Traits of college towns/cities

[Pragmatic Idealist]

Transit oriented development can be a great thing, but a couple hundred dwelling units and a few commerical/instituional spaces does not have much impact on a neighborhood or transform it into a college community.

It's just one development. Another is University Hills, which won the American Planning Association's 2009 Outstanding Neighborhood Planning Award for its California Chapter.





Similar in many ways to the planned Lifelong-Learning Neighborhood at The Great Park of Orange County in Irvine, the 404-acre University Hills in San Bernardino was adopted by the City of San Bernardino to establish a strong university-town atmosphere in the University District.

The highly-customized Specific Plan is a model of sustainability and environmental sensitivity. Nestled in Badger Canyon between Badger Hill and the San Bernardino Mountains, University Hills takes great care to preserve viewsheds and open space (58% of the site). Badger Hill is actually utilized to restrict or block views of the developed areas of University Hills from the surrounding area, depending on the vantage point, and residential products are carefully selected and oriented on the perimeter of the project.

University Hills is designed and programmed to create a long-term and synergistic relationship with San Bernardino State University through: 60 faculty units; the 235-acre Land Laboratory; pathways and cycleways that directly connect with the University campus; access to the University's sbX station; the 2.1-acre hang-glider park; and, the California Walnut Grove linear park.

In addition, the University Hills Specific Plan includes strict controls on the type and design of lighting to preserve a dark nighttime sky for the planned astronomical observatory atop Badger Hill. And, the developer has committed to working with Omnitrans and the University to establish a circulatory shuttle connecting all areas on campus to University Hills.

Additionally, the land owner has committed to ensuring that all construction on the site is certified LEED-Platinum. Residential offerings range from large-, standard-, and small-lot detached houses to stacked flats, townhomes, and cluster-court houses that all create a walkable and social environment.

[Pragmatic Idealist]

An interdisciplinary "superuniversity" campus with student and faculty housing, as well as university facilities and student-life amenities, is also planned for the city center. The campus would be shared among San Bernardino State University, Loma Linda University, and the University of Redlands. They are all being connected by B.R.T. and light rail. A small institution focused on professional sports, the American Sports University, already exists at the site and has already placed student housing there.





An orientation to students and faculty is also anticipated at T.O.D.'s connected to strategically-located park-&-ride facilities.

[illinoisplanner]

Being in a real college town, albeit for just a few days, has gotten me thinking about this a bit more. There's several overlapping experiences one will find in many college towns. They can probably be classified like this:

The Gown Town: this include the college ghetto, fraternity/sorority district, and businesses and organizations that cater mainly to college students; convenience stores, divey ethnic restaurants (Chinese, Vietnamese, Indian, Thai, etc), bars, pizzerias, textbook stores, consignment stores, record stores, laundromats, American Apparel, Newman Center/Hillel/Chabad, and the like.

The Townie Town: generally the stereotypical post-collegiate population (college/university faculty and staff, professionals not related to the college/university, and a large group of folks that could be best described as "crunchy". Representative businesses include outdoors outfitters, food co-ops, yoga studios, Volvo mechanics, upscale ethnic and vegetarian/vegan restaurants, high-end bicycle shops, new age healers, brewpubs, organic baby supply stores, Ten Thousand Villages, etc. It ain't college kids that are buying Maclaren strollers, Manduka yoga mats and organic free-range locally-sourced cage-free non-GMO artisanel tomatoes, and they're not driving Volvo wagons either.

Reality^*: the area outlying the core college town, where one will encounter something of a culture clash; ecovillages, organic farms, communes, and retreats, along with mechanical commercial uses, mini-storage facilities, mobile home parks, and traditional agriculture.

The Strip: where the Gown Town, Townie Town and Reality all meet. Big box retail, chain restaurants, and so on. Even Boulder, arguably the nation's most meticulously planned college town, has a strip.

* Is there a major college town that is not described as "[X] square miles surrounded by reality?"

Your analysis is close to describing my Midwestern college town, except all the commercial uses you present in "townie town" are nowhere to be seen really. At least not in any great abundance. Some may be located in the downtown CBD. There are nice homes and nice neighorhoods loaded with college professors and staff, as well as retirees, but all that other stuff just really isn't there.

As far as "reality", goes, there aren't a lot of ecovillages, organic farms, or communes either. Plenty of the other stuff though...mechanical commercial uses, mini-storage facilities, mobile home parks, and traditional agriculture.

I would also maybe add a "Downtown" section, since I think most college towns have them...a traditional downtown that's often a mix of traditional and college-oriented uses and is typically quite lively. It is also distinct from "the Strip".

[Linda_D]

personally, most of the great college towns I think of were not planned or "built," nor could they be, rather they happened organically over years and generations of students eating at greasy spoons, buying books, and trying to drink underage. [there is something very cool about drinking (in college) at the same bar your father drank at when he was in college.]

also, many student residential nieghborhoods next to campus are often the ex faculty/townie housing turned student getto. its the "old", not the "new," that gives college towns a specially place in the hearts of many... at least in mine.

