Ben, BOL design.

Ben, glad to see you here at permies, welcome. I spent a couple hours last night scouring your website and am very interested in your business and how you have everything setup. I would even say that from what I've seen it looks very similar to how I plan to have my business setup someday. I ran across a previous clients design of yours, where you designed a secondary home or a Bug Out Location, which is very intriguing to me, so, Iwanted to ask: What kind of things do try to do around the perimeter to keep out prying eyes and/or intruders? Do you try to design the house to be discreet as possible from both the air and ground or just the ground? Neither? Do you design for a clear line of site from the home to other places on the property or do you aviod long lines of site? Lastly, (for now anyway) do include anything in the design that makes the entry/driveway more discreet from outside the
property?
This was all typed out on my xbox because my comp took a crap this morning so sorry if it appears cramped

Great question..
The book addresses this well, especially line of sight issues. But I'll say this:
1) we live in a very safe area where most people don't lock their homes or cars
2) we still have a perimeter planted in black locust every 12-24", but it may be most needed for soil, fuelwood and nectar and building materials.
3) we still think about how people would enter the property if they wanted to rob us and how to address that with awareness, dogs, and more force if necessary.
4) we don't spend too much time thinking about this though because I am working to be an asset to the area around me, not someone that people would want to take from.
5) still, it could happen so layouts and practices are in place to deter and aid us in a situation like this, but mildly - they would ramp up if or when society around here is much poorer and more prone to burglary or worse. I don't expect it but i won't discount as impossible.
6 ) i've thought about what this place looks like from the air but i don't do much about that.
7) we keep things away and not easy to grab to reduce crime, though again, crime is very low here and people have other things to worry about like taxes - that's the main form of robbery around here.

the idea i work with is mainly to be able to scale up the systems to meet a higher crime/security situation not to live with them in times like these which are easy and safe here, anyway. i do procure and use the tools needed, though, to be able ramp it up and not be doing so for the first time, if things necessitate.

Thank you for the quick response.
It seems we are very close to being on the same page idea-wise
As i also live in and always plan to live in a place where the crime rate (crime commited by individuals anyway) can be considered low
It also feels right to me to encourage an atmosphere of respect and liberty as the first and strogest line of defense against any problems in the event of a SHTF situation or a situation in which violent crime rises to unsafe levels
All that being said, I hope get the chance to read your book soon as your work both intrigues and inspires me

Ben, you mentioned the biggest crime in Vermont is taxes.

Can you compare and contrast Vermont and New Hampshire (the 'liberty' state)

Landforms, government, and taxation.

Grant Schultz wrote:Ben, you mentioned the biggest crime in Vermont is taxes.

Can you compare and contrast Vermont and New Hampshire (the 'liberty' state)

Landforms, government, and taxation.

I don't know much about new hampshire... but lower tax rate. And much difft culture. I'd move there only if i couldn't afford vermont. Not that there's not great stuff going on there but it's much further behind in localization and local food access than VT. But that's true of probably the entire country save, maybe, parts of the west coast, maybe. Vermont has a local food economy as good as the best areas (for this) in europe, i am told by people who have gone there to study and learn from it.

yeah we all thought we were in a low crime area also until we found out from the cops that 2 murderers were hiding out in a vacant home on the back side just past the edge of our woods (not our property)..about 25 ' away.

cops woke us up in the middle of the night when they raided the place..had a tip from landowner that someone was on their property.

we STILL seldom lock up here..still feel safe..but are learning more and more that locking and common sense carefulness is more needed than in the past..of course we also have our arms...and know how to use them well..

I agree that you have to have privacy as well as line of site..which tend to defeat themselves..we have road privacy and inside our hedges line of site..from several areas on the property..also installed a dusk to dawn light with on off switch over our pond in the rear..and have motion sensors..but admit that some further work is needed

I plant the spiny edibles at the border of the land!!!
And quite close one to another....

Grant Schultz wrote:Ben, you mentioned the biggest crime in Vermont is taxes.

Can you compare and contrast Vermont and New Hampshire (the 'liberty' state)

Landforms, government, and taxation.

Grant, to jump in here...I'm relatively new to New Hampshire, so I can still see it from an "outside" perspective, despite experiencing it day-to-day. Unfortunately, I don't know much about VT, so I can't do a great comparison, but I can give you more NH-specific info. I'd say that while we don't have sales or income taxes, the property tax is high. My partner and I own our land debt-free, but we still pay monthly "rent" in taxes comparable to what I was paying to rent an apartment in Boston. That can feel pretty frustrating.

There seems to be pretty strong community feeling, at least in the small towns like mine (~2000 or so folks?). We have community events and potlucks and town plays and stuff like that. I think there is definitely, as Ben pointed out, work to be done in NH to get the local foods/transition/buy local type movements really gathering steam here, but I think that if we can do that, the way NH is set up in terms of small local govt (people seem to be really into town politics -- town meetings are important and well-attended) could work really well.