skyscraper or village idyll - living in PO times

alokin · Intermediate Crude Joined: Aug 24, 2007 Posts: 692

I would like to open a new thread country living vs city living in PO times:

In my opinion the best / worst places to live are:

1.) In the center of a a big city is certainly the worst. NO food no Jobs there certainly won't be manufacturing Jobs in office towers, inadequate buildings which need air conditioning and elevators (but electricity may not be a problem), lack of maintenance of these buildings is a security problem as facade panels may drop on your head.
2.) In the suburbs, slightly better as new manufacture will open were people are living ignoring existing laws, possibility to grow a part of your own food and keeping animals. But insecure as there are too many jobless frustrated people around. Important to have retails and schools in the suburb.
3.) the best: living in or around a small town of, say 10,000 inhabitants having some acres or running some manufacturing, enough water and arable land around.
4.) in or around a small village is not that good as you won't have a hospital nearby and there are not sufficient people to trade with (either produce or products), few job opportunities.
5.) worse, but still better than living in the center of a big city: alone in the country on acreage. What will you do if you have an accident? Were do you buy spare parts or screws? You must make literally everything yourself, that's hard labour and the products you make won't often be very serviceable.

Were would you prefer to live?

Rogozhin

Option 3 is the best option in my experience.

I roamed Russia for a few months and when I returned to America my impression of our country was ineffable (in the negative attribute sense).

Get the Fark out or buy some land far far away from never-land.
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alokin · Intermediate Crude Joined: Aug 24, 2007 Posts: 692

Never had been to Russia, only horrible politic stories.
What did you see there?
What did you like?

patience · Expert Joined: Jan 04, 2008 Posts: 1374

Our choice was 4.5 miles from a town of 5,000, in farm country. Lots of forest here, rivers, lakes and wildlife. And self reliant people, too. I grew up near our present home, so I know the area and the people, a great asset in understanding. I feel we are far enough from a major city (30 miles) to avoid the worst of their problems, yet can access the resources if needed. Cities are already going bad in the US, such as New Orleans, Cleveland area, Detroit, and lately areas of south CA, and FLA. Louisville, KY near us is messy in spots, but tolerable. It will get worse, and has in the past. No, not a city for us. Nor too far out, which we have done, and chose to move, due to bad roads and distance.

alokin · Intermediate Crude Joined: Aug 24, 2007 Posts: 692

patience, are you living on acreage?
What do you do for your everyday expenses?

We are in Australia and things might be different.
I don't know the US but the society here is more cohesive in
my opinion.

If I look at the city center here, all these new buildings, glass facades, they are simply not safe in some years. The offices here have no windows you could open. (You wouldn't open them in the 14th floor and having confidental papers flying around on the streets)

The shopping centers a multi story bus subterranean station. ...
I think the city as a city will brake apart and there will be some sub centers, the useless city center and useless shopping malls ...

Simply looking at these depressing things falling apart every day makes me feel that it would be much better living in the countryside.

And all the industrial rubbish, many of it highly poisonous will leach into the city soils uncontrolled.

BigTex

It might be boring until TSHTF, but if you live in a town of 5,000-10,000 that is a satellite community to a city of 100,000 or so that is in the middle of nowhere that might be okay.

I am thinking west Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and parts of Colorado.

I'm surprised no one has talked about Mad Max driving through Walnut Grove.
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BigTex · Last edited by BigTex on Tue Feb 19, 2008 10:59 pm; edited 1 time in total

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Pops

pstarr

'skyscraper or village idyll - living in PO times' It's funny you named this thread like that.

It doesn't have to be a choice. I have a dream of a finely built well-insulated, roomy, airy, skyscraper turned toward the sun and funneling wind to power itself. Surrounded by beautiful fields, pastures, and farms. People living in community in energy efficient buildings. The best of both.
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alokin · Intermediate Crude Joined: Aug 24, 2007 Posts: 692

and will you walk all the stairs up?

patience · Expert Joined: Jan 04, 2008 Posts: 1374

alokin,
We live on one acre now. Some years ago, we had 45 acres far out in the country beside a state forest, where we had cattle, horses, hogs, and chickens. When our children grew up and moved out, it was too much for us, both working day jobs, and had very bad road access.

Now, my wife works for govt and commutes for one more year, then retires. I work at home in my own farm repair shop. Our neighbors have farms, cattle, dairy, chickens, and grain. Indoor work is better for me at age 61! But we have large veggie gardens, an orchard and herb gardens. Firewood is plentiful, at $40/rick (1.5 ft x 4 ft x 8 ft). We do welding and machine work and can fix their equipment and buy anything they produce. I quit my auto industry engineering job 5 years ago to do this, and avoided the layoffs in autos.

Other efforts at PO prep include 1400 watts of solar panels to go up this spring, wood heat by next winter, a sun porch/summer kitchen on the south side where we can start garden plants and do canning, a cistern with hand pump and a new metal roof to catch water. We may add a few chickens for eggs and garden fertilizer. We buy local wheat, grind it in our own burr mill and bake all our bread.

Lately traded off an old 4WD truck for a VW Rabbit, and bought a new 21 speed bicycle. Have a new chainsaw, small truck and trailer, and parts to build a wood splitter. A wood shed is half done, and parts here to build a wood stove. We're always looking for better ways to live considering an energy poor world.

gollum

I opt for the small town, we live in a small Wyoming town of around 600, and have a house on an acre. There is national forest nearby for hunting and gathering wood, and we can have a pretty big garden. It is a huge advantage to have people nearby (but not too many people). In town there are 2 doctors, 2 nurses, a guy with a portable sawmill, a couple of mom and pop type mechanics, and a stone mason. We also have a school, library, post office 2 small inns, and 2 small stores. However the nearest town over 10k is 20 miles, and the nearest town over 100k is 140 miles.
There is also an intangable of knowing a good share of people in a small town, a wide skill set etc. As "cool" as it sounds to have a fortress in the middle of nowhere I believe it is probably more advantageous to be in a tight knit community with some basic facilities and more importantly lots of skillsets. Finally when our daughter died there was a huge outpouring of support here, and cohesion like that will be priceless in the years to come.

ccricers · Tar Sands Joined: May 27, 2007 Posts: 37

I would think that suburbanites would be somewhat worse off than a lot of city dwellers. At least you're not completely dependent on cars when living in a large city.

The End of Suburbia goes on about "new urbanism" with more energy-efficient infrastructures where commodities are a walking distance away, but now that I look at it, they are actually probably the small towns that Alokin described.

An ideal outcome for big cities would be that they break down into smaller towns, and abandoning many structures that would be too costly to maintain. These abandoned, useless buildings would form "buffers" keep towns apart, or more realistically "outlaw areas". The worst part would be having to compete with the surrounding suburbs for arable land.