Townshend, VT
Townshend wildfire risk explained
Out of every US place USFS scores, Townshend lands at the 17th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — a figure built from its 102 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Townshend at the 17th percentile, close to its 17th-percentile risk score.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Of Townshend's 102 counted buildings, 80.4% carry Direct exposure and only 0% carry Minimal — a lopsided split that puts defensible-space clearing ahead of vents or roofing as the intervention worth doing first.
Where Townshend ranks
Townshend's 74th-percentile standing inside Vermont outpaces its 17th national percentile — this is a hotter spot than most of its own state, even though the state as a whole runs cooler nationally. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Townshend ranks 26,110 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 28,977 by building count (1 is largest). Within Vermont alone, it ranks 49 of 179 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Vermont on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Townshend's low rating (17th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
What would actually reduce this score
Townshend's 80.4% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
More on how this number was built
Townshend's 17th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Townshend, see the exposure-zones guide.