<p>I have been reading a lot about the Penn development plan for campus. They had an article a while ago in the alumni magazine. But, I went online and read the official summary for the plan....and it looks phenomenal. I don't always think that the physical plant makes or breaks a university, but this is going to be so much better than when I was at Penn (for 8 years....). Check this out...many new buildings in places that were a bit of a disaster on campus, a pedestrian bridge across the river, completely redone athletic fields, and more:</p>
<p>I looked through it and it looks amazing. I'll be a freshman this fall. Will I see any major improvements in my 4 years? Will any of it be visibly noticeable?</p>
<p>bat: It would be difficult to imagine two campuses for similar sized institutions that are more different than Penn's and Cornell's.</p>
<p>Cornell has a huge campus on a hill overlooking what is really a pretty small town. The central area of the campus is very planned, the buildings are monumental. There is a huge arboretum, and a beautiful gorge cutting through part of the campus, as well as a large, empty hill suitable for tobogganing.</p>
<p>Penn's campus isn't small, but distances are much less than Cornell's. It is a jumble of buildings from different periods and plans. It is flat. It is in the middle of the city -- big streets with lots of through traffic traverse it, it is hooked in to lots of public transportation, it's walking distance from the business center of Philadelphia. The campus isn't monolithic -- there are lots of diverse businesses that are "on campus" for all practical purposes, and the campus area includes two very busy hospitals. There's lots of beauty on the Penn campus, but it's mostly nooks-and-crannies, small-moments beauty, no sensational, take-your-breath-away stuff that Cornell has lots of. And natural beauty? Fuggedaboudit. From some places you can kind of see the river over the expressway and the train tracks. There's a bio pond. Somewhere.</p>
<p>I'm not trashing Penn. What's important about a university is what happens inside the buildings, not what they look like. Penn has built some great buildings in the past 15 years. It's an exciting place. It's also a lot warmer in February than Cornell. But it's nowhere near as pretty to look at.</p>
<p>Look under "Find a Project" on the left side to get more specific timelines for each project (where available). Much of the "greening" of the former Postal Lands (into Penn Park, athletic fields, etc.) is scheduled to occur within the next few years.</p>
<p>bat, while Penn's campus is certainly urban (only 10-20 blocks from the hustle and bustle of Center City Philly and all the cultural, historical, dining, entertainment, and nightlife amenities and attractions it has to offer), it's also one of the loveliest urban campuses in the country. Most of the campus is actually closed to vehicular traffic, and contains shaded walkways, greens, courtyards, plazas, etc. that give it a bit of a cloistered feeling, despite its location in the middle of a major city. It's often said that Penn's campus offers the best of both worlds. However, as JHS points out, for pure scenic beauty, it's obviously no match for Cornell.</p>
<p>Penn absolutely has the loveliest urban campus in Southeastern Pennsylvania, hands down. And it is probably among the loveliest 40-50 urban campuses nationwide. That's about as far as I'd go. Is it lovelier than, say, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Brown, Chicago, Georgetown, Rice, Vanderbilt, Berkeley, USC . . . ? Um, no.</p>
<p>What Penn has done a really good job of, however, is integrating commercial, academic, and business development, so that the area is really vibrant.</p>
<p>JHS, of course it's a matter of personal taste, but like RZA, I find much of Penn's campus to be more attractive than several of the campuses you mentioned.</p>
<p>As I recall, you live(d) near Penn's campus, but I'm wondering if you've had a chance to spend much time--as an undergrad would--really exploring all of its nooks and crannies, such as, e.g., the 5 separate greens and courtyards in the Quad, Hamilton Walk, Smith Walk, the University Museum courtyards, and, yes, the Bio Pond? :)</p>
<p>I lived in University City for 10 years, during some of which my wife was a law student at Penn. I walked through the campus many times, especially when my kids were young -- the University Museum was a favorite place, as were the Oldenburg button in front of Van Pelt, the Bio Pond, the Shoppes, and, later, Pod. I've periodically done programs at the Law School and Steinberg-Dietrich Hall, and attended stuff at Irvine, Annenberg, and various lecture halls. I've had close friends (and children) in both hospitals. I have friends on the faculty whom I occasionally meet around there. I remember when Le Bus was a bus and Urban Outfitters a new idea in warehouse space.</p>
<p>You've got me on the Quad, however. Never been inside it. It sounds nice.</p>
<p>On the other hand . . . points off for the highrises, one of the worst decisions ever, on any campus.</p>
<p>I'm not trying to be a meany here. I like Penn. My son used to walk around the campus saying "I hope when I go to college it will be like this." Penn has lots of nooks-and-crannies beauty, I agree. One of the great parts of it is stepping out of the zoom of Walnut, Spruce, or 38th, and finding someplace that's placid and jewel-like.</p>
<p>Also agree with you about stepping off of the busy streets into the "placid and jewel-like" places. I've yet to visit an urban campus like Penn's--cheek by jowl as it is with Center City--that offers such places with the scope and abundance of Penn's campus (including Harvard, Columbia, Brown, Georgetown, etc.). That's why I think Penn's campus really offers the best of both worlds, and is unsurpassed by any other truly urban campus (IF one takes the time to thoroughly explore it on foot, as opposed to the drive-by's on which some CC posters seem to base their opinions--excluding those in this thread, or course :)).</p>
<p>^ Actually, the late '90s (specifically 1996) was when Penn really started turning things around, as discussed in this Washington Post artricle:</p>
<p>Throughout the current decade, Penn's campus and immediate surroundings have looked mighty fine, and this new plan merely extends that improvement to the east towards Center City.</p>
<p>Really, it dates from Judith Rodin becoming President of Penn. She had spent her entire career at Yale before that, winding up as the Provost there, and she was intimately familiar with Yale's worse version of the same neighborhood problem Penn had. She practically did a 180-degree turn from the Sheldon Hackney administration, focusing on building, on encouraging business, and on using Penn's muscle to raise real estate values (and thus encourage investment) in the surrounding community. She also instituted Penn's current house system.</p>
<p>Rodin did an amazing job with her tenure at Penn.</p>
<p>Rodin became president of Penn in 1994, and it took only a couple of years after that for the physical transformation--which required significant planning and preparation--to begin in earnest.</p>