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I'm on a hill among a few hundred homes. It's readily defensible with a company of volunteers, and good farmland is available within a short walk. The folks who aren't prepped, which is undoubtedly most, still constitute a good labor and security force. There are also a couple of medical folks here and there so decent care can be set up once the need arises. Most are working folks with community values, so a lot of the expected internal security issues will not arise, the culture is 'let's get this done'.

I think the internal security will sort itself out in a week or three. External security can be obtained by some careful planning, road blocking, patrolling, and an immediate reaction unit or two, followed by the reserves.
 
I'm in Portland, so no. I'm in a good neighborhood, but still no. There are some situations I can imagine, though, where (counterintuitively) it would be safer in the city than in the countryside. This goes against prepper orthodoxy, but in a partial breakdown scenario the countryside could be lawless and overrun with mauraders while what remains of civil authority maintains "law and order" and relative safety in the cities. Anyone in an isolated farmhouse, let's say, would be an easy target. This would be less likely than the more standard "get out of the city or die" scenarios, though. So, in short, I still have in mind a place out in the boonies...just not an isolated farmhouse, ;)
 
I posted this a couple years ago and think it might 'resonate' in this thread:

Recently I responded to a PM about this issue and the following is a theory I came up with regard to the bug in/bug out controversy. Mostly it was a case of writing as I was thinking as opposed to an edited composition AFTER thinking about it but read it and tell me if this has any merit or just stone craziness!

I am certainly no expert (and there are probably a LOT less than claim to be) but if I had to illustrate it I would create a scale from one to ten with the most urban life environment at one and and the most rural at ten. I believe in an unspecified SHTF scenario the closer one is to a rural environment the better the chances are for survival and not leaving the domicile would be a big part of it - IF certain natural resources were close and available such as wood and water.. This is also factoring in an assumption of more safety in a rural environment due to fewer people who possibly have more of a 'groupthink' mentality due to the lifestyle and probably greater longevity of people living in the environment as opposed to urban where people tend to come and go much more frequently. The longer one lives in an area the more one has 'vested' in it and less willingness to leave. Therefore if one is at 'one' or 'two' on the scale then they most likely are surrounded by concrete and buildings with few natural resources, a less rooted community with possibly unstable or dangerous people, leaving would almost be a necessity to ensure any chance of survival. Now the closer one is to the center or the larger numbers on the scale means one is most likely in a safer environment with resources close at hand and a much larger area to move about in to acquire the resources with less competition - AND being able to return to one's domicile to utilize the resources. So while those in the low end of the scale have little choice BUT to leave those at the greater end have less need to leave with more reasons to stay. As I said before familiarity and comprehension of one's environment are a powerful influence and I firmly believe those of us on the greater end of the scale have the greater advantages and influence to stay put. This is all just a theory (more like a hypothesis) but there is evidence to suggest I might 'have' something. Kind of like Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.
 
A large number of my neighbors are elderly men that served in the South Vietnamese Army alongside US troops, and then immigrated here afterwards.

Haha! You will be good to go if you make friends:) I was downtown with my wife Sunday and an elderly Vietnamese fella walks right up at the Max stop and right off starts staring hard at her from @3 feet away. Right at her. I was on her opposite side from him and squared off and stared back. Right over her head as she tried to ignore it. He looked up right at me into my eyes for a good 4 - 5 long seconds and I figured it was going bad soon then went back to staring at her as I continued to stare at him and moved in closer. It was damned strange....real real strange. We've been together for @ 36 year now and this kind of thing is pretty rare. Every once in a while we use to bump into some bubblegumhead racist back in the day who took offense that we were mixed race or she was Japanese, but that's been a long time. Then he quietly asks while staring right at her, "Vietnamese"?. (she looks it). She says: "No, Japanese ancestry" but the words confuses the guy. I try to engage, realize he's not a threat and get out of him that he claims to not speak English. Which I'd normally call Bs*it on (got raised up with some newly landed boat people who moved in right next door @ 1971-1973 and they caught on damned quick, real smart and sharp. After the army I was even in college with one of them and he was nailing it) but this older guy seems pretty quiet and I don't know him so I let it pass.

