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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>I’m about 5 minutes driving time from VNV. From my driveway to the Fire Station where we used to meet is a 40-45 minute drive by the freeway, if there is no construction. Going the back way because of winding roads and New Waverly, it is still about a 40-45 minute drive (longer if there is a log truck or a tractor in front of you). From my house to Conroe is 20-25 minutes depending on the time of day. From Conroe to the Woodlands is 10-20 minutes depending on where you’re going. We have members in Cleveland and it’s an even further drive for them to go to Huntsville. Those in the Huntsville area mostly work in that area. We have several members in my area who work in Houston. Which means they have to hustle to make it to a meeting in Huntsville. Those north of Huntsville have an even longer drive but fewer members live at the most north end of the Barony. We’re missing out on a lot of people in the southern part as since I’ve been part of Raven’s Fort we’ve had one demo in a local park. A lot of people consider Huntsville to be Raven’s Fort. It isn’t. That is just a town where members live in or around it and our post office box and bank account reside. The point to this meandering email is Raven’s Fort is comprised of more than Walker County. I know personally of at least 10 people who are members or would attend meetings and practices if it was more centrally located. Huntsville may be the central town but going by the location of the counties in Raven’s Fort. We’re missing the mark by not involving Madison County (again a sparsely populated area but still has potential), San Jacinto County (sparse population), Montgomery County, and Trinity County (sparse population) just to name a few.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>I haven’t been to Populace meetings for a while. Between being ill, having surgeries and it’s a long drive I’d rather attend the Business Meetings in Conroe. I can get the gist of what’s going to be said/done at Populace without the long drive. I do miss seeing everyone and joining in on the discussions. Plus since nothing is ever said online anymore about what went on at Populace many in this area are less inclined to attend. Baroness Giovanna used to do an excellent job of giving a summary of Populace. It actually made you want to attend Populace the next month. Now we either have to attend or call someone and find out what went on during the meeting.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'> ravensfort-bounces@lists.ansteorra.org [mailto:ravensfort-bounces@lists.ansteorra.org] <b>On Behalf Of </b>Darlene Burns<br><b>Sent:</b> Friday, April 04, 2014 5:37 AM<br><b>To:</b> RF<br><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Ravensfort] The demographics of Raven's Fort<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal>I'm not sure I totally agree with you, Marius. It's a 35 minute drive (according to Google maps) to downtown Houston and a 40 minute drive to Huntsville (again according to Google maps). It would look as though The Woodlands are pretty much balanced between the two points. <o:p></o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>Now my personal experience is that both of those time estimates are about 20 minutes too optimistic. If I lived on that side of the county, I'd give myself an hour to get to either destination even in the best of traffic. But in most cases, the stretch between Woodlands and Conroe is the heaviest traffic...after that it thins out and you can drive faster. But heading south, it just gets more and more congested. With being at such a balance point, I think what would influence myself would be the people I was driving to be with.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>The Shire started initially because drive times into Houston were so awful...and that is back in the 90's. It's only gotten worse in the last 20 years. If I had that history and moved to the center of the county to the Woodlands, I'd have a tendency to drive North rather than South. If all I were considering was the drive times involved.<o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal>On Thu, Apr 3, 2014 at 4:40 PM, byzytym <<a href="mailto:byzytym@consolidated.net" target="_blank">byzytym@consolidated.net</a>> wrote:<o:p></o:p></p><div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>My point exactly.</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>We can only take advantage of the fresh blood if we have a presence in the area.</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>People in The Woodlands will drive into Houston rather than Huntsville if Conroe is not an option.</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'> </span><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>V NV</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'> </span><o:p></o:p></p><div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #B5C4DF 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'> <a href="mailto:ravensfort-bounces@lists.ansteorra.org" target="_blank">ravensfort-bounces@lists.ansteorra.org</a> [mailto:<a href="mailto:ravensfort-bounces@lists.ansteorra.org" target="_blank">ravensfort-bounces@lists.ansteorra.org</a>] <b>On Behalf Of </b>Raven's Fort Ansteorra<br><b>Sent:</b> Thursday, April 03, 2014 3:44 PM<br><b>To:</b> Doug Bell; <a href="mailto:ravensfort@lists.ansteorra.org" target="_blank">ravensfort@lists.ansteorra.org</a><br><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Ravensfort] The demographics of Raven's Fort</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'> <o:p></o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;background:white'><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'>Very true my friend. On top of that we are about to have to deal with the population explosotion due Exxon-Mobile woodlands new campus. Many families are about to move in our zip codes!<br>Which means fresh blood :)<br>D</span><o:p></o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;background:white'><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;background:white'><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>On Thursday, April 3, 2014 1:02 PM, Doug Bell <<a href="mailto:magnus77840@yahoo.com" target="_blank">magnus77840@yahoo.com</a>> wrote:</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;background:white'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'>Baron Nicholas and I had this discussion back in the early 2000s while looking at the demographic data for the barony both SCA and real world. He had the data and I had taken some demography classes in my college's Geography department.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;background:white'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'>Raven's Fort has the area of a small Principality with the population found in many large shires. Rural baronies are not common in the SCA since a barony is usually grounded in a major city. The Province of Mooneschadowe is another example of a rural barony but centered around one small town and college. Raven's Fort was founded as a rural barony with many small population clusters in small towns but scattered over a large area. This is an unusual distribution for an SCA group. This distribution is also why you can't solve the problem of driving distance with cantons. One of these population centers by itself is not large enough to support a stable auxillary group over time.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'>As Houston grows outward the barony begins to look like Canada with the population concentrating in the southern zip codes.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'>Given another 10-15 years this will get to the point where 80-90% of the members will be in the southern quarter of the barony. You will have to manage these changes as best as you can but every future officer in the barony needs to remember the issue.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'>Countries like Chile, Indonesia, and Russia have some of the same demographic population versus geography issues, so it is not just an SCA creation. Real world nations haven't come up with a perfect solution to population distribution trends either.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;background:white'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'><br>safe journeys my friends<br>Magnus</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;background:white'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'> </span><o:p></o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;background:white'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'>_______________________________________________<br>Ravensfort mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Ravensfort@lists.ansteorra.org" target="_blank">Ravensfort@lists.ansteorra.org</a><br><a href="http://lists.ansteorra.org/listinfo.cgi/ravensfort-ansteorra.org" target="_blank">http://lists.ansteorra.org/listinfo.cgi/ravensfort-ansteorra.org</a></span><o:p></o:p></p></div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;margin-bottom:12.0pt;background:white'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><br>_______________________________________________<br>Ravensfort mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Ravensfort@lists.ansteorra.org">Ravensfort@lists.ansteorra..org</a><br><a href="http://lists.ansteorra.org/listinfo.cgi/ravensfort-ansteorra.org" target="_blank">http://lists.ansteorra.org/listinfo.cgi/ravensfort-ansteorra.org</a><o:p></o:p></p></div><p class=MsoNormal><br><br clear=all><o:p></o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><p class=MsoNormal>-- <br>Annes<br>"Munerius Ultra Sanitas" <o:p></o:p></p></div></div>
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