Lanesborough OKs Bylaw For Aerial Adventure Parks

LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — With a unanimous vote at town meeting, the zoning is in place for an aerial adventure park on Brodie Mountain Road and developers are already hoping to start construction in the summer.

Feronia Forests LLC, formerly Feronia Holdings, has been working with the town for nearly a year to bring in an adventure park. However, zoning bylaws prohibited them from opening on Brodie Mountain Road so the town crafted new bylaws to allow the company to move forward.

Those bylaws were approved at a special town meeting Tuesday.

The special town meeting was paid for by Feronia and the new bylaw is supported by the Board of Selectmen.

The bylaw allows any aerial adventure park to open in the limited business zone with a special permit. The law does require a minimum lot size of 10 acres and that 75 percent of the aerial elements be attached to natural features, not to utility poles or other manmade structures.

The developers are set to move forward with the design phase while they wait until for the attorney general's office to approve the new zoning, which could take up to 90 days, and then go through local permitting. They hope to start building in the summer and open for the fall.

Jonathan Sabin, who represents Feronia, said the group could "realistically" receive a special permit to build and open the park in July as long as there are no hitches.

Feronia is partnering with East Chatham, N.Y.-based Tree-Mendous Parks, which constructed a safari park at the San Diego Zoo, to build what they call a "social and economically friendly" park. Tree-Mendous owner Gerhard Komenda said the attractions will be attached to existing trees without drilling and that trucks will not be driven onto the course to prevent tree damage. The platforms will be made from native woods, he said.

"We will need about four months to build," Komenda said, adding that the construction will take longer because the workers will hike to the site.

Editor's Note: The aerial park is being built near the wind farm access road off Brodie Mountain Road in Lanesborough. There were stories reported in other media about a week after this meeting that used illustrations implying the old Brodie Ski Area was the site of the new park. That is incorrect. The ski area is in New Ashford.

Pittsfield Celebrates Robert 'Bob' Presutti on Arbor Day

By Brittany PolitoiBerkshires Staff
05:33PM / Friday, April 26, 2024

Bob Presutti, right, is presented the Hebert Award in 2017 for his volunteer efforts at Springside Park. He died in 2023 at age 88.

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — A tree has been planted next to the Berkshire Athenaeum in honor of local "giant" Robert Presutti.

Officials celebrated Arbor Day on Friday by installing a commemorative plaque next to the American elm sapling. This is a tree that James McGrath, the city's park program manager, said Presutti would have been particularly proud of.

"Today is a day where we yes, celebrate trees, but today is also a day where here in the city we intentionally try to acknowledge the good work of folks in our community who spend their time and their efforts and their talents to make Pittsfield a more beautiful place," he said to a crowd of about 20 people.

"Today we are honoring a longtime community volunteer named Bob Presutti. I'm sure a lot of you here know Bob and know his contributions to the city, not only when it comes to trees and parks but also to the Retired Senior Volunteer Program."

The longtime volunteer passed away last year at the age of 88. He contributed more than 10,600 hours to RSVP and had great impacts on the Parks Department over the years from sharing his knowledge and talents to ensuring that workers were safe when working on trees.

"This morning I went through my emails to see how many emails Bob Presutti sent me since the year 2001 when I started with the city. Bob Presutti sent me 14,000 emails and nearly every single one of those was about trees," McGrath said, prompting laughter and smiles from attendees.

One thread struck him as particularly important because it showed Presutti's empathy when it comes to the safety of city workers while caring for trees.

"There were multiple emails from Bob about the need to get the Parks Department maintenance guys into a program learning about chainsaw safety and learning about ladder safety. He was really into making certain that our city workers were well cared for and had all of the instruction that they needed and in fact, he even offered his own time and services after he became certified to teach our city workers," McGrath said.