Living in Boiling Springs PA? (Lancaster, Carlisle: insurance, home, school district)

[navyvet_bb0218]

Hello all,

Thanks for reading this. I recently accepted a job offer in Middletown, PA and will be relocating from Gilbertsville PA. My wife really likes Boiling Springs (BS) after our visit on Memorial Day because of the small town atmosphere and the scenery.

-Can anybody comment on the school district in BS?

-Are the people generally accepting of outsiders that move in, or does BS suffer from "small town syndrome" as I call it where if you werent born and raised there, they don't want anything to do with you?

-Does the school district have any services for kids with mild autism?

-What is something you wish you new about BS before you moved there?

-How bad is traffic trying to get over the river to Middletown and how are the roads around BS during the winter?

Thanks for the info!

[ki0eh]

I moved from Iowa to BS, right in the old town historic district, a few years ago. I kind of regret moving away to the "east shore". The water is pretty good tasting, the South Middleton Twp Municipal Authority intercepts it before it comes "boiling" up.

I was first surprised by the train horns in the middle of the night. The bucolic looking railroad is actually part of a main rail corridor from New Orleans to Newark, NJ. Since I rented I was not happy having to drive 5+ miles into Carlisle to do laundry. The advent of the Target-ish box strip mall in the north part of South Middleton and its associated access roads made it easier to get onto I-81, it used to be tough to make the left turn from Forge Rd onto PA 74 to get around the half-exits.

Then I had to move the car over to the school parking lot for the first Saturday in June, the Foundry Day craft festival - also corresponding with National Trails Day with hiking related exhibits on the other side of the lake (I'm sorry, since I grew up in the FLX of NYS I'd be more inclined to call it a small pond than a lake). Some of the Appalachian Trail thru-hikers also take advantage of the food stands (honestly more crowded than the craft/art booths), you can smell them from half a block away but are generally pleasant enough 20-somethings or 60-somethings at stages of life with sufficient free time and fitness to take four to six months on an adventure.

That side of the Cumberland Valley often has sinkholes, one block of Walnut St right in "town" has had them repeatedly in recent years. Not a place to go without sinkhole insurance.

Although this might have changed, at the time I lived in the old town there was no mail delivery. You got a combination to open the PO box area of the post office any time day or night. I would usually walk over if I got home at rush hour, less aggravating than fighting for a parking spot, and an opportunity to greet one's neighbors. Did not seem to be a problem later at night to pull in to get mail, seemed well lit.

I think South Middleton schools are considered OK but I haven't dealt with them myself and can't opine about autism services. Nearby Churchtown in Monroe Twp shares the Boiling Springs address (with mail delivery even, I think) but is in the brand name Cumberland Valley school district.

I never had trouble getting out PA 174 to Lisburn Rd to US 15 north briefly to the Turnpike easterly (except for the stop signs at old Gettysburg Rd, now thankfully replaced with a light), although Lisburn Rd is more built up now than it was, so YMMV.

In the old town as is common for places on the PA settlement pattern, snow piles would build up and eat up street parking. I imagine it's much the same in Gilbertsville.

If you like quaint small villages like that, a couple that are closer to Middletown are Union Deposit (in South Hanover Twp., Dauphin County, Hershey 17033 zip, well rated Lower Dauphin schools, within rifle shot distance of The Vista School should that level of autism service be needed, on the non-sinkhole side of the valley but watch for flood zones), and Maytown (E Donegal Twp, Lancaster County, don't really know anything about Donegal schools).

Mechanicsburg Borough and Hummelstown Borough are slightly larger communities with similar type of housing stock to BS and more full services.

[navyvet_bb0218]

Ki0eh,

Thanks so much for the insight and time it took to reply. You gave me a lot to consider, specially about sinkholes.

I will look into some of the towns you had mentioned also.

Thanks again.

[ki0eh]

To a first approximation, areas south/east of US 11 on the "west shore", and along and south/east US 322 then US 422 on the "east shore", in the valley, can have sinkhole issues of varying intensity. PA*DCNR*-*Geology - Sinkholes