How would a modern city manage after the Great Disruption?

[overgeeked]

It would certainly take an act of impressive cooperation to get everyone (most people) to not panic and trust that food would be coming in, keep the power flowing, etc. - BC (even just the southern half or so) definitely does grow enough food for the entire 5m population and then some. You would have to direct the shrinking fuel reserves to priority transport of food and other essential resources, impose rationing, communicate effectively with the population, and so on. Vancouver is an example of a city that could pull this off - very few others could. Sure, about 1 in 15 people own guns, but I don’t think it has to be the most important factor.

Also, this is a pretty boring story if it goes Mad Max straight away. What’s more interesting is what happens with communicating with other zones. Which all depends on what zones are nearby and what era they’re from.

We can choose other example cities but it’s very hard to avoid the Mad Max scenario for any length of time. Any thoughts?

Ah. I must have skimmed it. I thought it was just Vancouver and what would really happen.

 

[GreyLord]

Yes, for most modern cities this will basically end in absolutely horrific disaster. Somewhere like London is completely screwed. Heck, the whole U.K. is monumentally screwed since it imports most of its food, water, and electricity.

Vancouver is an example of a modern city that might survive long enough to adapt thanks to its local power, agricultural, and industrial resources. But there aren’t many such examples.

Even food production will decrease. Most Farms these days depend on large agricultural machines like tractors and combines. They are not just driven by carbon fuels for the most part, but they also have gotten far more electronically based in how they operate. The lack of fuels and/or component parts will make them break down. At that point, most farms are too large for a farmer to cultivate by hand or older methods. The farms will produce far less food than they do now.

Even if you decide you can go get oil in the North Atlantic or whereever, where are you going to get the pipe makers and pipe outfitters, the drill rigger makers, and the platform builders...all of those are long distance things that also get imported.

The Logistics of a modern society would kill most major cities rather quickly. I'd expect a 99% death toll in the first 2 years...after that the survivors may actually have found ways to remain sustainable, but it will be a long, hard, climb out of those dark ages into a more modern society. I'd say it would take at least a generation before they are back up and running again at a much less reduced population and scale.

 

[Tonguez]

Vancouver would be a great place to be
You've still got access to Timber, Fisheries and Agriculture.
Major port infrastructure, industry, universities and mining expertise.

You're going to have to raid Alberta for petroleum but Vancouver could quickly recover as a major industrial state and with Hydropower could soon reestablish electric railways, shipping and local internet networks.

Its Ports make it a maritime power too so it explores the Coast north and south and even across to Asia, carrying radios and electrical generators


If it hit somewhere like London there would be complete chaos and likely starvation.

but in New Zealand it might be hardly noticeable - Small Population but Huge Food Production sector. The horse will need to make a comeback since new machines, fuel and pesticides can no longer be imported. Also lots of Rivers that already have Hydropower dams. Theres also accessible Geothermal generation resources.
Technology is going to slip backwards though - no microprocessors but electric rail, vacuum tubes and early radio are style viable tech.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

It would certainly take an act of impressive cooperation to get everyone (most people) to not panic and trust that food would be coming in, keep the power flowing, etc. - BC (even just the southern half or so) definitely does grow enough food for the entire 5m population and then some. You would have to direct the shrinking fuel reserves to priority transport of food and other essential resources, impose rationing, communicate effectively with the population, and so on. Vancouver is an example of a city that could pull this off - very few others could. Sure, about 1 in 15 people own guns, but I don’t think it has to be the most important factor.

Also, this is a pretty boring story if it goes Mad Max straight away. What’s more interesting is what happens with communicating with other zones. Which all depends on what zones are nearby and what era they’re from.

We can choose other example cities but it’s very hard to avoid the Mad Max scenario for any length of time. Any thoughts?

Mad Max is never going to happen, or rather it will be very short lived. A last spasm before the fuel and ammo runs out. The bigger the city the more overwhelming the initial food crisis is going to be, which (I suspect) Flint and other that have written in this genre, limit their towns to 3 to 7k people.
Once it is obvious that the food supply will not last, people will start leaving in droves to find food. They will overwhelm local food sources, there will be an horrific famine and the population will crash.
That population crash will take most of the tech base with it. It is likely that a generation later, pockets of survivors has stabilised their tech bast at late eighteenth/ early nineteenth century levels, at least in part. A lot depends on the size of the surviving population and how much of the city was preserved.
The city would be valuable strategic asset for generations as a source of knowledge and exotic materials.

If you want a different story, then the shard has to get big enough to support the city to avoid a famine or it is more post-industrial and self-sufficient for some other reasons. Maybe it has vertical farms, and post agricultural food production.

