How do these towns rate in terms of family opportunities? (Edison: broker, transfer)

[sirk98]

Firstly, THANK YOU everyone who has weighed in on my earlier posts

We are now working with a broker based out of Piscataway. He has sent us properties to consider, based off our likes/dislikes and using the 'laundry list' I put together with the help of many of you on my previous thread (see original post: Back to Looking at NJ! Am I missing any towns?

So, we are looking this weekend at:

• Scotch Plains
• Fanwood
• Cranford
• Clark
• Metuchen
• East Brunswick
• North Edison

If time allows, we will also check out West Caldwell, Verona, Caldwell, Livingston. We may push those towns to another weekend


So, my question: for the towns above, can anyone give me insight into how strong a parent network there is in each area? Are there a lot of young families in these areas? In Brooklyn, our neighborhood has a parents group on Yahoo. Through this, my wife (who is a stay-at-home-mom) met some terrific friends when our daughter was born last year. I am hoping to find something similar in NJ


Any information would be appreciated!
-k

[capricorniana]

East Brunswick is very family oriented. The local public library has many children programs and your wife can meet other parents in the area by joining the programs. Also if you check the website meetup.com, you can see that there are many playgroup, playdate groups in the area of East brunswick where your wife can meet other parents as well.

And definitely check Livingston! My friend lives there and it is a nice neighborhood with great school system.

[sirk98]

thanks!

Glad to hear something positive about Livingston. I read some unflattering posts as I was scouring the archives (snobby town, etc)... With the Jitney, I am trying to figure out what commute to Wall St would be from that area.

So East Brunswick has an active presence on meetup.com? That is good to know. I guess that would be similar to the Yahoo group we currently have in our hood. Thanks again!

[capricorniana]

the commute from east brunswick to the city will be long ( it will take you at least an hour or more, depending if you have to make transfers to get to your destination). I used to work in the lower east side and it was at least 1 hour and 30 min (door to door every day), but you get used to it. I think Livingston will give you a better commute time. You can drive form Livingston to Harrison train station (about 20-30 min), and then take the train PATH which take you directly to wall street ( so it will be about one hour or less every day each way).

Good luck with your search and move!