<p>How is the campus? Is it like UPenn where it is in the city and like a concrete jungle?</p>
<p>I think it's all about where you're coming from. If you grew up in the country then it will feel like the city. If you grew up in the city then it will feel a bit less city. The ivy covered buildings, the large quads, and the Midway (long field with trees and such) give the campus a greener feel to it when not covered in snow. </p>
<p>It is in Chicago- but the architecture and feel of the campus has never given me the impression of "concrete jungle."</p>
<p>Penn really isn't a concrete jungle, either. But it's very integrated with the city, and it's traversed in all directions by big, busy streets. It's adjacent to, and essentially an extension of, the main business district in Philadelphia -- an easy walk for me from my office. Architecturally, it has some nice stuff (including some of the newest buildings), but on the whole, except for a few nooks and crannies here and there, and the one central quad, it's not that pretty. If you like cities, and get turned on by urban energy, it's an attractive and exciting place. If your idea of college is Williams or Dartmouth, it's not.</p>
<p>Chicago has a totally different feel to it. The neighborhood it's in is several miles from the main business district, and really a sleepy enclave with nothing much happening except for the university. Streets traverse the campus there, too, but they carry mainly local traffic, and there is much more area that's blocked off to cars than at Penn.</p>
<p>Chicago was the first university constructed in the "American Gothic" style; Yale essentially imitated Chicago's imitation of Oxford. Lots of the main areas of the campus, and especially the main quad, really have that fake-Gothic feel, and the buildings are actually a little more graceful and airy than Yale's. There are lots of trees and, as DannonWater said, the huge Midway Plaisance running through the bottom half of the campus (and another park on the western edge). It feels very green. There are some unfortunate mid-20th Century constructions there -- starting with the cozy-inside but ugly-outside main library -- but nothing as bad as the Penn high-rise dorm complex.</p>
<p>If you are looking for Williams or Dartmouth, it's still going to feel over-urban to you. So will lots of other urban colleges, like Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Brown . . . . If you are looking for spiffy shops and street excitement a la Harvard Square or Broadway, Chicago's campus is going to feel quiet and out-of-it.</p>
<p>take a look from the air and draw your own conclusion:</p>
<p>Great idea, newmassdad.</p>
<p>Also, if you are looking at that map, make certain to scroll eastward and check out the Museum of Science and Industry and the lakeshore (and The Shoreland dorm right there). Definitely not a concrete jungle!</p>
<p>and don't forget that this picture was taken in late winter or very early spring. I would guess late March, by the absence of snow or ice and the first hint of green on a few trees.</p>
<p>If you saw the same overhead shots in summer, it would be much, much greener!</p>
<p>Penn presents a very different look from space:</p>
<p>This is definitely a late winter morning. You can tell by the shadows of the highrises.</p>
<p>For a few views in real time:</p>
<p>I keep a link of Flick favorites ready for questions just like these:</p>
<p>It's a great campus. I spent this summer there doing the Chicago Academic Medicine Program at the Pritzker School of Medicine and I absolutely loved it. Hyde Park is a great little community, everything you need on an everday basis is there. I subletted over on 54th, so I was right smack in the middle of Hyde Park. It's also very safe in my opinion, though I have experience with more violent urban areas. There were a couple times I walked through Hyde Park at 4 AM alone, and although I had to keep an eye out and stay in well-lit areas, I didn't have any bad encounters.</p>
<p>It's also nice because the campus is right on the coast, like 2 minutes from Lakeshore Drive. That means you can catch the #6 bus and be downtown in 15 minutes without traffic. You can also get the bus to the Red or Green lines, and be downtown in about half an hour that way.</p>
<p>The campus is beautiful, it definitely reminded me of Penn. And again, the location is pretty good in my opinion. I'd prefer to be smack downtown like the Northwestern med campus, but the U of C is great for undergrad I think.</p>
<p>You know I already knew Chicago looked like that from above. (I can fly.)</p>