# Ideas for urban caching?



## redcat (Sep 21, 2010)

The mess in Japan has caused me to start thinking about the caching of supplies.

4 years ago I finally escaped from California and moved to Iowa. Last year my employer got borged by a bigger company and my job went away, so I'm now living near a big city again - Chicago this time. 

If TSHTF but leaves my neighborhood liveable, my wife and I are ok. But if some sort of disaster strikes while I'm at work and my wife is away from home and our neighborhood is rendered uninhabitable, we would be pretty well hosed. This suggests that having a standby cache somewhere remote from home might be a good idea. 

Has anyone given any thought to where you could cache supplies in an urban area? It's not like we have expanses of wilderness near here (other than some small and heavily used forest preserves), and I don't know any outlying farmers. The only idea I can come up with is paying for space in a storage outfit, and I'm not sure how comfortable I'd be with that.

Comments?


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## geoffreys7 (Jan 11, 2011)

Other than your workplace or car, is there anyone in your office you're friendly with that might let you store a bin at their place? Maybe you could offer to do the same for them, especially due to the Japan situation right now people seem to be more aware of the need to have a backup plan.
Rubbermaid bins with some supplies, food, clothes, copies of personal documents makes sense.


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## The_Blob (Dec 24, 2008)

I suppose it depends on what you are looking to cache


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## GXLancer (Mar 13, 2011)

Get a storage unit outside of town


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## CulexPipiens (Nov 17, 2010)

Redcat... similar situtation for me.. I'm close enough to Chicago to consider a mass exodus to be a real concern for us. Something like a tornado could have the same affect on us as the Japan disasters had... all of your stuff wiped out or destroyed. 

So, I'm also looking into rental space. I've considered spaces anywhere from not much more than a locker or two in size up to a garage where I could stash a future planned BOV preloaded with supplies. I've also considered going a few miles from the house in 2 different directions for smaller local cahces along with a larger one a substantial distance (but still within a 1 or 2 day walk) away. 

These are all just in the thinking stage so I'm curious to hear about what you come up with.


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## NaeKid (Oct 17, 2008)

I have four caches nearby.

First cache consists of a single large rubbermaid bin with "stuff" inside it placed into the back of an "abandoned" vehicle that I "store" at my friends place about an hour north of my home (80km / 45miles). The spare vehicle is road-worthy, has a solar panel attached to it to keep the battery ready to go at anytime and the fuel-tank is filled and touched with Sta-Bil gasoline stabilizer. My friend is also a hunter so I have spare ammo / firearms stashed in a safe at his place.

Second cache consists of a single large rubbermaid bin with "stuff" inside it placed in a friends garage about an hour drive south of my home (105km / 60miles). He also is a hunter, I have a safe with ammo and firearms stashed near his supplies. I have no worries about him using my stuff as he is ready for the Zombie Apocalypse.

My third stash consists of another large rubbermaid bin with "stuff" inside it that is stored at a business that another friend owns about 2hrs away (210km / 120miles).

My forth stash hides at my parents place about an 8hr drive away.

Stash #2 gets me to Stash #3. Stash #3 gets me to my parents place. From there, it is a case of re-grouping if required as it is "central" to the whole family. If there are problems in my friend's / family's general area, I will expect them to come my way.

I also have several places picked out as the BOL that I can reach within an hour by truck-n-trailer for hiding out in the woods if it is required.

*Note:* Bin with "stuff" may consist of spare clothing (socks, underware, rain-jacket, winter-jacket, work-boots, work-gloves, winter-gloves, etc), dried food, water filters, maps, batteries, fire-starters, mini-propane-bottles (and related cook-ware) - all considered disposable but still useful. My friends know what is in the bin, it is not locked and they are welcome to the contents as long as they let me know that they dipped into it, I will refill it (at my expense) as part of a "thank-you" for allowing me the space at their places for it.


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## Clarice (Aug 19, 2010)

In Japan if there were any preppers they would have lost every thing after the tsunami, even if they had storage units or caches The only problem I have with storage units is the cost. For every month you pay rent it adds to the cost of the things you have stored. On our budget we can't afford the extra expense. We have been talking about off site caches but so far have not come up with any ideas. It is one thing that really bothers me. Our nearest "on board" relative is 6 hours away under the best travel conditions. We have talked about burying some small ones on our property but haven't made a real decision yet. Right now if we should take a direct hit from a tornado(Heaven forbid) we would loose everything.


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## redcat (Sep 21, 2010)

That's pretty much our situation too. Storage units are expensive around here, so we'd rather not have to. Don't have a prepper friends or acquaintances nearby, nearest family is in Southern CA (we're just outside Chicago). So still thinking here.


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## slowpoke (Mar 16, 2011)

With just getting started at this I never thought about caching, but good idea. I live near a Nuke Plant in Maryland and was thinking about storing some things at my boat 30 miles to the south, but the power plant is inbetween home and boat

Fred


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## SurvivalNut (Nov 13, 2008)

*URBAN Cacheing*

I have a son who lives 250 miles away. The route here is via a major highway, but through some mountain passes and rangeland.

His plan is to bug here in his pickup. Thrown in the rig will be an ATV, bicycle and his BOB as well as a game cart setup.

