As I recall, I'd consider Colorado Springs more of a military town that also has a college.

Since you know all about it...I'll delete my post..ie: I lived in Boulder for 3 years.

I live 20 miles from such a small college town. Its population increases by 50% from 20K to 30K during the school year. My son starts his final semester next week there and I am very happy to have just made his last tuition payment!

I went to the same college for my freshman year back in the early 80s before transferring. The town has changed a lot since then but the campus itself hasn't changed much.

I do some of my shopping there since it is the same distance as the metro KC area and I get my son's 10% discount at WM where he works part time.

Nicole, I am thinking back many years. You may have a more current impression. Your description of Boulder was right on, but I lived there in the late 60's. Why not repost?

I do, have lived in 2 of them...love it! Keeps you young. :) Beats living with all the Federal Buildings.

Yes Hope College is in town. I love the young kids around town. Especially when the freshman arrive in the fall. I know our retailers love to have them return, helps with business and workforce.

I never have, but I wanted to live in Santa Cruz at one time and even applied for a job there when I was living in San Francisco. It was extremely difficult to get jobs in Santa Cruz, especially if one did not already live there. The campus there is extremely beautiful, set on a mountain top in a redwood forest, overlooking Monterey Bay.

I live south, 10 miles, of UCSC in Santa Cruz. I like living in college towns. I have lived in other college towns. I seem to be drawn to them.

I don't, but have good friends who do. They love it - the university offers many opportunities for locals to attend concerts, museum exhibits, lectures, etc. and their neighbors are highly educated, interesting people. Most of the students live on campus, so there aren't the drawbacks of loud parties, etc. in the surrounding neighborhoods.

Twenty years ago, some friends from Berkeley spent 3 years in PA while he worked at Penn. They wanted to live in the suburbs, and someone suggested 'a college town'. They chose a house in Radnor, close to Bryn Mawr College. There are college towns and then there are colleges that do not add any college atmosphere to their locale. Radnor was not a college town, they discovered.

Stanford is adjacent to Palo Alto. P.A. was once college-y, but is no longer, it's more a hybrid. OTOH, Berkeley will probably always be a college town, like Boulder. (I went to both). IMO, Santa Cruz was a beach town long before the University, so the college really did not change much in the town atmosphere.

Used to live in Urbana, Illinois (twin city of Champaign). Wonderful! Yeah, the University of Illinois (with 75,000) was a big thing, but health care (courtesy of the university medical school) was also big. AND, it is farm country, so the county's farmland takes up almost 50% of the land. Great, I wanna go back, the missus wants to move to the Chicago suburbs (we lived there, too).

They chose a house in Radnor, close to Bryn Mawr College. There are college towns and then there are colleges that do not add any college atmosphere to their locale. Radnor was not a college town, they discovered.

True. There are three colleges (Bryn Mawr, Haverford, and Villanova) in close proximity in this part of suburban Philadelphia but the area is, with the exception of some bars along one of the main avenues, not geared towards college students.

Apart from childhood, I've only ever lived in towns with universities. But the university wasn't the raison d’etre of the town. They all existed centuries before the educational establishment arrived and, although the unis are important, the towns always had, and continue to have, an independent commercial and cultural life unrelated to the students.

I'm not sure what the OP specifically had in mind but I think some of you are conflating two very different things - true college towns versus college adjacent areas located in larger communities.

To me a college town is a community physically located apart from other areas and separated by some distance. Self-contained. Where the name of the game is the college and the community and environs become a ghost town during school breaks. A college adjacent area in a larger community is what it is. I've been to both as I'm sure most of you have, they're very different. Take Berkeley as an example - It's impossible for an institution the size of a UC Berkeley, as with other large universities, to have low impact, a small footprint, where it's located. Like other similar ones, it's huge, has tens of thousands of students and employees living nearby and coming and going daily. It may have been a college town 100 years ago but it's hardly that now. But for the large UC footprint, Berkeley is otherwise part of the huge and continuous built up suburban area located all around SF Bay. As is Stanford and Palo Alto. I don't think Berkeley is any more a "college town" than would be the Westwood district in LA where UCLA is.

