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Do you have washing lines in the US?

Captain Shaw

Captain Shaw

Vice Admiral
Premium Member
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/22/20091118/tod-oukoe-uk-usa-laundry-bfe916c.html
Carin Froehlich pegs her laundry to three clotheslines strung between trees outside her 18th-century farmhouse, knowing that her actions annoy local officials who have asked her to stop
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Just a quick question here in the UK everyone who has a garden hangs there washing out and only uses the dryer if the weather is bad.
Does everyone in the US only use a dryer to dry there clothes because i would think that would be a waste of money when it comes to the electric bill:confused:
 
Lots of people in the US use clotheslines. I use my dryer because I don't like how crunchy the clothes are when they come off the line, plus it's a pain in the ass to hang them. I have no idea how much money it costs to use the dryer. My electric bill is anywhere from $150 to $350 USD per month depending on the time of year, for a roughly 3,000 sq. ft., 90-year-old energy-inefficient house. I think energy is cheaper here in general than in Europe and the UK.
 
I'm in the U.S., and most people seem to use the dryer for everything.

I don't have one, being a poor college student in cheap housing, but at my mother's house I never once hung up clothes to dry, and rarely met anyone who did.
 
I use a dryer, but when I lived in the Mojave Desert in Southern California, I used a line all the time because...because it's so dry there that the clothes dry just as fast as they would in the dryer, and they smell nice, too.

I don't have a clothesline here, though some of my neighbors do, and they use them as well. But there are housing developments where clotheslines aren't allowed, which seems pretty dang silly to me.

I also dislike that crunchy feel that Kes7 mentions that some clothes get on the line. Sheets are OK, but towels are not.
 
If you want to soften towels after hanging them on the line, just stick them in the dryer for five minutes :)


Yeah, what JustKate said is true - there are housing developments that think clotheslines are unsightly so they don't allow them - there might also be city councils who ban them too along the same lines. I read a natural living community on LiveJournal the people there are often complaining that they aren't allowed to dry outside.

Which reminds me, I need to get my inside line up so I can start drying inside on a line rather than using the dryer - solve the problem of the dry air from the heating being on while I'm at it!
 
People have them. I have never used them. Where I live, outside is not particularly clean and there are all sorts of smells that can get into them, birds that can shit on them, and people who can steal them. Also, drying things makes them soft and wrinkle-free. The few things that I do have that can't be tumble dried still get tossed in for 15 minutes on fluff to make them wearable.
 
Fairly common place back in the 80's. But in the 90's they started disappearing with cheaper and more dependable dryers.
 
We used to have one at our old house about 15 years ago.

I can't see using one now. I hate doing laundry to begin with; why would I want to make it more complicated?
 
trampledamage said:
If you want to soften towels after hanging them on the line, just stick them in the dryer for five minutes :)
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Yup. And use fabric softener. The money you save from using the dryer less with more than pay for the extra cost. It's a great balance.


As far as the NIMBY aspect, it's things like that, that can really piss me off about the US.
 
I would be interested in what sort of line those that use clothesline use. In Australia the majority of homes, including mine, have a rotary clothesline.

clothesline2.jpg
 
We aren't allowed to have them here; part of the HOA rules. But I have never used a clothesline in my life. We always had a dryer; it was just far more convenient. I could do laundry at any time of the day, or in any weather. Plus, where I live now is horrendously humid. If you hung your clothes out to dry, you would have a very, very long wait.
 
We have rotary at home too, but my Nan has one strung up between two trees.
 
RoJoHen said:
^That's the kind we used to have at our old house.
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Did you know that they are an Australian invention?

Rotary clothesline are great. You can even buy covers for them so that you can clothes can dry in the rain. The covers also protect your clothes from bird droppings and when the cover is on the line, minus clothes, can be used as a large sun umbrella.

I don't have a cover for my line.
 
I hang my delicates on a folding drying rack that I place on my apartment balcony, but I use a dryer for everything else. I find that most things turn out just fine either way, but the dryer is more convenient. Plus, it cuts down on ironing.
 
trampledamage said:
Which reminds me, I need to get my inside line up so I can start drying inside on a line rather than using the dryer - solve the problem of the dry air from the heating being on while I'm at it!
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Where would you put up a line inside? over the bathtub or in the basement?
 
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