Neighborhoods in Winchester/Lexington/Belmont

[holden125]

Originally Posted by jad79

Can anybody comment on the area of Winchester between Mt. Vernon Street and Prospect Street? It appears to have many things going for it (easy access to schools, downtown, rail and the fells) - are there any big negatives?

Not that I know of. As a kid over 25 years ago I lived for a while a little bit farther down, near the rotary at Main St and Bacon St. It's a very nice area, not that much traffic on most of the side streets, no real negatives.

[Lexingtonian]

As with Reguards to the question about lexington ma schools, Fiske is known as one of the elite schools. Here you will find some of the wealthiest familes in town. If you are interseted in "keeping up with the joanses" then this is the place for you. As far as Acedemics go all lexington ma schools are good, but thanks to the wealthy people, Fiske (which was just redone) gets tons of funding unlike other lexington schools... if you have the money it is the place to go.

[littleimp]

Do you know anything about Bowman?

[ATAK]

Originally Posted by elisemarie

4panthers -

I was just wondering how your search is going??

Have you settled on a town?

We've seen a few homes in Lexington and Belmont but nothing that we're wild about.

EliseMarie and 4Panthers,

This thread has been tremendously helpful to me. I am a mom of young children with very similar priorities - walkable town with great schools, and a network of young families to tap into. I live in the South End of Boston and am a little nervous about moving out to the burbs just because I have such a fantastic network of young moms here and love being able to walk everywhere.

I have just started my search, and was wondering if either of you have found a new home and what your thoughts are?

Thanks so much for your posts!

[tkfriendlyl]

I can tell you that my family is moving to lexington, very close to Monroe Hill - and we think the town seems great - although I have not seen tons of people out and about. I"m hoping to meet some stay at home moms too as I am at home with my 2.5 year old old son. If you do decide on lexington, get in touch!

Originally Posted by elisemarie

Thanks for the insights!

Airedaley - since you live in Lexington can you tell me a little more about the people? I know that you can not stereotype any town but one thing our realtor has said (in part b/c I think she's more comfortable selling Belmont vs Lexington because that's what she knows!) is that Lexington has a lot of academics (Harvard, MIT, etc) while Belmont has more folks in business and "regular folks". Another friend said that Belmont has a lot more stay-at-home parents than Lexington.

Again, I know it's hard to generalize but the town we live in now has so many stay-at-home moms that there is a 300-member moms club and there are always parents w/kids to do something with. Kids play outside and most neighborhoods are pretty active - even during the week. I noticed that neither Lexington nor Belmont has a Moms Club (and Belmont doesn't even have a Newcomers Club...Lexington does...) We are trying to find a great public school system near a walkable town center (don't want to drive for everything) that has activities for the "dying breed" of stay-at-home moms w/young children . I know that both Bel and Lex meet the first two criteria but I'm wondering if we have a better chance of finding stay-at-home parents in other towns???

We really like the town where we are now except for the fact that we have to drive everywhere and the schools are solid but not great and access to private schools is limited. Other than those two biggies, the town is friendly, extremely active and whatever family structure you have (stay-at-home or 2-career) there is something for everyone (the town is Franklin). People are actually out and about in their yards, the playgrounds, walking, shopping during the weekdays. I love that. I know that by moving closer to Boston we'll get lower car-dependency and better public schools and greater access to all sorts of private schools. But I'm wondering if the lack of Newcomers Club and/or Moms club says something about what I and my two young kids may experience on a day-to-day basis.

Our budget is up to $2M so we have some financially flexibility but we're just spinning our wheels in terms of feeling really good about either town from a fit perspective...advice please!!!

[tre1971]

Hi, i just had to reply regarding mom groups - both Lexington and Belmont have parent groups with stuff to do for stay at home moms. (they are for parents, but it's mostly moms at events) Goto lexfun.org for the five and under group, and i think there's another Lexington group for parents of school aged kids. The belmont group is just starting up, but i went to a speaker event they held last night and it was a good group.