<p>"The Durham public transit (DATA) runs buses in Durham. One route goes through Duke’s West Campus. However I personally don’t know anyone who takes DATA. </p>
<p>You can also borrow a friend’s car or get a taxi (though the latter option is expensive)</p>
<p>Duke also recently started a ZipCar program on campus. They have, I believe, 2 Toyota Priuses and 2 Toyota Matrix(es?) that students can rent either by the hour or by the day. The hourly rate is $8 I believe and includes rent + insurance (and maybe gas?). It’s good for the occasional short errands/trips around town. I don’t know the precise details of this program as I have my own car but if you google ZipCars, you can probably find more info. "</p>
<p>I am not sure how similar we are but a walkable city with great pubic transit is very important to me. Couple months into my master program at Stanford, I told myself I should have picked Berkeley for this reason and thankfully the program was only 1-yr. Keep in mind I did have CalTrain to take me to SF; it’s just not as convenient as taking the subway from Berkeley. You won’t even have that option at Durham. The only cities that meet my standard are SF, Chicago, Boston, NYC, and DC. I dislike LA because it doesn’t feel like a ‘real city’ to me and I don’t think midtown area in Atlanta is compact enough. That’s how picky I am about how urban a place needs to be. I grew up in Hong Kong so I guess that kinda explains it. I can see myself living in Evanston; so that says a lot about the area. There are a lot to do in this “suburb”; with the high rises, numerous stores, cinema complex in downtown, 150 restaurants packed into 8 sq miles (~90 of them in downtown), and the population density of 10,000/sq mi (same density as DC), it’s actually a good mix of urban and suburban; it feels like another neighborhood of Chicago (it shares the border with Chicago). All the cool neighborhoods in Chicago are in the north side (north of downtown) and fairly close; for example, Lincoln Park/Lakeview are just 30-min subway ride away (15 mins if you catch the Purple Express during morning/afternoon rush hours).</p>