dont?go east

( DON”T? ) GO EAST YOUG MAN
Remember the movie with John Candy, Wagons East I believe it was. A wagon train doesn’t like what they see out west so they go the opposite direction of everyone else and head back East. In part it highlights the fear of the unknown. Of a yearning for civilization. Back East is where the action is. Most of the population is there. Most of the rainfall and fertile land. Most of the industry. Outside of the West coast and certain retirement areas the west offers little more than it did over a hundred years ago, mining and cattle ranching. I was born and raised here and it feels natural to me, but in a petroleum starved future it is going to be a tough place to make a living.
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I am not saying that the east is necessarily bad. Just that I don’t care for it personally as I have an irrational fear of crowds. Not to the point of paralysis, but the fear of being trampled by a faceless mob is always there. I have never been to a music concert, never been to a sporting event. I won’t even go to a large movie theatre anymore, they must be small and not too crowded. I avoid crowds whenever I can. I’ll even walk around a cluster of people if I can. And that is why I don’t want to live back east. I lived in Florida. The Daytona metro area of les than two hundred thousand. But there was enough green areas to divide the city into small units, giving a feeling of a smaller city or large town. I don’t think I would do it again however. As I get older and wiser and more aware of all the hazards out there I grow to like people less.
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So I tend to write from a Western standpoint. Not dealing with humidity in food storage. Large caliber weapons instead of carbines. Water scarcity. Food storage to make up for lack of food growing areas ( I think two tons of wheat is a good idea, someone with a medium size garden would only want one years worth for a seasonal crop failure ). You get the idea. But for those growing up on the east coast or in the South, it would seem like a strange idea to move to the West. I am strange in that I like the desert. Most normal folks want trees and green growth around them.
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So there is nothing wrong with living and prepping for the East or South. If you are familiar with the area it would be stupid to leave it. You should stay where you are familiar, even if it is less than optimal. With friends and family around and knowledge of the local terrain you are much better off than moving to a strange area even if it seems better from a survivalist standpoint. If you had years to prepare, it would be okay. But do we have years to leisurely learn a new locale? I don’t think so myself, but then I an pretty paranoid.
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Just beware that the eastern seaboard does present its own hazards ( besides natures ). While most of the lower 48 states has little significant oil reserves left, there is still a lot of coal left on the east coast. Thus it might become a source of conflict. Either the locales will be displaced or a lot of pollution will be generated when we start running out of oil and start stripping the coal reserves, despite what the Greens think. When it comes to the lights being left on even most environmentalists will vote for raping Mother Earth ( and that is even if their vote counts- most of the time anymore the politicians just do as they please anyway ). So beware that area. And there will be conflict over arable land and water ways. As agriculture becomes more local as petroleum becomes dear, we must take the farmland back from the suburbs. So beware house seizures. That is if you manage to keep your house through job loss and an economic depression. And as more small sources need to be dammed up to turn into hydro power, there will also be a fight over that. If river transport takes over more semi-trailer routes due to fuel shortages you will see a resurgence of river trade locations.
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In effect, the more people in a given area, the more conflict. But the East also has the ability to reconstruct the pre-petroleum way of life. Small scale farming is easy due to rainfall. Transportation can go back to rail or river. Perhaps, on a per capita basis the East can survive the coming of Peak Oil much easier than the West. The west will see a massive depopulation as there will no longer be mass water pumping from one region to another. We won’t have the energy inputs to make food grow in the desert. It will become a giant cattle range once again, outside of the fertile coastal region. Logging, ranging and mining will be pretty much all there is. So while the west might not be as massively populated as the east, it has far more population than it can support without oil.
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If you stay east or south, prepare for more conflict over available resources. But the recovery should be a lot easier. In the west expect abrupt violence as resources are fought over, then a mass depopulation. The numbers will then stay as low as the natural carrying capacity of the land. A few areas, such as coal or metal mining will be traded with by rail and will survive off of imported food, as will cattle gathering hubs. Expect live cattle to be shipped again and Chicago to process them again to feed the east. Cities evolved to take advantage of natural resources. They should reprise their historical roles. If your area lives off of government activity, or social Security checks or pumped water, expect to become a ghost town. Learn what your area used to do to feed itself and expect to do that again. Go back before oil was a way of life.
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So, where you stay is a gamble, a toss up. The east is not as bad as some of us write about, and the west is not necessarily a total safe haven. Both have their good and bad points.
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