If you have plans for this coming Monday, May 22, or Tuesday, May 23 that include activities at one of our beautiful lakes here in Pittsfield, you may want to change them due to a temporary closure.

Yes, it's that time of year once again. Memorial Day weekend will soon be here followed closely by SUMMER! And every year around this time in order to get ready for the summer boating season, some lake clean-up is in order.

According to a media statement from the City of Pittsfield and the Mayor's Office, Pontoosuc Lake...

...will be CLOSED on Tuesday, May 23, to all uses as part of the nuisance aquatic weed management program...(conducted)to control the growth of nuisance aquatic vegetation.

The management program will be conducted by SOLitude Lake Management of Shrewsbury, Massachusetts. Here are the restrictions for use of the lake:

  • Swimming, Boating, and Fishing: restricted for 1 day or until May 24
  • Direct Drinking: restricted for 4 days or until May 27
  • Livestock Watering: restricted for 2 days or until May 25
  • Irrigation: restricted for 6 days or until May 29

In addition, and this is very important, the boat ramp at Pontoosuc Lake(Hancock Road, within the park) will be CLOSED on Monday, May 22, so that state personnel can install a new aluminum dock system.

For additional information, you can contact SOLitude Lake Management at (508) 865-1000. The city of Pittsfield thanks you in advance for your patience during this time. After all, we want our lakes to be in good shape before we jump in, right?

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Many of the included towns jump out at the casual observer as popular summer-rental spots--the Ozarks' Branson, Missouri, or Arizona's Lake Havasu--it might surprise you to dive deeper into some quality-of-life offerings beyond the beach and vacation homes. You'll likely pick up some knowledge from a wide range of Americana: one of the last remaining 1950s-style drive-ins in the Midwest; a Florida town that started as a Civil War veteran retirement area; an island boasting some of the country's top public schools and wealth-earners right in the middle of a lake between Seattle and Bellevue; and even a California town containing much more than Johnny Cash's prison blues.

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Every beach town has its share of pluses and minuses, which got us thinking about what makes a beach town the best one to live in. To find out, Stacker consulted data from WalletHub, released June 17, 2020, that compares U.S. beach towns. Ratings are based on six categories: affordability, weather, safety, economy, education and health, and quality of life. The cities ranged in population from 10,000 to 150,000, but they had to have at least one local beach listed on TripAdvisor. Read the full methodology here. From those rankings, we selected the top 50. Readers who live in California and Florida will be unsurprised to learn that many of towns featured here are in one of those two states.

Keep reading to see if your favorite beach town made the cut.

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