Do you have disaster fatigue? News report indicated that Florida keys residents are tired of evacuating from the key every summer. In addition, the insurance has gone up to the sky that many can't afford to live there anymore. Property tax have risen to extremely high level. Insurance is at $16,000 / month. That is alot. <img src="/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" />

What I think will happen is that the rich will stay there and secure/rebuild/upgrade their buildings to keep on enjoying these coastal areas. <img src="/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />

The poorer will move to places where it is cheaper to live and keep on living. <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

Here, its the combination of the high property cost and high insurance. Taxes haven't caught up... yet...

Here during the approach of Hurricane Jeanne, people starting worrying. The roads were absolutely empty.

It's an interesting question. I just finished reading "San Francisco is Burning", a retired firefighter's take on the 1906 earthquake and subsequent fire that destroyed the city. The author stated that in ancient times, humans would eventually learn to move out of harm's way to a safer location. Today it seems that we want to stay in place, rebuild and try to pay higher insurance.

If I lived in NO before Katrina, I doubt that I would move back today. It still seems that the pols are counting on duct tape and bailing wire to hold the levees together. However, at least with a hurricane there would be some 24 - 48 notice.

There is little chance that I would move to the California Bay area (even if I won the lottery and could afford it) because an earthquake in SF today would be hard to escape due to no warnings.

I guess that I'm trying to say that although I love disaster/emergency preparation and practicing, I do not want to intentionally put myself in the path of a disaster.

Be disaster fatigue as it may. At a point, -it gets to being understandable enuff.

But just a further observation though. -Nature (or whatever else the cause may be) ain't gonna care about how fatigued we may be. So obviously, -we can't throw in the towel or drop the preparedness ball, -just over being X amount fatigued or tired!,.... [color:"black"] [/color] [email]picard120[/email]

I live in SF Bay area. One would think that every home here is stocked to the gills with emergency supplies...but in many homes you would be hard pressed to find a working flashlight.

It seems to me that people are putting the thought of a major earthquake out of mind as much as possible.

Ii wonder how different it is now than it was in 1906?

I don't have hard data, but I am sure that percentage of homes that have at least some disaster supplies in their homes is higher then, lets say Midwest.

I wonder if such data is available anywhere? Does anyone know?

As most of y'all know, I live in south Louisiana and both my parents and my in-laws lost their homes in Katrina. For three months after the storm, we had either our parents or friends staying with us. Nearly nine months later, we are still trying to figure out what to do with my parents home (thank you, FEMA), and we still have piles of things that need to be cleared out, cleaned or restored.

Do I have disaster fatigue? Darn right I do.

.....CLIFF

I'd rethink that if I were you... before you put any money on it. The MidWest is a quite a large area compared to SF, and a lot of those folks are still rural types... their pantries ARE disaster supplies. Many of them don't have the luxury of a 7-11 two blocks down the street, and stock their shelves appropriately. Quite a bit of the MidWest is still subject to the whims of Mother Nature on a regular basis, so they have back-up heat and warm clothes on hand as a matter of course... not even thinking of it as "disaster supplies". Remember, it's hard to beat a farmer when it comes to being able to handle anything you throw at him... while I'm considered a "townie", I'm surrounded by a sea of farm boys, and in a pinch, I'd rather have a handful of them at my back than all the desk jockeys in Chicago.

Troy

No doubt that rural areas are better prepared for a disaster then an urban one. In fact, I would love to move to a more rural area, perhaps a less expensive one too <img src="/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />, but it is impossible for now.

I should have clarified my previous post. My question is: does anyone know which urban areas of the country are more or less prepared for a disaster? Does this data even exists?

thanks

Alex

Picard120,

Where are you getting these statistics? $16K/mo for insurance? That's $192K/Yr! Maybe on multi-multi-million $ mansions. Even with rates nearly doubling, the rates for a $150K-$200K home would only be in the $1500-$2500/year range. And its those mansions, not storms, that cause the property tax to increase (by causing the property values to increase).

Good luck with that one... if everybody was prepared, it wouldn't be a disaster <img src="/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />

Troy

I live near Wildcard and I have to agree with him... you won't find a house here without warm clothing and basic supplies like flashlights, etc. And I'm talking about in-town - the country dwellers are self sufficient and could be for months most likely. If you mean major urban areas like Chicago, St. Louis or more minor ones like Peoria, Quad Cities, Bloomington Normal, I have no idea which is more "prepared" and I doubt anyone could effectively answer that. Your bet is likely a safe one to make since nobody could tell you who won. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

SF and other CA residents are reminded to maintain emergency supplies more often than their urban compadres in Chicago. I've been in both cities for quite a long time each, and I can confirm that fact at least. We've got floods and tornados (or tornadoes if you like) which both tend to be fairly localized and we get some warning most of the time. Plus they don't generally wipe out infrastructure, especially larger bridges and such.

I would be much more worried about living in the bay area. I've spent over a year living there in the last 10, thankfully uneventful. We do get the occasional quake (New Madrid fault) though.

I got the info from the ABC news inteview of Florida keys residents as they evacuate from the last storm. They are moving to mainland permanently this time. The cost of evacuation in every storm is expensive for average folks.