Holden is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The town was founded in 1742, and the Town Square was donated by John Hancock, former Governor of Massachusetts. The population was 19,969 at the 2020 census.
West Boylston is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States and a northern suburb of Worcester. The population was 7,877 at the 2020 census. West Boylston includes the village of Oakdale, located on the opposite side of the Wachusett Reservoir from West Boylston center along Route 140. Although the town was split off from Boylston, it has a larger population than its eastern namesake.
The Quabbin Reservoir is the largest inland body of water in Massachusetts, and was built between 1930 and 1939. Along with the Wachusett Reservoir, it is the primary water supply for Boston, 65 miles (105 km) to the east, and 40 other cities and towns in Greater Boston. The Quabbin also supplies water to three towns west of the reservoir and acts as backup supply for three others. By 1989, it supplied water for 2.5 million people, about 40% of the state's population at the time. It has an aggregate capacity of 412 billion US gallons (1,560 GL) and an area of 38.6 square miles (99.9 km2).
The East Branch Delaware River is one of two branches that form the Delaware River. It is approximately 75 mi (121 km) long, and flows through the U.S. state of New York. It winds through a mountainous area on the southwestern edge of Catskill Park in the Catskill Mountains for most of its course, before joining the West Branch along the northeast border of Pennsylvania with New York. For a long stretch it serves as the Blue Line, the park's boundary. Much of it is paralleled by State Route 30.
The Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA) is a public authority in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts that provides wholesale drinking water and sewage services to certain municipalities and industrial users in the state, primarily in the Boston area.
The Nashua River, 37.5 miles (60.4 km) long, is a tributary of the Merrimack River in Massachusetts and New Hampshire in the United States. It is formed in eastern Worcester County, Massachusetts, at the confluence of the North Nashua River and South Nashua River, and flows generally north-northeast past Groton to join the Merrimack at Nashua, New Hampshire. The Nashua River watershed occupies a major portion of north-central Massachusetts and a much smaller portion of southern New Hampshire.
Mount Wachusett is a mountain in Massachusetts. It straddles towns of Princeton and Westminster, in Worcester County. It is the highest point in Massachusetts east of the Connecticut River. The mountain is named after a Native American term meaning "near the mountain" or "mountain place". The mountain is a popular hiking and skiing destination. An automobile road, open spring to fall, ascends to the summit. Views from the top of Mount Wachusett include Mount Monadnock to the north, Mount Greylock to the west, southern Vermont to the northwest, and Boston to the east. The mountain is traversed by the 92 mi (148 km) Midstate Trail. It is also home to the Wachusett Mountain State Reservation.
The Wachusett Reservoir is the second largest body of water in the state of Massachusetts. It is located in central Massachusetts, northeast of Worcester. It is part of the water supply system for metropolitan Boston maintained by the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA). It has an aggregate capacity of 65 billion US gallons (250,000,000 m3) and an area of almost 7 square miles (18 km2). Water from the reservoir flows to the covered Norumbega Storage Facility via the Cosgrove Tunnel and the MetroWest Water Supply Tunnel. The reservoir has a maximum depth of 120 feet (37 m) and a mean depth of 48 feet (15 m).
The Wachusett Dam in Clinton, Massachusetts, impounds the Nashua River, creating the Wachusett Reservoir. Construction started in 1897 and was completed in 1905. It is part of the Nashua River Watershed.
The Ware River Diversion is a dam on the Ware River. It is part of the Boston, Massachusetts public water supply system, maintained by the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA). It is located in Worcester County in the town of Barre, close to its border with Oakham.
The Ware River is a 35.4-mile-long (57.0 km) river in central Massachusetts. It has two forks, both of which begin in Hubbardston, Massachusetts. The Ware River flows southwest through the middle of the state, joins the Quaboag River at Three Rivers, Massachusetts, to form the Chicopee River on its way to the Connecticut River.
The Wachusett Aqueduct is a secondary aqueduct that carries water from the Wachusett Reservoir to the John J. Carroll Water Treatment Plant at Walnut Hill in Marlborough, Massachusetts. It is part of the public water supply system for the communities of Greater Boston that are served by the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA), which manages the aqueduct. The aqueduct serves as a standby backup to the Cosgrove Tunnel.
The Stillwater River is part of the Nashua River watershed. This river is part of the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority system that supplies drinking water to the greater Boston area.
The Old Stone Church, built in 1891 to replace the Baptist Church that burned, is a historic building in West Boylston, Massachusetts. On April 13, 1973, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.
The Barre Falls Dam is located on the Ware River in Barre, Massachusetts, about 0.3 mile (0.48 km) below the junction of the river's east and west branches and 13 miles (21 km) northwest of Worcester, Massachusetts.
Wekepeke is the name of an aquifer and brook in Sterling, Massachusetts, United States. The aquifer has a land surface area of 11.5 square miles (30 km2).
The Weston Aqueduct is an aqueduct operated by the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA). Now part of the MWRA backup systems, it was designed to deliver water from the Sudbury Reservoir in Framingham to the Weston Reservoir in Weston. The 13.5-mile (21.7 km) aqueduct begins at the Sudbury Dam, and passes through the towns of Southborough, Framingham, Wayland, and Weston. In 1990, the route, buildings and bridges of the aqueduct were added to the National Register of Historic Places as the Weston Aqueduct Linear District.
Salmon Falls Creek is a tributary of the Snake River, flowing from northern Nevada into Idaho in the United States. Formed in high mountains at the northern edge of the Great Basin, Salmon Falls Creek flows northwards 121 miles (195 km), draining an arid and mountainous basin of 2,103 square miles (5,450 km2). The Salmon Falls Creek valley served as a trade route between the Native American groups of the Snake River Plain and Great Basin. Today, most of its water is used for irrigation.
The Sudbury Reservoir is an emergency backup Boston metropolitan water reservoir in Massachusetts, located predominantly in Southborough and Marlborough, with small sections in Westborough and Framingham. It was created when the Sudbury Dam was constructed to impound the Stony Brook branch of the Sudbury River; no part of the reservoir lies in the town of Sudbury. Nearly 5,000 acres (2,000 ha) in the Sudbury Reservoir watershed are administered by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation as a limited-access public recreation area.
Trout Brook, also called Ball Brook, is a cold water tributary of the Quinapoxet River located in Holden, Massachusetts. Trout Brook is stocked with trout each spring by the Massachusetts Fisheries and Wildlife Division. As the Quinapoxet River is part of the water supply for Worcester, Massachusetts, both the Quinapoxet and all of its major tributaries including Trout Brook are monitored by the USGS for water quality.
The headwaters of the Quinapoxet River
