Pioneer Valley vs metro-west

[ogre]

Since you're familiar with Maynard, you know that its downtown is fairly active but not cute in appearance like the main drag in Norhtampton. You also know that within Maynard it will be difficult to find the amount of land you want. If you're more interested in the downtown area's content than a cutesy look, and if you can make the commute work, I'll second WoodyWW's suggestion of Stow. You could find a good amount of land there, and it's right next door to Maynard. You could really almost view Stow physically as being like a semi-rural outlying section of Maynard.

For the same reasons, I'd also suggest a look at Acton.

By the way, jobs can be hard to come by in the Northampton-Amherst section of the Pioneer Valley. Lots of low-wage jobs get snapped up by the huge number of college students in the area, so if you'd consider moving there you'd be well advised to have something lined up before the move, in the way of professional work or a job in the trades. In either category, you'd be likely to find that many of the jobs are associated with the colleges.

Also, I don't have serious inside knowledge about the local employment outlook, but I lived in Amherst for nine years, so I got a view of the situation that's about as close as you can get as an outsider. I had the impression that a lot of jobs at the in-between level--above the low-wage student kinds of jobs and below the professional level, basically decent-paying blue collar jobs--went to local people with local connections. Lots of local political connection games going on around there. Sort of like a little bit of a rural Chicago (in terms of old-boy networking, certainly not in terms of crime). Another reason it would be a good idea to have work line up before moving to that area.

[RiverBird]

Originally Posted by ladyalicemore

I hope you get good answers, libraryhead because as I continue to research MA I am in the same bind, and would love to hear the different opinions. I want to be near schools because I like the culture as a uni teacher who will probably retire in a few years and would lilke to keep that sense of good energy one feels on campuses (most days, anyhow.) COL is a huge factor for me.

So I keep looking, but feel the same dislike of some of the near-to-Boston places.

Yet in the Pioneer Valley there are problems with access to eastern Ma. I looked yesterday and saw that Northampton is 5 hrs by bus to Boston. Not great if I want to see family and friends in that area, pretty much the reason I am moving from FL when I retire. Yes, I have a car but I spent most of my pre-Florida life in Boston and NYC and never really got to like driving. Maybe a tiny apartment in Roslindale will be where I end up but another thing I miss about MA are the trees and the lakes and the wonderful pineywood smell where I grew up. I could get that in the Pioneer Valley or the Berkshires. But my family are way over on the Cape and in the immediate Boston area.

Hard to figure things out. It's still quite possible I'll either go totally urban or totally rural in Maine. With a family things are different, but I still felt I knew just what you were talking about in your post.

?? bold, above. Northampton is about 100 miles straight to Boston on the Pike. Are you thinking stagecoach?

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/26/us...stem.html?_r=0

If you don't like driving, other than Portland, the state of Maine would not be for you. If you are traditional retirement age, think carefully about your transportation needs. The Five College bus system in the Pioneer Valley is free, and goes all over between many towns.