 

[Umbran]

Vancouver is an example of a modern city that might survive long enough to adapt thanks to its local power, agricultural, and industrial resources. But there aren’t many such examples.

Even if they have sufficient hydro power generation within whatever sized bubble this situation puts them in... you can't EAT electrical power.

A typical modern city depends upon a constant flow of incoming food, rather than stockpiles, and has about three days worth of food in its local grocery stores and warehouses. After that, people start to go hungry.

Agriculture is seasonal - fisheries, ranches, and local farms don't put out food at arbitrary times you need them, and pretty much nobody in the modern world has ways to harvest or process food without the power provided by hydrocarbon fuels, which will have also stopped flowing.

 

[jian]

Vancouver would be a great place to be
You've still got access to Timber, Fisheries and Agriculture.
Major port infrastructure, industry, universities and mining expertise.

You're going to have to raid Alberta for petroleum but Vancouver could quickly recover as a major industrial state and with Hydropower could soon reestablish electric railways, shipping and local internet networks.

Its Ports make it a maritime power too so it explores the Coast north and south and even across to Asia, carrying radios and electrical generators


If it hit somewhere like London there would be complete chaos and likely starvation.

but in New Zealand it might be hardly noticeable - Small Population but Huge Food Production sector. The horse will need to make a comeback since new machines, fuel and pesticides can no longer be imported. Also lots of Rivers that already have Hydropower dams. Theres also accessible Geothermal generation resources.
Technology is going to slip backwards though - no microprocessors but electric rail, vacuum tubes and early radio are style viable tech.

Yes, I wondered about somewhere like Christchurch which also has plenty of food and electricity, and is used to not relying on a lot of imports.

Another thing that’s nice about Vancouver in this weird little scenario is that historically, the area isn’t very dangerous from a war and conquest point of view. There’s no point where you can expect the armies of Trajan, Genghis Khan, or Napoleon, or their equivalents, to turn up and stand a very good chance of conquering and pillaging the city (Vancouver doesn’t have much in the way of military presence or materiel AFAIK apart from some army and navy reserves). The worst you can expect is Haida raiders up coast from the 16th century, or maybe Russians (from Alaska) or Americans from the 19th century.

Christchurch is probably going to find that harder if the rest of NZ is from the 15th century or so, I suspect, but still not as bad as say, modern Doha confronted with the armies of Trajan from 116 CE as in the YouTube video earlier.

Quite a few modern city states have made recent efforts to become more self-sufficient (desalination, hydroponics etc) but I wonder how well those efforts would work in this scenario. Singapore would be more resilient than it was but how well would it do?

 

[jian]

One question about radio - if a given surviving modern state (or one from the last 100 years) is using radio, how far away can they expect to pick up signals from another similar state doing so?

 

[jian]

Another question - how modern or recent can an average city not blessed with significant advantages and internal resources be and expect to survive and hold together? This would mean that the needs of the city are manageable with resources within a few hundred miles, in food and water and so on.

For London I think the latest you can do with that is around 18th century at best.

 

[Umbran]

Another question - how modern or recent can an average city not blessed with significant advantages and internal resources be and expect to survive and hold together? This would mean that the needs of the city are manageable with resources within a few hundred miles, in food and water and so on.

A few hundred miles? A few hundred miles is huge!

As the crow flies, Boston is 190 miles from NYC. And Washington DC is 225 miles from NYC - so yo don't get one "city" - you get the entire East Coast Metroplex, and west through most of PA...

Hadrian's Wall is some 300 miles north of London - so you don't get "London" you get "England" in that bubble.

For London I think the latest you can do with that is around 18th century at best.

Again, for London, within a few hundred miles is almost the entirety of England... and part of France!

 

[jian]

A few hundred miles? A few hundred miles is huge!

As the crow flies, Boston is 190 miles from NYC. And Washington DC is 225 miles from NYC - so yo don't get one "city" - you get the entire East Coast Metroplex, and west through most of PA...

Hadrian's Wall is some 300 miles north of London - so you don't get "London" you get "England" in that bubble.



Again, for London, within a few hundred miles is almost the entirety of England... and part of France!

Yes, let’s say the shards are quite large by 1632 standards - it makes retaining agriculture possible. Maybe only about 100 miles if you like. Of course, if this happens to London then the 18th century French people across the Channel will be very upset if the rest of France is 6th century or whatever.

In the original book as far as I can tell, the shard isn’t just 1799 Boston but quite a chunk of the East Coast, including New York. The new state refers to itself as “New Occident.”