Shutting down highway off ramps?

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Last year while at the local shooting range I had a conversation with a member of our local law enforcemant about Y2K. We are in a rural area but there is a large city 90 miles up the road. His greatest concern was people from the city flooding down to our area to escape the horrows of a bad Y2K outcome that cities would experience.

This led me to believe that rural law enforcement may be considering blocking access to their enforcement areas by outsiders. Since most local law enforcement agencies lack the manpower to do this on a 24 hour basis it would require the enlistment of local citizens, in many cases as in our area that would be the local militia.

Don't jump out of your socks at the mention of the word militia. In many rural areas including mine the militia is the the largest, best trained, best equiped, and most regulated group that is capable of performing law enforcement. They are not racists or haters. They are concerned citizens.

I stumbled upon the below post on another Y2K forum that I thought might be worthy of discussion. Comments please.

Ground Squirrel posted September 01, 1999 05:38 PM ------------------------------------------------------------------------ I can tell you this, I have three friends/relatives that are with different County Sheriff's depts. One is with Pine county Mn, which is Pine city Hinckley Mn area whci is about 80 miles north of Mpls/St. Paul area. If they need to on Dec. 31st they have been issued swat gear, ar15 rifles ammo, spike stripes etc. they intend to close the exits from the freeway to their towns as well as state and county highways. If you do not have either a drivers license with an address in the immediate area or a copy of your warranty deed etc. showoing you have a reason to be there, you will not exit the freeway. I would suggest that anyone who for any reason has n ot gone to their retreat by noon on Dec 31, better have a copy of their real estate tax statement or warranty deed etc. to prove they own property there. I know this is true for Crow wing county Mn, Pine county, Mn and Beltrami County, Mn. I would suspect that it may hold true nation wide. If you are going to try the idea of Plummer etc., in addition to the uniform, sign, tools etc. I would add business cards and fake invoices. Should be easy enough to duplicate on todays computers, heck you can buy a c/d for $9.95 at office depot that will allow you to do that. You might even fix up a fake photo ID for your fake company. It would be a gamble with the law to try it though seeing lying to a police officer and giving them phony ID is a felony in most states.

IP: Logged

-- Ed (ed@lizzardranch.com), September 11, 1999

Answers

I live near an offramp and have been hoping that local ham or CB radio operators have enough Y2K sense to plan ahead and arrange blockades.

-- Pearlie Sweetcake (storestuff@home.now), September 11, 1999.

possesion of id is usualy a misdemeanor,attemting to pass a fake to an officer is almost always a felony.If a cop asks about a fake,tell him it's a fake.He/she'll find outone way or an other and that one lie will get you seriously busted instead of ticketed and released on bond.

-- zoobie (zoobiezoob@yahoo.com), September 11, 1999.

Most HAMs do not have a clue. Even if they did, they are not authorized to do roadblocks or other police type activities unless they were deputized which is not likely. Would local law enforcement support or resist blockades? Most will be blindsided and will not expect the sudden influx of people. What would the Highway Patrol or the State Department of Transportation do if people started leaving cities in mass due to lack of electricity, sewer and water? They might even try to block the roads so that only emergency traffic could leave. Check it out. At least get people thinking about what could happen. Contingency planning anyone?

-- Moe (Moe@3stooges.gom), September 11, 1999.

I am lucky that our sheriff here is a GI. He has already made contingency plans for the jail and our town. We have 3 militia groups here and if the need arises they will be helping the cause. My advice is to leave before TSHTF.

-- bardou (bardou@baloney.com), September 11, 1999.

I imagine highway blocades will be a basic contingency plan.

-- Mara Wayne (MaraWayne@aol.com), September 11, 1999.


I know my bugout plans include my laptop (which can run 4+ hours on battery) and a CD that contains street maps of the entire US. I won't need to be on the highways if I can stick to back roads...

-TECH32-

-- TECH32 (TECH32@NOMAIL.COM), September 11, 1999.


I don't know about "militia" groups in my city, but our county Sheriff (ya know, "the toughest sheriff in the country") has access to more than 1,000 official posse members, about half of which are authorized to carry firearms while on official duty.

I would hope that he would forward deploy to block access at the Colorado River to keep the hordes of Californicators out!



-- K. Stevens (kstevens@ It's ALL going away in January.com), September 11, 1999.


This is complete B.S.. If you believe this stuff, you are a tin foil head! I am a police officer in the Pacfic Northwest. I will tell you, something like this would shut down all roads and high ways, due to the congestion caused by the traffic trying to exit. Think about it, this will not happen! The biggest problem of Y2K will be people causeing panic. Stop this B.S. now!

-- JTB (SWAT@u.com), September 11, 1999.

actually the biggest problem continues to be brain dead morons in charge of things ...

-- D E F (eattherich@mailcity.com), September 11, 1999.

JTB, with your attitude, you must not have done much research. Your post lacks credibility. However, we'd be willing to meet you. We'd also be interested in introducing you to the Mayor. Cops like you may be eligible for certain case studies.

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), September 11, 1999.


