Well, I’m sorry, but if you MUST live in a forest and it burns down then you have two choices: remain where you are and cope, or move to a different forest. You are correct that is not trivial and it can really suck, but that’s reality.
Even with the best fire crew and gear it’s impossible to save everything from every experiencing wildfire.
Just as I originally said. If you choose to live in a forest, however much money you might spend on your fireproofed home so that it can survive a major fire, it may no longer be located in an environment that most people would want to live in for decades. A timeframe that you greeted with skepticism.
without the trees the mountains are visible. I’m seeing a lifetime of firewood for the houses in area. It’s not like the tree’s have to be there. Cut them down and plant something that is fire friendly.
Insurance rates should be based on how well the house is designed to resist fire. There’s your cost incentive.
Government involvement should be in the form of forest management. They should have fire break roads and whatever science driven technology can be used to keep things in check.
Sounds sensible.
The problem comes in with how we handle the uninsured and underinsured. They’ll cry for help & they’re very photogenic. So the pols agree to subsidize rebuilding.
Most of the USA is grossly underinsured versus the true risks and the true costs. Even if you (any you) have what looks like proper insurance, rest assured your premiums are much lower than they should be versus your actual likelihood of claim.
All due to regulators driven by politics to keep rates “affordable”. And insurers happy to take the premiums while confident they’ll either get a bailout or stiff most of their customers if the Big One hits. Whether that BO is fire, flood, hurricane, or earthquake.
It’s the “most people” in your post I was arguing, not that the environment had changed.
I do have plans to retire to the North Woods, but part of that plan is clearing a swath around the house. Not so much from fear of wildfire (though that can’t be ever ruled out) but to avoid a tree falling on the house. It’s not the West, though, it’s in a considerably wetter part of the country.
So… I’m planning to retire to the woods but also planning to clear them around the residence. And if a big chunk of the woods burn down between now and when my partners and I in this endeavor start building/move in we’d probably still continue to live there even though we would not live to see a climax forest return. But that’s us. The woods are not the only reason we’re planning to locate there.
Part of the push to keep things “affordable” are the legal requirements for insurance on a lot of property and building types. If the premiums weren’t affordable then the building industry comes to a halt and that lobby screams bloody murder.
Politics also enter into building codes, which often have perverse incentives and overlook some rather simple safety things that could and probably should be added to at least new structures. But try to put in sensible updates and people scream about that.
Some of the most riveting footage in the documentary I mentioned above is not the videos and 911 audios during the blazes (Paradise CA, middle class, “libertarian” and Malibu CA, rich, left leaning), but the aftermath, when the communities come together to rebuild and, in two parallel city council meetings, the suggestions by the fire departments for some building codes going forwards are shouted and ultimately voted down.
One that sticks in my mind, it was in Paradise IIRC, is the fire chief reduced to a single request that they enact a requirement that houses have a 6 foot “no flammables” zone around every dwelling. This is roundly shouted down by the community and duly voted down by the council. At that point, I lost all sympathy for the residents/survivors of those communities.
I wouldn’t build anything elaborate or expensive deep in the woods.
I’d love having a basic 2 room log cabin in the woods. Great views and hunting when its in season.
I’d keep a firebreak around it. A big wildfire might burn my cabin. It wouldn’t be a big financial loss and I’d eventually build another one.
To me, this is the best plan. Minimal cost, minimal impact, and in the worst case you’re not going to demand that firefighters make extraordinary efforts to save it.
Why not instead just drive a small camper van into the woods when you want to be there?
I live in a fire-prone area*, and our safeguard seem to be “hope it doesn’t reach town.”
*“Fire-prone” may be a bit of an overstatement. We have had, and still have, forest fires, but they seem to be contained rather quickly. And for now anyway, the area gets enough rain (barring the odd drought from time to time) that it’s not, you know, a powder keg like other parts of the country.
A camper van greatly increases the risk of getting horribly murdered by mutant redneck serial killers.
For flood-prone areas, there are specific, standard FEMA maps that outline the flood risk of any given place, and insurance is required in some of them, and is probably expensive.
But the catch is that often the people who choose to live there have more money than sense. It’s surprisingly common in this part of the country to hear people wailing about how they built their dream home in the floodplain, and now after the floods, it’s floating in pieces to the Gulf.
I would say that the nature of the threat would be the determining factor. If it’s something where the risk is relatively measurable- like living in a river’s flood plain, or on the Gulf Coast, in a wildfire prone area, or the like, then either restrict living there, or make sure that anyone who builds there is well aware of the risks and the emergency response capabilities, etc…
But if it’s something like living 50 miles inland from where hurricanes hit, that’s more of a building code thing and public works effort, because at that distance, it’s going to be high winds and heavy rainfall that do the majority of the damage, not storm surge.
For more random things like tsunami and tornadoes, it’s just a roll of the dice, and there’s pretty much nothing you can do to really predict them. At best, you can say in the case of tsunami that it’s worth living higher than some particular elevation to mitigate it. But tornadoes are essentially random and not the sort of thing that building codes can prevent, so the best bet is to be prepared in the sense of knowing what to do if one is spotted nearby.
I recall an exchange I had with another Doper a few years ago. I always have lived fully urban/suburban, but in the southwest and so well acquainted with wildfire, though not from personal upclose experience.
I pointed out that the right way is with 1/4mi of clearcut bare dirt between you and the forest. His comment was: Here is the less-than-vast parts of the sorta West, that’d be the entirety of the space between me and my neighbor. If we did that we’d all be living in a barren wasteland, not in a forest.
Those two ideas are obviously not compatible.
Building codes don’t prevent tornadoes… but they very much can help you survive one. Some places are trying to mandate safe rooms/tornado shelters. Many mobile home parks in tornado country have a sort of storm shelter/bunker that has decreased the injuries and fatalities of such events.
After one of the hurricanes hit the Gulf Coast of Florida, I remember seeing a news report showing the devastation on one town on the shore. Almost every home was destroyed but one was still standing. The report mentioned that the home met newer standards for building in hurricane country, like tying down the roof to the walls (once the roof goes, the rest of the house is lost) and having a front door that opens out (so that when the wind is blowing at the house, it’s pushing the door closed). For pretty much every disaster (hurricane, tornado, fire, flood), there things that can be done to mitigate or prevent damage.
It’s extremely unfortunate that some people insist on cedar shake roofs. They are beautiful on a home in the woods.
A few flying embers from forest fires will ignite them. Homeowners will wet down the roof to prevent fires. But its smarter to use metal roofing.
I live in a city with a riverfront that floods EVERY YEAR, and for as long as said city has existed, officials have discussed what to do about it.
“Not building in the flood plain” never seems to be an option.
Those are called hurricane straps. We use them in my area not because of hurricanes but because of tornadoes. They can help for the lower-level EF0 and EF1 tornadoes, which are more common than the larger ones.
The devices are easily installed. There’s no reason NOT to use them in my opinion.
Sure, but that’s more in the line of “must have a shelter” type regulation.
I meant that your house is screwed if it’s hit by a reasonably sized tornado, regardless of whatever building codes are in place. This is unlike hurricanes, where building codes can make a huge difference in high sustained wind conditions. Or shingle material mandates in fire-prone regions.