***College Towns to Visit***

[qwerty]

No one has mentioned Jonesboro, Arkansas. As we are going there in September, I was hoping someone would post about how great it was. Alas, we are gong anyway.

I have been there, 20+ years ago for basketball games. Nice arena, not impressed with rest of campus/town.

 

[JP4CY]

I was there once.

It was...awkward?

Probably more chapstick sales per capita than anywhere else in the US.

 

[NWICY]

I stay just east of it (Blytheville, AR) for work... the area is generally beautiful but poor... you can still get a hell of a house cheap View attachment 151499

Those are some nice homes

 

[clonechemist]

Nova is solid 40-45 minute drive from Philly and is one of the wealthiest areas on the east coast.

Penn, Drexel and Temple are just in rough areas

Philly is legit a hidden gem. Yes, half the city (which happens to include Temple and LaSalle) is a ghetto that should be avoided. But the rest of the city is AWESOME

The area around Penn gentrified a ton in the past 25 years and is now pretty nice

 

[clonechemist]

Outside of Big 12 schools, Auburn, AL and Bloomington, IN are ones I visited that I liked.

Drove through State College on a road trip once and echo that it's kind of an odd vibe.
Highly populated state like PA with two large metros, and PSU is in the hinterland outpost. I'm sure that's part of the charm though.

A common description of Pennsylvania by the people who live there is ‘It’s Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with Arkansas in between’

Another common name for the middle of the state is ‘Pennsyltucky’

 

[clonechemist]

Anybody else been to Durham?

The town is kind of rough but the Duke campus is really cool. We were walking around and found Cameron Indoor, doors wide open and nobody there so we went in and got some pictures on the court. This was in July.

Lived there in 2006-2007 and haven’t been back since 2008. I’ve heard the downtown area has developed a bit since then but I’m sure it’s still a gritty town. When I lived there we’d usually go to neighboring Chapel Hill or Raleigh for fun.

With that said, Duke Gardens and Durham Bulls games were awesome

 

[nfrine]

Both ISUs and Iowa's campuses are really nice in my opinion. Iowa doesn't have that central point on campus where you can go and basically see nothing but the classic campus view like ISU has in central campus. But I really like how Iowa's campus blends with the downtown, and it's pretty cool along the river.

The flooding in Iowa City in 2008 showed the challenge of the location. They even had to move the book out of the library....

 

[ribsnwhiskey]

Corvallis = Ames on the west coast.

 

[JP4CY]

Corvallis = Ames on the west coast.

I love that whole area of Oregon.

 

[2forISU]

Philly is legit a hidden gem. Yes, half the city (which happens to include Temple and LaSalle) is a ghetto that should be avoided. But the rest of the city is AWESOME

The area around Penn gentrified a ton in the past 25 years and is now pretty nice

Penn and Drexel are doing their bes4t to buy everything around their campuses, but West Philly is still a troubled area. I lived in Philly for 6 years and it was great time, but the city has/is lagging behind other areas on the east coast.

 

[2forISU]

Went to a conference at Temple and made the mistake of getting off the train at the North Philly train station to walk to campus. I swear there were weeds growing in the train station, it was so run down and deserted. Walked one or two blocks and then ducked into a subway station -- no way I was going to walk the rest of the way.

Lived in Ann Arbor for 4 years and loved it. Great campus town and nice downtown. Campus itself is not great.

Lucky to be alive.

Ann Arbor is nice and growing a lot

 

[cyfanatic13]

Visited Fargo for the first time last week for work and the downtown area was much cooler than I expected it'd be. Pretty fun town

I go to Fargo a couple times a year for work and always am impressed. They have a ton of unique non-chain restaurants and bars that are a good time. Also have blackjack in some bars depending on the night which is pretty sick

 

[coolerifyoudid]

We have gone to a lot of campuses over the years.
USC - in a terrible area
UCLA - not very college feeling. Felt kinda commuter-ish. I felt poor there
Vanderbilt - fun area in Nashville, but not the campus feel that I would enjoy
Florida - really impressed. Contained campus with a lot to offer. Great layout, IMO.
Georgia - sorta felt cramped, but neat area. Avoid the eastern side of town.
Clemson - loved it. If they had a law school, my daughter would have gone here. It had very similar vibes to ISU.
Yale, Harvard, MIT - cool for the prestige sake. I like Boston and CT, though.
Notre Dame - great campus in a dump city

 

[BACyclone]

I also think Columbia is a cool town. I think Lincoln may be the worst college town I've ever been in. Absolutely nothing appealing about it in any way. Sucks as a college town and sucks as a small city. Tuscaloosa is a great place also. Lubbock may suck in general but the campus at TTU is pretty cool.

Reminds me, we stopped in Waco once on a non-game-day visit. Maybe during a football game it would be different, but I found no redeeming quality to Waco.

 

[zumbro clones]

Northfield MN is a nice older, river town that has a nice downtown. Colleges are St Olaf and Carleton.

 

[Al_4_State]

Reminds me, we stopped in Waco once on a non-game-day visit. Maybe during a football game it would be different, but I found no redeeming quality to Waco.

 

[clonechemist]

Penn and Drexel are doing their bes4t to buy everything around their campuses, but West Philly is still a troubled area. I lived in Philly for 6 years and it was great time, but the city has/is lagging behind other areas on the east coast.

Eh, the western boundary of the good vs bad neighborhood cutoff has consistently been moving west from Penn for 25 years. Last time I visited it was pretty gentrified out to 48th street and lots of houses were being sold to potential gentrifiers and even further west. For Drexel I agree, it gets bad quick very close to campus.

Comparing to other east coast cities, yes DC NYC and Boston are the Crown Jewels, but they are terribly expensive (especially for poor college or grad students). Philly walks a nice line between those cities and, on the other end, Baltimore or smaller bad cities like Newark, New Haven, Bridgeport etc. There are large swaths of Philly that feel just like a nice section of DC/Brooklyn/Boston, but much cheaper to live and many more businesses that cater to the non-wealthy

 

[stuclone]

I go to Fargo a couple times a year for work and always am impressed. They have a ton of unique non-chain restaurants and bars that are a good time. Also have blackjack in some bars depending on the night which is pretty sick

I got out to Beer and Fish and Blackbird Wood Fire pizza last time. Planning to explore more when I'm back there in July

 

[CycloneSpinning]

yo dudes,

With my job I am in many middle and small cities with colleges and universities..

I would like to start keeping a list and invite anyone else to add their experiences...


Tonight I will be staying in Bloomington, IN for the first time.





Cool towns:
NIU (Dekalb, IL) - Has a HyVee felt like central iowa
University of Kentucky (Lexington, KY) - awesome city (had shots with little horse riding guys)
University of Nebraska (Lincoln, NE) - Runza
University of Wisconsin (Madison, WI) - THE OLD FASHIONED!!!

Meh towns:
Illinois State (Normal, IL)
Vincennes University (Vincennes, IN)
University of Illinois (Champaign-Urbana, IL)
Notre Dame (South Bend, IN)


I'm sure i will remember more


please feel free to add any you've visited!!!!!!!!

Were these little guys…or regular size guys riding little horses?

 

[0u812]

I love that whole area of Oregon.

True, but basically all of Oregon is wonderful.