Urban vs. Rural Post-Peak Living

[Wednesday]

It doesnt make sense to drive further than I have to. Rural life involved a lot of driving.

Living in a small town outside of Houston so I can be close to work. I really don't like this town, for many reasons that I don't have time to go into now.

I want to stay mobile, I am loosely involved with several communities and I'm in no hurry to commit to any particular one just yet.

Right now I'm just here for the job.

[Plantagenet]

urban vs. rural question ... where will my chances of survival be better?

Another factor to consider is: Oil producing vs oil consuming.

All urban areas are oil-consuming areas.----- But some rural areas are also oil producing areas, while others are not. Also look at how NG, geothermal and wind power factor into local infrastructure and energy pricing.

Right now high oil prices are screwing up the world's economy. But in rural areas with oil or natural gas production, things are pretty good.

--Amish farmers get 2 million dollars for the rights to drill and frak for NG on their farms in Pennsylvania...you can survive quite a while on 2 million bucks----and thats pretty good.

--In North Dakota McDonalds jobs have to pay $20/hr to get employees....pretty good.

--In Oklahoma there is so much NG that there is a local economy based on NG...lots of NG gas stations and NG cars with energy costs 1/2 what the rest of us pay for gasoline....pretty good.

--On the Big Island of Hawaii gasoline is very expensive....but there is plenty of wind power and geothermal energy.....pretty good.

---In Alaska it can be -60.......but there are good-paying jobs and at a time when many states are bankrupt the state of Alaska has got a $50 billion sovereign wealth fund.....pretty good.

And so on.

[Quinny]

One thing that is often not taken into account when assessing where to live post peak is historical population levels in rural villages.

I have recently been studying population trends in some rural areas, where there have been significant de-population over the last 100+ years. In these areas there are often large tracts of land that are now lying fallow and could quickly brought back into production.

In a fast crash scenario such areas would not be 'lootable' as there are no massive hoards of food that could be looted. There is however a capability to produce much more food than is currently being produced.

In a slow crash a gradual return to the land might enable many areas to become more self sufficient with the input of extra human labour.

I have currently looking at a couple of places where friends of mine live and these villages had population 3x their current levels in 1900. This could soak up a fair few refugees if necessary.

Just a thought.

[kublikhan]

I posted this in another thread but I think it is applicable here as well:

I predict the opposite: cities will continue to exist and function in a post oil world. Cities were around for a long time before oil and will be around for a long time after. They are centers of commerce, residence, and social functions. The urge to flee to the boonies is the old "fight or flight" response and speaks more about our fears than rational thought. Even in times of dire strife, like the collapse of the Soviet Union or the Great Depression, the cities fared better than those living in rural settings. People migrated to the cities looking for food, jobs, and shelter. City populations increased during these hard times, not decreased. No man is an island. No matter how well prepared you think you are for times of dire strife, you will still need society to function.

As I was thinking about this topic, I was struck by the following realization, counter-intuitive but supported by evidence. The limiting factor in the survival, on both the level of the individual and the community, was not the ability to produce your own products and not even the available resources or lack of them. It was transport and infrastructure - the ability to trade, deliver your surplus elsewhere and from there get other things you need.

This is why rural areas and small towns in Russia took a very hard hit in the 90s, and may never fully recover, as some say. One would think it should be exactly the opposite - people would have gone into the remote villages and live off the land and the woods. However, even in the most self-sufficient household one cannot produce or make everything needed. And being in a remote location makes it difficult to deliver surplus to others in a timely manner for trading or exchange, especially with the roads being as atrocious as they were.

The lesson from this is that the desire to hide out in the boondocks results from a 'fight or flight' emotional response to a stressful situation, and in the long run is counterproductive. Instead, a survivor should network within the community, stay just close enough to major traffic routes, keep the transportation lines open and have some kind of vehicle at one's disposal. A truck is good if there is reliable fuel available (the rising prices of oil should be considered). A horse too, if things get that bad. It is best to be by a river or another body of water, it is very good to live by the bridge, ferry or a dock on one's property, and a boat.

One thing that is important to mention is that organized crime moved in very quickly to control all the trade and businesses. Mafia and gangs banded together based on location and/or ethnicity. Therefore, one shouldn't be afraid so much of people with guns who come to take your food away, but rather of people who come with guns and demand a regularly paid share of your profit or surplus.

The value of education didn't decrease. On the contrary, it increased, especially for certain professions. In truth the most valuable major in my college ended up being geology and geophysics. It was the easiest to get into but the graduates were snapped up by Russian and foreign corporations in the booming oil and related industry, to do the exploration of natural resources, and have on average done exceedingly well.

USSR Collapse - Russia in the 1990s

As the Depression deepened, cities attracted beaten people from all parts of the country. Farmers whose livelihoods had been foreclosed packed up their families and moved into the cities. Hoboes and other itinerants sought shelter in cities during harsh winters. City dwellers themselves were not immune to the rails of the nation. Thousands of unemployed residents who could not pay their rent or mortgages were evicted into the world of public assistance and bread lines.

At President Hoover's beckoning, charities had stepped in to help ease the burden on municipal resources. Hoover was a firm believer in volunteerism. Feeling that each community was responsible for aiding people in distress, Hoover created programs that bolstered morale and encouraged charity.

