Last year I had really bad output from my garden, as well as the year before that, with the small exception of some tomatoes that grew well.  This year, the garden is much more successful.  I attribute that to three factors:

1. I started gardening much earlier this year.  I started growing things from seed in my garage in February, and planted mid-March.
2. I used raised beds for several of my plots.  This keeps the weeds out, and keeps the plants from drowning in our sometimes torrential rains.
3. I used wide-row planting.

What is wide-row planting?  Another, slightly more descriptive name for it could be "massively overplanted garden beds".  This year, I threw out most recommendations for plant and row spacing, and just flooded the garden beds with seeds.

The results have been phenomenal:

1. Grow more in less space
2. Don't have to stake pea plants
3. Less bother with weeding

Less maintenance - more food!

Here's my wide-row planted pea plants:

You might be saying, "but you do have stakes in there!"  That's true, only because I got scared at the last moment and said, "what if they all fall over!?!?  However, let me assure you, that the peas prefer to hang onto each other than the stakes - almost no pea plant is attached!  My pole beans are another story - they like the stakes, though I am curious how well they would do without them. 

In any case, these peas required no staking whatsoever - they just attach to each other and hold themselves up.  And they are producing tons of peas.  I actually think that I under-seeded it, as there are several spots where I didn't get a pea plant, and feel that the space is under-used.

Here is my massively overseeded lettuce:

I didn't overseed my collards, but I think I should have.

Here are my overseeded beans.  On the left I have pole beans and on the right I have bush beans:

Next year I'm just doing bush beans, and leaving the stakes in the garage.  The pole beans haven't produced anything, while the bush beans were wildly productive.

And then, here are two more beds:

The bed on the right has peppers.  It is overseed but not massively so.  I'll have to correct that next year :)  The bed on the left is fairly well overseeded.  It is a 3'x3' bed, and has 6 tomato plants and 3 cucumber plants.  All of which are doing very well (I already got to make pickles from these guys, and the tomatoes are just about ripe).

I also overplanted my radishes, but I've already discussed those.

To get an idea about just how many seeds I planted, for the peas I used a single Burpee 4oz Value Pack for both beds (each 3'x3'), and for the beans I used one value pack for each bed.  I'll probably do two packs for the peas next year, or at least spread them out better.  From looking online, a 4oz packet of seeds will probably have about 300-400 seeds.

Anyway, why waste garden space?  Sprinkle your seeds liberally.  Using 3' rows with a decent walkway between rows will allow you to reach in anywhere you need, and give your plants plenty of companions while they grow.  Consider wide-row planting (i.e. massive overseeding) for your garden next year!