Comments

1
I line dry everything. I'm convinced it is less damaging for my clothes.
2
You will tear my clotheslines out of my cold dead hands!

Global warming is NOW, children on the City Council!

Not tomorrow. TODAY.
3
A tip for option 3. If you can't stand the crunch, tumble dry for a few minutes after you like dry. That's a tiny fraction of the energy of drying clothes completely, with the fluffy softness of machine dried clothes.
4
There was a time when putting clean clothes outside to dry risked only the occasional bird poop. Now, there are so many poisons in the air that putting air dried sheets and clothes next to your skin is probably carcinogenic.
5
@4, then I assume you only go outside nude to keep your clothing from picking up carcinogens.
6
I find clotheslines to be aesthetically very pleasing.
7
How do you assholes always manage to make polls where every single answer is ridiculous? I like line drying, and I think caterwauling about your RIGHT TO DO IT is goddamn stupid.
8
Why is this even a discussion in Seattle? For 2/3 of the year, it's too wet and cold for your clothes to ever fully dry, and if you actually have the space to put your clothes on a line, that means you own your own home and can do what you want. To frame this as a climate change issue just makes one look ridiculous.

Also, you could have warned us that the ridiculous site for this campaign (replete with bare HTML on its front page and childish sound effects) automatically starts playing hillbilly music.
9
How is line drying even a viable option here? It's raining or misting so often. (This is an actual inquiry, not trolling.)
10
@ 8, as long as clothes dryers use tons of energy, you bet your ass it's a climate change issue.
11
Clotheslines, schmotheslines. When I were a lad, everyone in Seattle had a clothes drying tree in their back yard. They were great fun to play with, spin around, pinch your sister with the clothes pins, etc. Not so fun in the winter when daddy would take it down and you'd kick the concrete ground sleeve with your foot while running.
12
I agree with #4. In our non-cold months, I keep the window open, and I'm always amazed at the crud that accumulates on my window sills -- crud that would be gathering on my clothes if I line-dried them.
13
@8 and @9 are right - and this legally binding Slog poll should have one more option to reflect the obvious:

"WFT - are you kidding? If you hang clothes on a line in Seattle they'll never get dry!"
14
@8 In many places, clotheslines are pulleyed between apartments across an alley. Not so much here.

I hang some clothes up inside all year, using a simple clothes rod hung near my dryer. But I admit I hang clothes up for all of a month or two outside in our short summers, when I'm confident rain isn't on its way.
15
@7 are you new to Slog?
16
I am against clotheslines, as they lead to kitchens. And we all know what happens then.
17
@13,

Or they might eventually get dry, but they'll smell like mildew.

I was line drying everything except my towels and sheets until my boyfriend moved in. His clothes are so large and heavy, there's no way they can get dry without smelling like mildew. So we dry his clothes in the dryer, and since the dryer's running anyway, we throw my clothes in there too.

I'm a little conflicted about the law, I think mainly because I don't want to see people's gross granny panties/torn up boxers.
18
If your cause is righteous your eagle should be shedding a tear.
19
I hang most of my clothes off my canopy bed. I dry sheets and towels because it would take forever and I don't have enough space around the bed. Maybe I need a king size bed?
21
In the 1950's-60's City Light (and every other utility) was really pushing electric dryers, and there was a campaign to portray clotheslines as old-fashioned. My late chum Mary Norris (City Light's Home Economist) spoke out against them in her TV show and newspaper column.

But it should be noted that the electric dryer was the last in a string of improvements in what had previously been a hateful, thankless process. It may be quaint now, but it was a pain to do laundry before electricity - particularly before the thermostatically controlled water heater.
22
Clothing has a chance to get dry in the weather we have?
23
@10: And you're welcome to pursue that, but be aware that people will generally dismiss you as being some crunchy hippie (and not just because your clothes will be crunchy) because most are not aware it's such a power suck. It would probably be more effective to point out how much they cost in electricity relative to everything else that's on a lot more.
24
A modern high-efficiency washer makes your dryer more efficient by rinsing and spinning clothes more thoroughly, meaning less dryer time (if you use the dying sensor option, rather than the timed option. The timed option is for Republicans)

Also, the medium setting works just as well as the high setting for the dryer heat.

Lastly, make sure you clean the lint trap EVERY time you use it. And clean the vent hose every six months or so. Take the front off of the dryer and vacuum it put annually. All of this will make your dryer more efficient, and help reduce the danger of fires.
25
@24 all great advice.

"vacuum it out annually" Almost thought I was in the wrong thread.
26
Oh me and my fumblefingers....
27
@13 and others before and after you: have you ever heard of a place called Japan, where the humidity is ever so much higher than Seattle?
Have you ever noticed how much they rely on line-drying there? It's a fuck of a lot.
28
That website looks a bit too professional to be believed. I suspect it's astroturf backed by the clothespin lobby. Just a theory, but someone needs to investigate.
29
After reading this I walked around the Ravenna and Bryant Park areas looking for cloths lines. I only seen 3 that were up in anyone's yards.

Growing up on Gallifrey everyone didn't have the tree, but most everyone had the two crosses with the lines stretched out between them. they worked great.
30
@ 23, I can't believe they don't have refrigerators on that page.

Anyway, don't worry about the crunch of my laundry. As others have suggested, you can finish them in the dryer on the no heat cycle (called air fluff on older models) - five minutes is sufficient, and it doesn't blow off that wonderful line-dried smell.

That said, I never line dried in Seattle. I was always an apt. dweller during my time there, so there weren't any clotheslines. (I had to flat dry sweaters, but that was always indoors.)

@ 27, is Japan sunnier than Seattle? Direct sun is the most important thing for line drying. Laundry dries faster when it's 50º and sunny than 70º but cloudy.
31
If you really want to know how much your appliances cost, check out a kill-a-watt from the Seattle Public Library, plug the appliance your are interested in into it for 24 hours, and observe how many kilowatt hours it consumes. Then multiply that by .08. That is the daily cost.

You can't do that with 240v appliances, of course, but you can find out a lot about your plug load that way.
32
Once we're all living in Charles's shoeboxes with buildings crammed with 5 feet of each other we won't even have closet space to hang our clothes, nevermind clotheslines.
33
Proof we have too much money chasing to few decent non-profits.
34
Ever been to Venice? It makes a lot of lists of possibly the prettiest, most charming cities in the world. Settle yourself into a gondola, drift through those dreamy canals. Now look up. Yep. Clothes hanging from the bridges, clothes hanging from lines across the canal. Spoil your vacation? It kind of made the place for me. It told me there are real people living in this calendar-photo town, not just power-hogging esthetes who can't stand the sight of undies.
35
This is such a non-issue! OF COURSE, it's good to line dry laundry!!!!!!!!!!!!!
36
Why would you ban something that is really beneficial? Line-drying is the best and most simplest way to dry your clothes. Plus you get to help the environment as you spend lesser energy.

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