At strategic points along the way we have 'adopted' fruit trees on public land and planted some other edibles in out of the way places. We also took some 5gallon buckets and buried BOBs from garage sale scavenging. We visit the trees from time to time to fertilize and prune them.

In the event of an increase in the situations, we have the plan to upgrade/preposition a very limited amount of fuel and LTS food in areas where fire safety is not an issue.

That way whether he rides, trikes or walks, he has preplanned caches.

If one way traffic in all my direction occurs, he will know I have at least updated my end of the route.

We also have a signal system established so he can spray paint/tag some landmarks along the way in case we begin looking for him.

Also, obviously, the cache system works both ways.

I just don't know about the storage unit idea, in SHTF, I'll be going through those myself.

In his office he keeps mental note of items of interest (snacks, water, gear) that he can liberate in need. He does some minor purchasing of those consumable items so he keeps those items stocked up. He will walk away prepped and moving quick.


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## BillM (Dec 29, 2010)

*Catch of survival goods*

I have considered your delimia and believe a storage unit is your best bet.

In a SHTF situation , storage units would likely be untouched. If you are afraid looters might break into it searching for food, just pile some old furniture and junk in the front of the unit and put your catch of goods in the back. In the event looters open it, they will see a bunch of crap to move and they will quickly move on.


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## sailaway (Mar 12, 2009)

slowpoke said:


> With just getting started at this I never thought about caching, but good idea. I live near a Nuke Plant in Maryland and was thinking about storing some things at my boat 30 miles to the south, but the power plant is inbetween home and boat
> 
> Fred


Glad to hear someone else has a boat here. I keep a weeks supply of food and water on mine, that will get me quite far. My only problem with the boat is Lake Erie is seasonal, right now I am on the hard.


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## TrackerRat (Mar 24, 2011)

Heres a thought. You will always have your car nearby. Make a stash in your ride. pickups have great space under the bed of the truck. A nice makeshift box can be welded under there. Just dont store food or water in it due to heat. check state laws as some make hidden compartments illegal due to drug smuggling but if it was underneath in plain view to someone laying down and looking under I dont see any problems. Nobody will do that to see it there anyways.


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## CulexPipiens (Nov 17, 2010)

After reading this thread yesterday I started pricing storage in the greater Chicago area. Looks like a 5x5 space is around $30-35/month while a vehicle sized space 10X15 or 10X20 runs around $100+.

That works out to $350-400/year for a small space and well over $1000 for a larger one.

2 or 3 small storage facility caches in different directions is easily going to exceed $1000/year. 

That's a lot to spend on space, on the other hand a tornado could easily make that a worthwhile investment. Then again, something buried in your yard would also survive a tornado. As long as you don't run the risk of flood or other "ground covering" event, a back yard cache would be a quick and cheap option to protect against tornado or house fire. 

Still haven't decided what approach I may take but at least I have more info to think about.


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## 101airborne (Jan 29, 2010)

Without reading all the answers, depending on what your cacheing you might consider building some cache tubes. ( You can see examples and how to make them on Utube) I have made dozens of them for myself and others. They are made out of 4' sections of 6" PVC heavy wall sewer pipe. You can fill them and seal them and bury them where ever you can find a spot. Then if you own a GPS just set the location as a way point and you can go back to them later. You use a post hole digger and bury them upright so the don't need a huge amount of room to bury one. We live just at the city limits of town and We have several buried in the surrounding areas along several road ways. Along the right of way for electrical ( high tension) power lines, main gas lines etc. Are good locations as they cut cross country and through wooded areas and are usually cleared and maintaind "pathways" a hundred feet wide or so. Just bury your cache along the woodline ( edge) and you should be safe. Otherwise maybe set cache's with friends family and such. Personally I'm not a fan of public storage, because of the lack of security. It seems that here you read about one getting broken into on a ragular basis.


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## Magus (Dec 1, 2008)

Put a BOB everywhere you might be when it hits.


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## NaeKid (Oct 17, 2008)

I had another thought after reading a thread on another board about a guy who has a motorcycle but no-where to store them for the winter-time (apartment / dorm / college living). He was discussing portable tarp-sheds, garden-sheds, renting a storage-locker, etc.

One person came up with what I thought was a great idea. Purchase a larger enclosed utility trailer, fill it with the required stuff (motorbike and related gear in his case) and park it at a storage-lot for trailers - invisible in plain sight and only pay rent for the amount of land that the trailer sits on (sq-ft).

If you work in an industrial-area (warehouses, manufacturing, etc) you might be able to park the trailer in the back-lot of a friendly company - especially if you are willing to have their company logo put onto the side of it - they get free advertising, you get free parking --- a win-win situation.


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## BillM (Dec 29, 2010)

*Buried Catches*

You can bury catches of food and/or supplies in five gallon buckets sealed in Mylar.

It won't take a very large hole and if you put it below the frost line, it will not freeze or get too hot.

Mark the location by tying a nylon cord to the bail and leaving it sticking out of the ground a couple of inches. you can place a rock on top of the cord to hide it and mark the location.

A descriptive map will be better than a G.P.S. location. Your G.P.S. locator won't work if satellites are out of service.

This is a good way to store long term food catches outside on your property.
Looters may get what is in your pantry but they won't get what is buried in your yard.
Never keep all your eggs in one basket !


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## TrackerRat (Mar 24, 2011)

This guy has some great ideas


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