plot line behind barplot

Question

I would like to create a barplot where the bars are plotted on top of the horizontal line.

The following code accomplishes this:

y <- c(1,2,3,5)
barplot(y)
abline(h=mean(y))
barplot(y, add=T)

However, I'm concerned that the add=T parameter in barplot(), if used repeatedly, can introduce printing artifacts. I'm curious if there's an alternative to the above code (though the above code may be the fastest method).

Answer 1

You could just plot nothing in your first call:

y <- c(1,2,3,5)
barplot(
  rep(NA, length(y)),
  ylim = pmax(range(y), 0),
  axes = FALSE
)
abline(h = mean(y))
barplot(y, add = TRUE)