Back to what I think the question had in mind, it probably varies from place to place. There used to be an active "college circuit" for performers of various kinds, travelling shows, travelling lecturers, etc. I'm not sure that still exists. In true college towns, such things provided a source of cultural events that might have not otherwise been available in a small community. For a college located in or adjacent to a larger city, the reverse is true, the city provides the majority of cultural opportunities for students and staff of the college.

"Where the name of the game is the college and the community and environs become a ghost town during school breaks"" ... The towns I have lived in are University towns...and I have

never seen either "become a ghost town during school breaks". School breaks don't mean

the school is shut right down to become a Ghost Town. Maybe the smaller schools do? I

don't know about that. Sure, lots of students gone...but lots of students and other activity

still busy. Well...maybe 2 or 3 days at Christmas...it is pretty "ghosty". ;) Lots of foreign

students never leave Campus, even then.

I lived in Davis Ca from 1987 to 2001. It had affluent, educated residents and high property values. Good if you have the income, but rents were high because of students sharing rentals. Progressive politics. Excellent schools with high graduation rates. Strong school support--school bond measures always passed. Plenty of parent volunteers in the schools. Low crime except for some petty theft. A strong downtown core because they discouraged big box or chain stores that would take away from local businesses. Lots of diversity in shops and ethnic restaurants in the downtown area. Lots of public parks and community swimming pools. Excellent farmer's market.

I agree with Bookwoman about this area, near Haverford and Bryn Mawr colleges and Villanova University. The collegiate life is very self contained and doesnt spill over much into the surrounding communities. Villanova has the most impact because it is bigger and livelier than the other two. Their presence could not be missed when they won basketball tournaments. When we lived near the University of Pennsylvania, in the city, the entire area was very much a part of the university, and better for it.

Radnor has two colleges, Eastern University and Cabrini College as well as Valley Forge Military College. It’s not a good choice if you want to be near Bryn Mawr College or Penn but a lovely place to live. Lots of Penn employees live in Merion and Wynnewood, a short commute, but still no college atmosphere. University City has loads of that!

Nicole, for some reason I had thought you were in Colorado Springs. Our young relative from overseas just arrived there for his junior year, had the coach (soccer), curriculum he wanted and they offered a scholarship. My SIL and her husband flew down to meet him, make sure he has all he needs. He didn't. They thought he was going to be in a furnished house with a couple team mates and might need them to shop for sheets, towels etc. He needed a mattress, bed! Lamp and study table. All kinds of things. Think they may be staying longer than a couple of days ;0) In the meantime, he's in their hotel room on a cot.

morz8....I am currently living in Colorado Springs. Boulder is nearby. I've also lived in Wheat Ridge Colorado and Manitou Springs Colorado. I hope your "junior year student" is enjoying himself? Housing is tight here. Really full. Did he find a place? I hang out on a Landlord Forum & maybe could ask around. PM me if you think I could help.

Nicole, thanks for asking. And offering. I hope I don't have to impose on you but at the same time its nice to know there is someone there I could call on if something came up. This is a great kid and very focused, really a young man. Children grow up faster in some of the European countries.

The way I understood it, the house itself was set and arranged by the team coach. I don't have a clue in which part of town, was assuming convenient to the campus, walking as he wasn't planning on having a car this year. House just wasn't live in ready, caught my SIL and BIL off guard in a city they'd never visited. Bed, mattress, study aids and some kitchen things and not knowing what stores were even there or how quickly they could arrange deliveries;0) They have the advantage of a budget that can easily handle the surprise and he won't go without. I'll call her again this afternoon and see what kind of progress they've made - they had only just arrived Sunday night.

Our biggest earlier concern had been the weather. He is used to a seaside Mediterranean climate - no real winters. He nearly froze his first two years of school in Washington. When he decided on Colorado, he added 'I can endure the two cold winters if my future will benefit from that college degree ;0)'

Our town is home to a large university. It has more of an economic effect on the town and county than anything else. We don't mind the students, and I'm sure they add to the coffers of local businesses like restaurants, stores and entertainment venues. The university also provides employment for many in the area. It is also home to a Center For the Arts that hosts concerts, etc. that brings many people here other parts of the state. I would say it's a huge asset to the community, rather than a detriment.

