Would Rural Areas Be Safer In A SHTF Situation?

[Achilles]

Would Rural Areas Be Safer In A SHTF Situation?

Jan 17

By: Tom Chatham


In a situation where national infrastructure and life sustaining resources are suddenly cut off , population density will have a lot to do with how well you get by in the days following the crisis. When it happens, what you have on hand will likely be all you have to work with for an extended time. Those that lack supplies will seek out and take what they need in an increasingly hostile manner as time goes on. This is why being in a large city will likely be hazardous to your well being.
Very few will argue that being in a rural area when something catastrophic happens will greatly increase your chances of survival. A lower population density and more available natural resources to help you get by will make long term survival much easier. This is why so many people advocate heading for a rural area when something happens. The problem is unless you are already established in a rural area, survival will not necessarily be easier.
Leaving the city when supplies and infrastructure are shut down would work only up to a point. Rural areas are like anywhere else. They have infrastructure designed to service a certain number of people that normally live there. The housing, restaurants, roadways, water systems and grocery stores will only handle a small excess of people even in the best of times. When the city dwellers suddenly evacuate to the rural areas in mass, they will simply be taking many of their big city problems with them. They will likely find no housing, food supplies or other infrastructure they need to live.
Because of this many small towns will likely close their roads at some point and prevent entry to anyone who does not live there. They will suddenly realize their already finite resources will not be enough for themselves much less thousands of new people. This realization will likely come only after they have been inundated with strangers demanding supplies and housing. It is for this reason that rural dwellers should hope cities are locked down fairly quickly to prevent people from leaving.
When Henry Kaiser built a new shipyard in Richmond, Ca. in the 1940’s the town was suddenly overwhelmed with new workers. People lived in shoddy trailers they towed in, some slept in boarding houses in shifts and the schools ran three shifts a day. Eventually they built the new infrastructure they needed and life went on but this only happened because they were living in normal times when everything was working properly. Imagine an influx of people into a small town when supplies are already limited and likely to get worse as time goes on.
That is why it is essential that you establish yourself in a rural area before something happens. Simply hoping to show up following an event is no plan and will likely cause resentment by the locals when supplies run low.
Rural areas offer the opportunity to be much more self reliant than city spaces. This is the reason rural areas offer people a better chance to survive something like a grid down scenario. This is only true until the carrying capacity of the rural area is breached. That is when the city problems become rural problems. Simply moving a mass of unprepared people to another area with even less infrastructure will not solve the problem, it will only change the surroundings and create other problems.
There is an old saying that you never eat your seed stock. Self sufficient people know this because if they eat their seeds or butcher their breeding stock they will not have anything to raise the following year which will lead to eventual starvation or loss of future income. To an unprepared person that thinks food is produced in a factory, preserving seed stock makes no sense when they are hungry right now. They do not care about next year, they only care about today which is why they got into their situation in the first place. This is the type of situation that can doom a society if they lose the ability to produce future crops, even on a small scale.
Will rural areas be safer in a SHTF situation? Only if they can maintain order and protect the resources they have to insure long term sustainability of the community. Most communities are not prepared for this type of situation and will need a steep learning curve if they are to survive it. Many will likely not survive it.
Modern farming communities do not have the infrastructure to maintain themselves like many once did. Factory farming has moved much of the local production to central locations around the nation and few farmers produce their own seed locally. These and other modern systems will make it difficult for many farm communities to even care for their own much less thousands of new arrivals.
The only communities that are likely to survive in tact are the ones that are mostly self sufficient already and have a plan to maintain production and protect themselves from looters and overcrowding. Simply running to a rural area in a time of crisis is no cure all. Wherever you are, the key to survival will be advance preparation and a good plan.

https://projectchesapeake.wordpress....htf-situation/

[1-12020]

Makes you think

[consteacher1]

there'll be a lot of city folks who will be disappointed or worse when they come calling down here on da bayou. WE look after our own, newcomers, under the above circumstances, will not be cared for. either move on or go back but don't stop here. it will be interesting times, won't it?! prep and pray, the end has arrived.

[BugoutBear]

Pluses and negatives going both ways.
Just before rollover we moved to rural Maine. We already knew people there for over a decade so it was (we thought) a logical move.
Late one night around the camp fire our "friends" were drunk enough to tell us what they think about "People from away," and described in detail what they'd do to us (especially Mrs. Bear) if they believed they could get away with it. I carried a .45 from that point on and limited my contact with these people.

I think about the white farmers living in the rural areas of S. Africa who were massacred by the locals.

[Summerthyme]

Wow, Bear!

It's sadly true tgat much of rural and small town New England is insular beyond all reason. There are places we where, if your grandparents weren't born there, you will forever be an "outsider".

On the other hand, there are small towns and rural areas where you can move in, and as long as you're polite, and don't go around telling people how things are done- better - where you came from, you can be an accepted part of the community quite quickly.