He seemed like a good guy, and I was musing on what his life must have been like that got him to this point in time (damned interesting no doubt!). I wanted to reach out and bond, and asked him when he came over and got to the US, but he either didn't want to engage or the language got between us. Maybe my blue lips and extreme shivering put him off. My wife and I were freezing, having walked the 1/2 marathon in a 50 degree downpour of rain, and weren't in good shape to converse.

Regardless, I feel like if you have some LDS or Vietnamese folks around, you ain't doing too bad if it does hit the fan. That's a high percentage of good folks in comparison. ...Till it does or lord forbid it ever gets there, just return the chickens with a smile that bail from their yard into yours every once in a while, and laugh about picking the "wild" sweet peas that seemed to start growing spontaneously everywhere around town @ 1975 when the Vietnamese folks showed up. Their recipes for those peas will certainly make you appreciate them, damn they cook good. The trick is they only get the tender ones into the bags/pots. Think "small ones":)

For myself, all the trash except us moved out of this neighborhood a while back and plenty of rich folks moved in. I don't know most of them well although I know their names, family members and what they do for a living. The next door fella on one side hung some huge elk horns up on his fence, on the other side fella grew up in Puget sound crabbing and fishing and the folks across the street also own a farm (right now) they are still working on weekends but they also moved into inner city to educate their kids. I figure with a few exceptions we're all pretty much good to go.
 
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Oh, i wanted to say, get a 55 gallon water barrel (or 2) hooked up to your gutters to alleviate your water concerns. That and a filter is not a bad idea.
 
My house is visiable from I5, and not defendable. I don't like the idea of bugging out, but what does one do? Plus both my wife and I work across major rivers. Im going to have to keep a raft someplace just to get the kids if there is a bad quake. As for my wife, she probably won't make it out of Salem. Her only escape route would be towards Monmouth and Independance. This would leave us both without a vehicle.

So bug in the first week, till folks get hungry? And give the wife a chance to meet up? Or walk out asap with two young kids? Then, where to go, that 100,000 other folks have not thought of?

Grrr. :mad:

Maybe I'll just eat a neighbor with a more defendable position?
 
The end of the month marks 4 years my wife and I have been in this neighborhood. Can we bug in? Yes. Our neighbors? On our street, I'd say at least one, if not two houses on our 4-city-blocks-long street.
Crazy part of living in the city, in four years I'd say I know 3 of our neighbors, and I try to be out-going when it comes to people which we live next. My wife knows damn near everyone, and I was a stay-at-home-dad for the first year... I guess I know the ones that hunt, fish, and otherwise can fend for themselves, and she knows everyone else...
 
I'm S of Hillsboro, too close to Portland. Most neighbors pretty decent. It's not the best setup, but not the worst either. Oh well! We will do what we can with what we have. I'm not going to become a refugee if I can help it.
 
My new house in Idaho.... Is golden. If I happen to get stuck at my house in Washington... I doubly screwed because I have moved everything I would need to Idaho and no one around here would be worth spit if it came to it.
 
Too much crap at my place to take with me, nonwhere to go that 100,000 people won't be headed to anyway.

I'll just start tearing empty houses down for firewood and tagging signs with Joe13 NW Side in spray paint - purple of course.:rolleyes:
 
The conditions at my place could be better. But on the bright side I live on a hill out in the country and 75% of my neighbors shoot on a regular basis. One guy is a retired state patrol and I know that he is prepared. spoke to him last week after you guys made me aware that I'm not where I should be. We as home owners are going to get together and come up with a plan. There are 15 houses on one to five acre lots that we could secure fairly easily with a private road in and out.
 