We live in a college town, about 1 mile from the UC Santa Barbara campus. We are 31K residents, and they have an additional 28K. We have owned our home for 25 years, and if I had it to do over, I would have bought further away.

I don't mind the students. Most of them are smart kids from good families. I've worked with some amazing interns over the years, and enjoy helping a deserving student get a start in life. Many great tech companies have been started here, as a result of the strong engineering program. This benefits our community greatly.

The students live and party in a student community which is separate from the rest of the community, which is ideal for both groups. I do have to stay away from the grocery store on Friday and Saturday afternoons to evenings, as some will drive drunk to go on a beer run.

I detest the administration and the faculty that support them. It is an opinion widely shared by my neighbors. One rule for thee and another for me. The minute that the University buys land, it immediately becomes State property and goes off the tax roles. Never mind that the residents use our streets, recreational facilities and schools. They take the position that because it is State property, they don't need any local approval to build. This self approval allows them to build in a way (taller, denser, and with inadequate parking) that no private builder could. If anyone else wants to build (or remodel) they are the first to oppose it on environmental grounds.

They owned a gorgeous piece of vacant land between my home and the coast. It was in the middle of our community and a mile from campus. They immediately designated it "West Campus", even though no student facilities (only private faculty homes) were planned. They would promise the community things (like a coastal access path, or a reduced density) and when the next version of the plan would come out they had made none of the promised changes. I was shocked to hear a well known environmental advocate suddenly change position (she had vocally opposed any building on a privately owned adjacent property) and announce that this coastal property was "degraded" and had little environmental value. I went home and googled the her, and found they had recently put her on their payroll. Many of the faculty that advocated for the development were rewarded with below market home ownership.

It is a sad cycle. The students go into debt to pay ever increasing fees, those fees are used to compensate people who will advocate for their position, allowing the bureaucracy to get larger and more powerful.

I lived in Berkeley for two months in 1972 (Sept - Nov), and it seemed very much like a college town to me.

I went to Palo Alto to apply for a job at the Stanford library in 1974, and it also seemed very much like a college town, but I did not like it, and I ended up not applying for any jobs there.

Have moved around a lot and have lived in several different University Towns..or very

close off campus...wouldn't have it any other way! People have always been super and

so many things to see and do...whatever you like. Visiting Broadway Plays, Popular

Entertainment groups, individuals, Sports, being around the students is a treat (most

times?) LOL A great place to learn about the History all around you, too.

I love how this post just keeps going and going, like the Energizer Bunny!!!!!! Several

years of thoughts in one post.

No, too many young people with all of those hormones and energy makes me want to stand outside and yell at them all to get off my lawn and stop whining about the life that you have yet to live.

On the other hand, it does add some class to the area as it attracts the educated folks who both attend and teach and support the learning institution.

I really would not do that, but I only in the scenario in my own head.

Spent two years of high school in twin town with two Universities and a private college as well as a business school and a Vo Tech. It's great for arts and sports but challenges the housing market. Retail was great--but for some reason my daughter's University the retail STUNK. Love that you can put your cast offs on the curb and the co-eds will come and snatch it up, use it and no land fills!! When my parents were down sizing my dad drug out a desk with no drawers. By the time he returned with the drawers the desk was GONE!! It is good for the town is the schools aren't THE EMPLOYER.

I haven't, my sister did. Right outside town proper where the property/rent prices start to drop off. It was really nice, good shopping, great food. In the spring and summer it was touristy as well as college, pretty hopping. In the winter it could be lovely, though the crowds tended to stay indoors so it wasn't so busy.

But in the fall... football. If there was a home game weekend, forget about it. Unless you are with them, leave those sports times alone. So many people, it's very intense. Hit the lovely fall markets outside of town.

Grew up in a college town, went to university in a university town. Now live in - 30 years - a smaller county seat community.

Mine is not a 'college town' although there is a small college (1600 students) here. It was founded in the 19th century -- as a co-ed school. We see some out-of-state license plates as school starts and ends, and there are more young-adult faces around town during the school year.