Look, this issue is not very complicated. If in the view of local authorities there is the danger of spread of disease certain areas would and could be quarantined.

If water and sewer did not work for a week or more that would certainly do the trick for that water and sewer district, since those folks could spread disease to people outside the district.

The concept of quarantine would be to prevent people going both in to and out of the affected areas. We could well face a situation where parts of the country are quarantined. Therefore interstates that ran through such areas would simply be closed.

-- cgbg jr (cgbg jr@webtv.net), September 11, 1999.


I don't have any verification ,but I believe that the state police across the nation can shut down the inerstate systems in an hour. Any feedback? Seems doable.

-- (freeman@interx.net), September 11, 1999.

Takes a chumk more than an hour and the various state police/highway patrols to shut that system down.

There ARE areas where this has been discussed, the trees selected and marked, and the extra vehicle carcasses id'd to do this right.

Chuck

-- Chuck, a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), September 11, 1999.


We had a semi-tractor trailer high-speed chase recently that started in Stockton, CA and ended near Willows, CA. Though it was under different circumstances than just trying to prevent a large mass of people from leaving the city, the CHP was able to control off-ramps. They blocked off off-ramps, laid strips of nails across the roadway to prevent the semi from further travel. Willows is at least 2-1/2 hours away or approximately 175 miles from Stockton. The semi was capable of traveling at high speeds and over nail strips until his final blowout came near Willows, CA. He lost it because his second trailer flipped over and brought him to a dead stop. We watched the chase on TV from beginning to end, and the CHP did a fine job of keeping traffic off the freeway. So, under different scenarios, I believe that law enforcement can shut down major freeways and off-on ramps in a matter of minutes and hours. I you plan to leave the city, get out your Atlas and find the best way of escape.

-- bardou (bardou@baloney.com), September 11, 1999.

If there is a mass exodus from any large city there will be gridlock. I live near (25 miles) a city of approx. one million. During rush hour if there is an accident everyone heads for the side roads they are not equipped for this type of traffic. The intersections are blocked by cars, folks are pounding on steering wheels and this is during so called normal times when the power is on and gas pumps are still working. I am not saying that some folks will not head to the suburbs and the surrounding country. I just don't believe very many will make it. I now work in the opposide direction of that city and live in a semi-rural area. My preps for myself and my extended DGI family are very basic but enough for 6 months. I am sure I haven't thought of everything but I do have a list (it's amazing what I bought at the beginning of my GIdom). Keep posting I always find something mentioned here I didn't think of... lili

-- lili po (lili po@aol.com), September 12, 1999.


In terms of the High Speed Truck Chase::: Consider that the CHP's were shutting down ONLY ONE highway (essentially) and were NOT working a LOT of others. Look at a reasonable scale map and consider how many exits need to be closed to do the job. (NO FAIR trying to just shut it down with a truck load of sand or riprap in the middle of the interstate, because you have to be able to TRANSIT the area with troops/materiel as needed.

Chuck

-- Chuck, a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), September 12, 1999.


Chuck, it was a major freeway that was shut down. My son and I got to talking about it today and depending on how many personnel were available for the task, if you did find a way to get on the freeway, they would have airplanes and helicopters patrolling the roads and they would eventually catch up with you. ITSHTF, I won't be venturing out anywhere, but I am concerned about my kids getting here safely. They have chosen off-road routes, but nothing is always plan tight.

-- bardou (bardou@baloney.com), September 13, 1999.

TEch, hope your Map software isn't the same as ours! WE typed in a local address, and it printed out a map that was definitely incorrect, and had me running circles half an hour before I suspected the dadgum thing was wrong. So much for technology. Better check out the backroads ahead of time.

-- Mumsie (Lotsakids@home.com), September 13, 1999.

I don't really believe this is going to happen, but if it does, couldn't the local cops who were trying to keep the "hordes" out, simply put one cop at each exit? My nearest town has only two exits, for instance, and my valley has only one (each direction).

Am I missing something, here?

Al

-- Al K. Lloyd (all@ready.now), September 13, 1999.


I guess it depends on where you live. Our community is small and out of the way of major freeways, but there's lots of ways in.

-- bardou (bardou@baloney.com), September 13, 1999.

I suppose you're right, Bardou. I live in a mountainous region, and the other ways into my valley are mostly unpaved, unmapped, and certainly unknown to "the hordes".

Al

-- Al K. Lloyd (all@ready.now), September 13, 1999.


Strictly rumour, but recently was talking to a Navy recruiter.

He mentioned a small town (one main intersection type small) in Southwest Michigan which is planning on using the concrete type barricades such as used for lane dividers to shut the town off if needed.

Again, RUMOUR, folks. But there are lots of strange tidbits floating around.

As for my town, there are 10 freeway exits for an area of 200,000 people. Add one more that is an intersection between two freeways. That gives you 11.

Then add about 30 or 40 secondary to tertiary side roads.

You aren't going to block them all.

But I think they will try.

-- Jon Williamson (jwilliamson003@sprintmail.com), September 13, 1999.


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