Well,again,I have already bugged out of pugetropolis.
And I'm not worried about neighbors. Too many armed citizens here for stupid people to try and take houses.
They would get 1 maybe,then the wrath would come down. First it would be a reasonable, 'hey that wasn't nice,give the house back!'
Then the removal would begin. Lots of folks like to help the old and needy.
Good luck over there
 
Well,again,I have already bugged out of pugetropolis.
And I'm not worried about neighbors. Too many armed citizens here for stupid people to try and take houses.
They would get 1 maybe,then the wrath would come down. First it would be a reasonable, 'hey that wasn't nice,give the house back!'
Then the removal would begin. Lots of folks like to help the old and needy.
Good luck over there

If I win the lotto (I should play sometimes...) I'd be out there in a sec:p
 
My portland neighbors are absolutely clueless. If it doesn't involve voting democratic or listening to NPR, they don't have a clue. It also means I am not worried about them giving me any trouble. (In case they ask- I got nuthin' sorry)

What I'm really worried about is the local stupid bubblegum acting LEO (police, national guard, etc) coming by and forcibly evicting me and the rest of the neighborhood - just to go sit in a traffic jam somewhere. While I know that somebody else is raiding my house. :mad: Oh- and I imagine said official evictors would confiscate any guns they can find while they are at it.

Never under estimate the stupidity of elected officials.
 
I did a neighborhood assessment earlier this year and it's a mixed bag. I am likely going to relocate in the next few years to a rural area in a state where my 2A rights aren't going to be taken away anytime soon.

My assessment started with a map section I downloaded from my County property assessment web page. I re-drew it in CAD, then used it as one of my assessment tools - for example contact info for my neighbors and estimated preparedness as well as mentality. I used another copy to develop my security plan along with Google Earth and observations gained by walking my dog through the neighborhood.

My 10 house cul-de-sac is 50% solid and 40% liability with only 3 of us likely having any food or water preps. I have a realistic neighborhood security plan in the event it's necessary as well as comms and additional arms/ammo. I have a security plan for my house that takes in vulnerabilities from all sides.

The cul-de-sac faces a large high school that would likely be used as a staging area in the event of a really serious issue such as earth quake/volcanic eruption, etc. That's good and bad. The potential for good is that we would be close to security and supplies, the bad would be in the event we were manhandled the way Katrina victims were by FEMA. Attempts to take my weapons WILL result in very bad things. Otherwise I'd be happy to volunteer for comms, security, etc. as opposed to sitting on my butt.

Fortunately we are on the edge of the rural area and have a back way out if we have a bad FEMA type situation and need to flee. Just have to knock down one section of fence and get the hell out of Dodge. My neighbor who owns the fence is one of the prepared ones who would be leaving for the same reasons if I had to.

My family is set for 2 months supplies (including expected unprepared relatives and minor handouts for unprepared neighbors) and I'm working to increase this. The next location will have aprox two acres per person and it's own water for better sustainability. It will be off the likely path a "golden horde" fleeing urban areas would take and will have an overlook.

We are OK where we are for minor to mildly extended problems.
 
We're semi-rural, with both higher density homes and plots of 1/2 to 10 acres all around us. Neighbors on 2 sides of us are lost causes and I wouldn't want anything to do with them in such an event. My other neighbor, a retired officer and regular hunter, would be well suited to 'team up' with for a neighborhood bug-in gathering. Some other neighbors down the road could be beneficial too. We're in a cul-de-sac, so it's not going to have a bunch of traffic passing through, which means it's easier to keep an eye out for folks that don't belong.

All that said, I've never discussed such events with my neighbors. As I prefer to keep to myself, I'm not sure I'll be doing that, but maybe someday we'll have a chat about it - especially how to evict the nasty folks next to us ;)
 
All that said, I've never discussed such events with my neighbors. As I prefer to keep to myself, I'm not sure I'll be doing that, but maybe someday we'll have a chat about it - especially how to evict the nasty folks next to us ;)

Earlier this year there were a lot of news stories about earthquake potential. I would casually bring that up with my neighbors to get their take mostly letting them do all the talking. Usually ran into them walking the dog which also made them more comfortable.

Edit: Just thinking this weekend's storm would be a good conversation opener as you check for downed branches, etc., keeping in mind @mjbskwim advice about opsec below.
 
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All that said, I've never discussed such events with my neighbors. As I prefer to keep to myself, I'm not sure I'll be doing that, but maybe someday we'll have a chat about it - especially how to evict the nasty folks next to us ;)
I think it is wise not to talk about this stuff too much with the neighbors,unless you saw them at a gun show or with bulk goods in their vehicle.
Say too much and you're the crazy neighbor now
 

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