Exactly. You described Fredonia, NY, home of Fredonia State College, to a "T". Buffalo's Elmwood Village, metamorphisized from middle class townie neighborhood to student ghetto for nearby Buffalo State College to mostly Dan's "Townie Town". It's the quirkiness of these places that give them their charm, and you can't plan "quirkiness"; it has to develop over decades.

[DVD AI]

I was going to start a similar thread, about what makes a town a "college town". I don't always think the presence of a large college or university is enough. Consider Las Cruces, New Mexico, with New Mexico State University. 18,000 students, and a traditional college campus with quads, but no signature "college town" built environment or vibe to speak of. Downtown Las Cruces is dead, and University Avenue, which borders the campus, has a Southwestern suburban character despite previous city plans to create a more pedestrian-oriented environment.

What about other communities that should be college towns, given the presence of a good-sized college or university relative to the host town's population, but with little or no college vibe whatsoever? A few more that come to mind:

* College Station, Texas
* Kalamazoo, Michigan
* Alfred, New York
* Valparaiso, Indiana

Cal Poly Pomona, CA total commuter school. Pomona could capitalize on the school/college town vibe, but they are pretty much the poorest city in L.A. County.

[Pragmatic Idealist]

Downtown Pomona has tried to capitalize on its proximity to Cal. Poly. and to the Claremont Colleges. And, the district has had some success targeting students and other young people. The major deficiency there, though, is the lack of high-quality transit linking the area with the universities.





Claremont is really the most successful college town in southern California, and the city is only getting better. The Colleges are now prohibiting freshmen and sophomores from obtaining parking on-site.

[DVD AI]

Downtown Pomona has tried to capitalize on its proximity to Cal. Poly. and to the Claremont Colleges. And, the district has had some success targeting students and other young people. The major deficiency there, though, is the lack of high-quality transit linking the area with the universities.

Exactly. Aside from transit, there's just a complete disconnect in terms of land-uses linking the area as well as there being a large hill in between Pomona and Downtown.
As a former student at Cal Poly Pomona, the link to Downtown was an afterthought.
Most students just wanted a place nearby to walk to and grab lunch and live out their social life. It's an issue that the school has been talking about addressing within their property boundaries for quite some time.
The first priority the city of Pomona should have is to utilize the use of land directly adjacent to the school and provide more of a college town in the direct vicinity of the school.
Once that's accomplished, the transit linkage to downtown would be the next logical step.

[Linda_D]

Exactly. Aside from transit, there's just a complete disconnect in terms of land-uses linking the area as well as there being a large hill in between Pomona and Downtown.
As a former student at Cal Poly Pomona, the link to Downtown was an afterthought.
Most students just wanted a place nearby to walk to and grab lunch and live out their social life. It's an issue that the school has been talking about addressing within their property boundaries for quite some time.
The first priority the city of Pomona should have is to utilize the use of land directly adjacent to the school and provide more of a college town in the direct vicinity of the school.
Once that's accomplished, the transit linkage to downtown would be the next logical step.

I think you are assuming that the City of Pomona wants to promote a college town atmosphere. I know nothing of Pomona specifically, but I would be surprised if that was the case. When cities or towns think of colleges, they think primarily in terms of the economic develop that comes from the jobs associated with said college. They envision "students" as shopping at malls or trendy chains or eating at upscale resturants, not shopping at truly funky little shops or patronizing bars. They are NOT interested, and may even oppose, the kinds of businesses that students actually want.

The old "town and gown" friction that has existed since the late Middle Ages remains alive and well in the 21st century.

[DVD AI]

I think you are assuming that the City of Pomona wants to promote a college town atmosphere. I know nothing of Pomona specifically, but I would be surprised if that was the case. When cities or towns think of colleges, they think primarily in terms of the economic develop that comes from the jobs associated with said college. They envision "students" as shopping at malls or trendy chains or eating at upscale resturants, not shopping at truly funky little shops or patronizing bars. They are NOT interested, and may even oppose, the kinds of businesses that students actually want.

The old "town and gown" friction that has existed since the late Middle Ages remains alive and well in the 21st century.

Well what I'm assuming is that Pomona HAS BEEN targeting students and young people with the Arts Colony and bars in their downtown area.
I also agree, as you alluded to, that Cities thinking of Colleges think in terms of economic development. There is a MAJOR need for Pomona to address the potential economic development around the Cal Poly Pomona campus, mainly because of their poor economic condition. It is also, blantantly obvious, and widely expressed among Cal Poly students to have more off-campus amenities and destinations in the proximity of the school.
What Cal Poly wants to do to provide those things for the school, I do not know. And you're right, they might not want Bars and funky little shops except for in their Downtown...However, there is much money to be made for Pomona if they simply took initiative and worked witht the school on supplying more mixed-uses adjacent to the school. Nothing is being done though and I feel as though the city is limiting themselves, only to what their Downtown once was and can be again, rather than viewing the areas to the west as a supplement to downtown and a major opportunity for economic growth.

Afterall, the school is strongly pursuing linkage to downtown, where the metrolink station is, so that Cal Poly can start to combat the commuter syndrome that dominates the connectivity to the school. Pomona should reciprocate.