A post about Canada Post

Everyone in rural Canada seems to have to go and collect their mail from a postal box at the end or part way along their street. Coming from rural England where I'm used to the postman driving along our lane and into our driveway this is just another odd thing about Canada. In Churchill there's no postman at all and everyone in the town has to walk, and probably more often than not drive (because hardly anyone walks when it's that cold!) to their PO box in the post office. At around 4.30 on a sunny afternoon it was quite the happening event, when everyone was walking with their dogs and children in tow to the post office and bumping into friends. I don't even know if postmen deliver letters directly to your door anywhere in rural Canada, in Fernie, in the desert, among the blueberries, on Hornby and on Denman they all have to get their letters from these mail boxes. On Hornby and Denman the mail boxes are looking somewhat weathered, and just like everything else different from those on the mainland. On Denman they keep their mail boxes closed not just with padlocks, but with spoons and bits of wood. Apparently Canada Post does not like this as it's apparently not legal to leave post in an unlocked mail box.

I can't work out if it's more energy efficient for people to go to the box and collect their mail or for the postman to drive it directly to your door. Most of the time people wont drive just to get their mail, but rather collect it on their way to or from somewhere. So that would clearly be more efficient. One thing's for certain though, Canada Post is saving itself a lot of money (and Royal Mail would have to make a lot of people redundant if we changed our system).