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This is a brief article about a change in home buying trends toward less square footage and in favor of higher quality of life in terms of neighborhood. It's the second in a two part series. It resonated with me because I grew up in a suburban (not McMansions by any stretch) neighborhood detached from any civic or cultural hub activity. People mostly kept to themselves and within their yards, and I always longed as a kid to be able to walk places and just observe human activity or go to a store. Had it been purely rural I might have been satisfied in other ways but it didn't really have the advantages of rural or urban life. That is the reality I think of many suburbs - yes, there is a city somewhere in the vicinity but you are surrounded by private property, so it's kind of the crud of both worlds rather than the best.

This is a page with instructions on how to build your own bamboo bike trailer. At the bottom there are additional links to other designs for utility trailers for bikes. I have borrowed the trailers that the Pedal People use in Northampton and they are great. You can haul up to 300 lbs and they don't compromise your stability much. The catch is that their trailers cost upwards of $450. There is a a significant community of enthusiasts that simply want to promote human power as an alternative to fossil fuel, and consequently you can find all of these trailer plans offered for free - some with Creative Commons licenses and others just there for the taking/sharing. It's great!

This is an incubator facility in Greenfield that helps entrepreneurs get their ideas up and running. They offer expert advice in business planning, operations, and lending as well as workspace. Their food processing division has been tremendously successful, helping many creative people turn locally grown foods into unique products that highlight the agricultural importance of Franklin County.