In 1930 the International Apple Shippers Association was faced with an oversupply of fruit and came up with a unique solution to a national problem: to clear out their warehouses and give the unemployed a way to make a little money, they sold apples on credit. The ploy worked. Months later a shivering apple vendor could be found standing over a fruit crate on the corner of every major American city. By the end of November there were six thousand people selling apples in New York alone. The trend spread, and suddenly there were pitchmen of all persuasions standing alongside the apple sellers, handling everything from patent medicines to gaudy neckties.

Many people planted subsistence gardens in vacant lots or rooftops to feed themselves when grocery money was really scarce. Twenty thousand of these gardens were reported in Gary, Indiana, alone.

City Life During the Great Depression

[pstarr]

I have always said cities will explode (people-wise ) post peak. There is direct train/barge traffic from midwest growing regions to the big cities. (But not to the burbs.) Folks can expect to live out their days stuffed into 50-story windowless office skyscrapers (sans electricity and elevators). Of course the lower floors will be reserved for the building "superintendent" (read: Overlord/Mayor/Rent Collector) and the upper floors for the crack/methheads, joggers and health nuts. Everybody gets fed their morning porridge, afternoon gruel, and evening slop (with bits of jerky). Except the Mayor. He eats goat. And rat.

[kublikhan]

Pstarr, how is your location peak oil friendly? You mentioned you lived in a rural setting, but it had some unique circumstances that lessened some of the traditional drawbacks of rural living. Care to elaborate?

[pstarr]

Pstarr, how is your location peak oil friendly? You mentioned you lived in a rural setting, but it had some unique circumstances that lessened some of the traditional drawbacks of rural living. Care to elaborate?

Kub, it is an interesting area. Del Norte, Humboldt, Mendocino, Trinity, Lake counties are covered in valuable redwood and doug fir and have very low population density . . . on average. The Coastal Range is new geology (Pacific Plate/San Andreas activity), very rugged, and hugs the ocean. Only two roads (largely two lanes) cross the mountains out of Humboldt Bay (A third, Rt.36 is mostly a private pot highway.)

What isn't timber is valuable coastal agriculture, year-round grass-fed pasture. We have a large ocean fishing fleet. Few if any large developments since the 1970's. I live one-half mile from Eureka city limits and three miles from Arcata, yet there are mountain lions, coyote, an occasional elk. If I were to cross the street, and walk due east, I might not cross a driveway or road for fifty miles.

I am lucky. My friend subdivided a piece of land for me. Now I have pasture orchard and gardens. Cold all year, but I just harvested the last eggplants and red anaheim peppers from my unheated greenhouse. Downsides; total isolation (nearest real city SF 260 miles) Half the year in fog. Ireland must be like this. Green lush and kind of gloomy. But I love it

[kublikhan]

Sounds nice. That's the way to do it, stay where you love it

[careinke]

That's the way to do it, stay where you love it

Have to agree. I would never be happy moving to the city. I'll stay in my homestead and try to fix the planet one plant at a time.



Our Place

[pstarr]

Sweet. I see a yurt, deer fenced orchard, and a chicken coop? Is that a stream/small river in front? You are not facing south.

[careinke]

Sweet. I see a yurt, deer fenced orchard, and a chicken coop? Is that a stream/small river in front? You are not facing south.

The Yurt is my sister in laws (it is a family compound), that we put up ourselves. I live in the house below the yurt. That is a chicken coop that sits in the middle of the orchard and I move the solar powered poultry fence around the coop every week in a paddock system. They love it.

The water you see in front is our salt water cove. When I took the picture, I was facing NNW, The property slopes to the ESE, not perfect but close enough. From the yurt, there is an awesome view of Mt Rainier.

Although I need to update it, here is a link to the site where I post my projects on line, in case your interested.
http://www.permies.com/t/12804/projects/Cliff-permaculture-projects
It has some pretty good pics of the place. I have to say, every morning I wake up with a smile on my face for being so lucky to have finally put down roots in what I consider paradise.

[Quinny]

Careinke - love your place - I feel really jealous.
KK - I understand your point about Crime, though if there's not much 'surplus' to tax I don't think small rural villages are a prime target.

The point is that many rural villages are underpopulated and also under-producing as cheap food can currently be imported from all over the world. As transportation costs escalate many of these areas could quickly ramp up local food production. In a fast crash scenario they are pretty remote and hordes of people would not find good pickings (as is often commented there was often food rotting in the fields during various collapses). In a slow crash, I can only see these places becoming more popular with younger people as we are currently seeing in places like Greece.

[pstarr]

Sweet. I see a yurt, deer fenced orchard, and a chicken coop? Is that a stream/small river in front? You are not facing south.

The property slopes to the ESE, not perfect but close enough. From the yurt, there is an awesome view of Mt Rainier.

Now I understand. I assumed you were not facing south because I didn't see PV anywhere. But you explained why. You are in gloom deeper than mine PV doesn't work in rain!

I have to say, every morning I wake up with a smile on my face for being so lucky to have finally put down roots in what I consider paradise.

Me too. I just discovered this; Eagle nest

I can see the nest from my driveway. The birds are now on an adjoining tree.