We moved here in 1979. Our daughter was born in August, 1980, and our house burned to the ground three months later, leaving us homeless with a newborn and two preschool boys, and a dairy farm to run.

Our church members, as well as the members of another church we'd attended for a few months before we joined a small home church group (which had quickly outgrown meeting in homes and had moved yo an abandoned bowling alley, which we gradually remodeled into a house of worship over the next decade) rallied around us, helping us find (and move, at 3 am to avoid the necessity of oversize load permits and other legalities!) a cheap mobile home. They brought food and clothes, and devoted hours helping us clean up the mess. We were woefully underinsured, but managed to replace the 11 rooms we'd lost (big OLD sprawling farmhouse... the dining room was the original log cabin! You could freeze water in the corners in the winter... honestly, that fire was the greatest blessing we could have been given, in hindsight!) with a 4 room, single story addition to the 2 story newer part which was spared (but had to be gutted due to smoke and water damage)

I've been asked yo run for the town board (I declined... politics and, to be honest, people in large quantities, aren't my thing!)
They continue to press hubby to take the Highway Superintendent's job... he continues to decline that tar baby!

We've become integrated into the Amish community about as much as any Englischers ever are... when hubby had his hip replacement after being laid up for months, thry brought him a get-well book with over 300 pages, each of which was an individual work of art, many decorated with 3-D collages, each created by a member of the community.

My biggest concern, should TSHTF in any way that food supplies become short and the fabric of civilization begins to fray, his that all those citiot tourists who come to gawk at the "quaint" Amish and purchase their handmade products in all the little shops, will think, "hey! The Amish have tons of food! Look at all those big gardens and the animals! They'll help us out!
And truthfully, if the first ones to show up would ask politely, they WOULD try to help. But they have those big gardens because they have huge families to feed. And they buy more food at the store (all their flour and sugar, but lots of other stuff as well ... I've seen them at Aldi's and Sam's Club with carts piled high with cheap cereal and junk food than most would believe)

And they do believe in non violence... which means their defense would fall on the English neighbors.

It could get ugly. Even now, we've heard citiot men (and a few locals) joke about all the nubile teenage daughters...

Summerthyme

[always learning]

BB is correct, I live in rural Idaho, along the salmon river, and I can say with all honesty, the morality of the folks that live here now are not what they were way back when..........sadly most are transplants from california, they moved here because of the condition that state is in and the first thing they want to do is start making this state into what that state has turned into......
when this state will let illegals rape a mentally ill little girl and get away with it because they are moozee's is an indicator of the deepths that this state has declined..
being rural means nothing anymore, and most likely put big targets on all of our backs...............especially the mormans in this area, as everybody is led to believe they have tons of food, which they don't, they will be targeted right off...........the only saving grace we have is we're armed................

[CaryC]

IMHO it depends on what it is, when it happened, what caused it, and how long will it take to fix it, or government help to arrive.

City people will get help first, in every circumstance.

City people will also be the first to die by the millions in an extremely bad situation.

City people that survive, will probably stay in the city for quite some time. Why run off when all that food is in the neighbors house, or the next neighbors.

Once the population decreases dramatically in a city, people that were not pro-gun will be, the guns will be in houses all around them. And they can raid various stores for seed for gardens.

So an unknown number of people will always stay in cities.

Even as an unknown number people will leave. I don't think one will see 10 million people in NYC leaving the city and going to the country.

For city folk knowing the dangers of living in the city, should also know those same dangers exist in the country.

Country folks already know they are the first line of defense against theft, etc. even now. Cops are 20 minutes away at any given time. So when you know there are no cops, it's all on you.

So if you live 100 miles from a big city, it will be a year or longer before they get to you, considering they are walking, considering they are in gangs. It won't be millions, but small gangs and individuals who escaped the gangs. The further out you live the more will die before they get to you.

There are some things a country person can do.

1) consider the above and have a plan
2) be prepared to stand your ground
3) it would be better if you either had a large family, or banded with some in your area, but you got to know them now, even as Bear found out
4) realize that you don't have to wait for the city slicker to come, your neighbor could be your worst enemy

In our case there is a lot of rural land between me and the small cities, where people can hold up and get water, and gardens etc.... The big cities are over 100 miles away, and those leaving the big cities, have large tracts of rural land, water, and tons of people with guns before they get to us. That said my neighbor is an EBT card person, and me and him will probably have a face to face moment, but we may not, since we both know the other has guns, and we practice with them in our yards.

So long as someone doesn't get weird, there is enough land, enough tractors, tillers, shovels, hoes, etc... for all to eat. Plenty of springs, and creeks too.

If you don't work, you don't eat. And I will be the first and last line of defense.

[Thunder]

Maybe safer, but not safe. No place will be safe.

[CaryC]

Not many places safe now.

[Oscar Wilde]

Someone here has a sigline that reads "Be prepared to kill everyone you meet" ... AWM I think.

Let this be the focus of your "OODA loop" ....

O.W.