It is around 18 km to the nearest big town. There are steep hills. Right now it is cold, I have bicycled in such weather, but it is not easy. Exposed flesh will freeze in seconds. Wear too much and dampness builds in clothing, not good, too little and you freeze.
Ice is dangerous to ride on.
There are hundreds of houses around here that face the same situation. I do not produce nearly enough food to feed even just the people living on this road a partial diet, and this area is full of such roads. If I go further, I find the same situation all over, hundreds of thousands of homes built far from centers that have food and work. They do not have enough land around each of them to produce enough food. My experience shows that intensive methods of agriculture always require outside fertility to be brought in to maintain the yields, this is not sustainable.