Ottawa has an interesting weekend every year, where you can attempt to pick up stuff for free, but better still, you can start giving away stuff that is cluttering up your house.
The rules are quite simple, you simply take the clutter from your house and take it down to the curb and maybe put a sign on the articles saying take it away, and usually someone will. I guess if you are on the look out for some free bargoons, you then drive around looking for things at the ends of driveways as well, but I don’t participate in that side of things, I simply enjoy getting rid of stuff in my house.
We managed to get rid of an old bicycle, a tricycle, some toys, a sled, a pink blow up chair, a beer bottle drying rack and various other articles, which hopefully have gone to homes that need them and will enjoy them. I can hear some folks saying, “You could have sold those on E-bay or Kijiji…”, but that would have meant me investing time to do this, and this is much easier. The articles have no value to me right now, and if someone else gets something out of them, more power to them.
My neighbour (who was having a yard sale), did manage to get rid of a couple of computer monitors he didn’t need as well (he couldn’t sell them, but when he put them down by the curb, they disappeared). I view that as a good use of this system as well (and very green).
My garage has less junk in it, and this exercise caused me to throw out more junk that I was “storing” in my house as well (interesting how that happens). For the folks who take this stuff their plus is they get stuff for free, and for the city of Ottawa, they hopefully get less crap in the garbage going into landfill sites, so all in all, I think this is a good community idea.
In my area in Toronto you’ll very often (throughout the entire year) find stuff left for free pick-up by the interested passer-by. It’s students who finished their U year and consequently renting the place (anything from books to dishes), zealous readers and subscribers who finished books and magazines, etc. All people who don’t bother with garage sales, and wisely offer stuff for reuse rather than tossing them away into the garbage or recycle bins.
(As for bicycles, these are as a rule stolen around here.)