Permaculture equivalent of New-Urbanism

On our remote 11.5 acres in North Idaho, I'm starting to realize that not everything about our lifestyle is particularly permaculture friendly. The biggest thing is the distance and being dependent on driving, especially a far distance. Walmart, for example, is a bit over 40 miles away, and 10 of those are gravel.

We do have our goats on about 1.5 acre fenced, chickens, and our garden is looking decent this year (other than what the late frost killed.) Surrounded by trees that seem like an absolute wildfire liability (even with some reasonable spacing from the house.) I'm realizing that to cleanup this much timber and burn it out regularly, it's going to be a ton of work.

We also now have both sides of our family about 40 miles away (in the region of the Walmart) and though we'll probably always have to drive, if we were at least close to something (ideally, walking or bike riding distance) not burning fossil fuels seems like an improvement.

One thing that I like about this setup is that I have all of the fuel and timber I could ever need on the property. I don't have to go anywhere for it. Other than fuel/timber, we could have what we have on 2-3 acres. It'd be less private, but a lot less to maintain and less fire concern. Coming from a die-hard freedom background, I'm ironically starting to have some appreciation for zoned counties.

I stumbled across a new development that describes itself as "new urbanism." Everything is designed to be walkable, including cafe, stores, etc, with houses around it. In some ways it seems like a step in the right direction. To me, it looks very crowded and like it lacks a lot of independence capability.

A common model, the one we have employed, seems to be that everyone buys 5-10 acres and tries to duplicate a lot of the effort. Now I have a friend about 7 miles away (practically a neighbor!) who's done well with pigs. And we've finally started selling some of our goat milk.

Ideally, we'd have some kind of regenerative setup with the goats, rotating from pasture/browse to another. We could do this with enough fencing work. And it might be possible to feed them year round on this size acreage, which would be great. Probably an acre or two would be set aside for haying, though I'm not 100% sure that's even enough.

I know this is a bit of a ramble. I remember my grandma's place. It was a few acres, I think. Very narrow strip of land that eventually went up the mountain. Seemed very usable and practical. Neighbors could still be close, but you still had a good bit of land. These 1:2 or so rectangular 5 acre lots are nice for privacy, but not practical for walking to neighbors. Of course some notion of a trail or sidewalk would help a lot, and not an active, gravel logging road...

I think there have been a few attempts at eco-village models. I guess we're thinking about moving into something smaller to be closer to family, while retaining some capabilities. I absolutely love being able to have my water solar powered and off grid, but I can do that on an acre with a well. The wood for fuel... maybe if the land is near state ground.

I guess I'm wondering both what makes sense for us, and what sort of model an intentional community might develop. Obviously, land shape impacts a lot, and causes some limitations. I just feel like I have been investing a lot into something that doesn't fully make sense. I think I'm not the only one.

Anyway, thank you for reading my ramble!

(Speaking of, if you want 11.5 acres with a not fully finished house, somewhat of a shop, a barn, and fencing mostly good enough for goats, let me know...)

check out Village Homes in Davis California. It was featured in a permaculture documentary made by Bill Mollison in the early 90s

I remember my grandma's place. It was a few acres, I think. Very narrow strip of land that eventually went up the mountain. Seemed very usable and practical. Neighbors could still be close, but you still had a good bit of land. These 1:2 or so rectangular 5 acre lots are nice for privacy, but not practical for walking to neighbors. Of course some notion of a trail or sidewalk would help a lot, and not an active, gravel logging road

A lot of medieval fields were set up as long strips. I think that had advantages for the way that fields were plowed. But it also meant that when everyone was out working, no one was too far from a neighbor.

I don't understand why remote living is not particularly permaculture friendly? Would you please explain?

I understand about not being close to Walmart as the nearest Walmart to me is a 200 mile trip.  I don't really need Walmart to practice permaculture.

I agree having resources within walking distance (and with pedestrian paths safe and prioritised over vehiclular traffic) helps build community. Once we get in our little tin bubble it is much more difficult to interact as humans with each other. Sharing resources, shopping with local businesses and neighbours, looking out for each other's kids and so on, helps make a place better to live as humans.

I get the impression the original poster is talking about how driving long rural distances in general isn't the most permy idea in some ways, how walking places and driving shorter distances and public transit and the like uses less fuel/makes less carbon footprint.

There is this Australian author who wrote a book called Retro Suburbia who makes a reasonable case for the idea that suburbs are potentially good for permaculture if enough people apply themselves to it, well managed oversized yards can produce lots of food, things are still sometimes close enough to walk to and have transit access to, houses can rent out rooms to borders for better space usage, easy neighbourly sharing potential, etc.  Since a rural life isn't really on the docket realistically for me this guy's interview on The Permaculture Podcast really was exciting to me.

Lots of different ways to think about and weigh the tradeoffs, for a variety of contexts and conceptions of what the future holds (or could). Transportation systems really are a huge determinant of lifestyle/quality/sustainability, and the western US is pretty deep in the hole of car-oriented living and widely spaced more-than-human-scale landscapes.

New Urbanism is a worthy response for city dwellers; some of which can translate to more rural or exurban settings. Personally I'm most excited about the prospect for "e-bike-able" eco-district development patterns, where several low density neighborhoods/hamlets and some busier town centers or hubs are linked with bike/cart-friendly or dedicated alt transit networks. The best example of this I know of is in the mid Hudson Valley of New York, where a few intersecting rail trail routes link several small towns and farmland surrounding the city of Kingston.

There's a lot of potential for innovation and proliferation of versatile compact efficient electric vehicles in between bike format and enclosed cab vehicles that I expect will take off here in coming decades, with corresponding push toward dedicated travel routes. Even as is, I can get around pretty well within 10-20 mile radius on all manner of surfaces via fairly comfy fat tire bike that I charge free from the sun. Eventually I want to build out or buy into a semi-wild co-homesteading arrangement with a couple shared larger utility vehicles as needed, but most local and on site traffic via light electric conveyance. So many upsides, it's hard not to see an exponential trend going that way! But choosing the right location - and neighbors/community who support the needed broader infrastructure - will be key.

I was looking at our local Facebook page and saw lots of folks posting about looking for ride shares to go to the big city.

That struct me as a perfect solution for remote living.

We only shop once a month and that to is another solution to remote living.  We also combine Dr appointments with these shopping trips.