the Mexican Muslims.

They have those??!!??

Yeah, that Joe Padilla guy. I hear there's millions of them tunneling over here from China.

/I blame the Chinese.

I've had 19 cars try to go thru my fence in the past 12 years - some successful, most not. Only two ended up with serious injuries. I redesigned my fence to keep 'em from going thru, up across my yard, and into my house. 100% successful so far... closest anything has gotten was when some drunk redneck didn't slow down on purpose (FHP says he was doing 90-100mph) and hit one of the oaks on the edge of the property - car stayed there, pieces came off. Found a headlight about 20 feet from the house (75 yards back from teh fence).

One local drunk has hit my fence 3 times, in 3 different places... he keeps getting more and more thru the curve before impact, so I guess he's got it down now...

robodog: mod3072: While the idea of an indestructible death-fence seems appealing, the whole going-to-prison thing that happens when it kills someone doesn't. I would be pressing the county (or state, depending on whose road it is) to put up a guardrail. Obviously it's a dangerous curve, there should be a barrier there to keep people on the damn road. Then the DOT can pull repair duty every time someone hits it.

You know how I know you did not RTFA? Yeah, DOT said bouncing cars back into oncoming traffic was bad so they would not put one in.

I read some of it, guess I missed that part. My deepest apologies.

I like the rebuildable fence idea. Collect the insurance money, put the old one back together. Repeat, repeat, repeat........

ThisNameSux: I would have gone with cement barricades.

This.

There is a road that passes through the town my grandparents used to live in (East Hampton, CT). This is a main road through the state, traveled heavily by large trucks. As the road passes through town it takes a sudden jog of about 50 feet at a stop light. This is because it goes around a house. Several trucks went through the house, thanks to sleeping, fatigued, etc truck drivers. They eventually put those huge cement blocks around the property line...house has stayed nice, the trucks not so much.

Everyones iron drain pipes are being replaced around here. Set pipes in ground like pickets and fill with concrete. Never replace fence again. It would definitely be a safe fence for me, the home owner.

Track rail mailbox post with 7x7x1/4 box has has been a homerun with mailbox baseball fans for 18 years.