North Dakota is quickly becoming one of the largest oil-producing states, and not without some growing pains for many of the state's rural residents. Among those pains are increases in traffic accidents, rising rents and longer waits for medical care.
Of the state's 17 counties producing oil and gas, two-thirds exceed the state's average for crash risk, according to the Great Plains Transportation Institute at North Dakota State University. The estimated property cost related to traffic crashes has increased from $90.9 million in 2006 to $121.8 million in 2010. The number of large trucks involved in crashes doubled from 2006-2010 and trucks, pickups and vans now make up more than 70 percent of crashes in these counties, The Jamestown Sun reports. To read an NBC News interview with Williston, N.D., Mayor Ward Koeser, who talks more about the traffic impact, click here.
Lois Sinness, an 82 year old resident of one small Oil Patch community, is among those leaving her home because surging rent prices. Sinness' $700-a-month apartment became almost three times that due to the increased demand for housing, James MacPherson reports for The Huffington Post. "We're all on fixed incomes, living mostly on Social Security, so it's been a terrible shock," Sinness told MacPherson.
North Dakota law prohibits rental rate caps, so many low income housing units are now housing oil workers who can pay higher prices, MacPherson reports. With a missile base in the area, the elderly are not the only ones left without affordable housing. Lt. John Nordstrom, a single Air Force officer, experienced a $1,000 a month rent increase for a small house he was renting, MPR News reports.
At Mercy Medical Center in Williston, N.D., emergency room visits have increased 50 percent over the last 12 months creating an average wait time of at least two hours, Blake Ellis of CNN Money reports.
Of the state's 17 counties producing oil and gas, two-thirds exceed the state's average for crash risk, according to the Great Plains Transportation Institute at North Dakota State University. The estimated property cost related to traffic crashes has increased from $90.9 million in 2006 to $121.8 million in 2010. The number of large trucks involved in crashes doubled from 2006-2010 and trucks, pickups and vans now make up more than 70 percent of crashes in these counties, The Jamestown Sun reports. To read an NBC News interview with Williston, N.D., Mayor Ward Koeser, who talks more about the traffic impact, click here.
Lois Sinness, an 82 year old resident of one small Oil Patch community, is among those leaving her home because surging rent prices. Sinness' $700-a-month apartment became almost three times that due to the increased demand for housing, James MacPherson reports for The Huffington Post. "We're all on fixed incomes, living mostly on Social Security, so it's been a terrible shock," Sinness told MacPherson.
North Dakota law prohibits rental rate caps, so many low income housing units are now housing oil workers who can pay higher prices, MacPherson reports. With a missile base in the area, the elderly are not the only ones left without affordable housing. Lt. John Nordstrom, a single Air Force officer, experienced a $1,000 a month rent increase for a small house he was renting, MPR News reports.
At Mercy Medical Center in Williston, N.D., emergency room visits have increased 50 percent over the last 12 months creating an average wait time of at least two hours, Blake Ellis of CNN Money reports.
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