<p>Just some background:</p>
<p>Somebody in my family studied at Yale in the early 80's, when New Haven looked pretty different, and visited again recently. She was surprised to see the level of college-student oriented retail, and when I went to New Haven, I thought of it as a charming New England-y college town.</p>
<p>Unalove, New Haven has become the "hub" for the 50,000 college students in the area. Even with 11,000 students (undergrad + others), Yale isn't even the largest university in the center municipality of New Haven; there are two colleges with larger enrollments. It has also become a magnet for young professionals and wealthy people from all over New England, which has driven up retail sales dramatically, allowed expensive apartments to be built everywhere, and caused dozens of extremely expensive, New York Times five-star restaurants to open. There are literally hundreds upon hundreds of stores, cafes, theaters, clubs and restaurants within a few blocks of the Yale campus. 5 or 10 years ago, the situation was different - there were about 50 restaurants close to Yale then, now there are about 200. There are even a couple of luxury five-star hotels under construction.</p>
<p>The only major problem with New Haven is that it is starting to look more and more like Harvard Square. One disturbing sign is that a Buffalo Wild Wings is opening right near campus, for example, and there are two Starbucks within earshot of one another. Right now it is the best college town on the East Coast, hands-down, but in another five or ten years it may become too expensive for student budgets. For another example of this, look at parts of New Haven's East Rock neighborhood, which borders the campus. It used to be affordable for students and graduate students, but now it is full of condominium conversions, multi-million-dollar homes, upscale grocery stores and bakeries, and $2000 per month apartments.</p>
<p>But given how much money Yale has and the rate at which they continue to hire very highly-paid staff and faculty (several hundred per year, especially if you include the massive expansion at the hospital and cancer center) and build new buildings (between $600 million and $1 billion dollars of construction every year), I guess that's no surprise.</p>
<p>I'm usually skeptical about posterx, but what he's saying is pretty much true. Although i'm not sure how much the other colleges in the area matter. I go out a lot and i've had little contact w. people from other nearby universities... barring Quinnipiac of course, but Q-pac girls (/boys) have a less than illustrious reputation here. </p>
<p>And i wouldn't worry about new haven becoming gentrified any time soon, but it's definitely getting nicer each year.</p>
<p>I have said this many times on this forum - my DD chose Yale for several reasons, but one important factor was New Haven itself. She loves the urban setting, the many affordable ethnic restaurants, the compact nature of the college. She decided it was important to her to be somewhere that would keep her grounded in reality. She volunteers in the city schools and I think it helps her keep her sense of perspective. </p>
<p>If you want a great school in a bucolic, pristine setting - then visit Williams or Dartmouth. If you want urban, then there is no better place than Yale.</p>
<p>the aids info is from a government website, so i'd say its not too suspect. as for relevance, its showing that new haven isnt full of new england splendor and has a dark side, as aids commonly goes with infected needles/drug use.</p>
<p>Concur with worknprogress. Yale's self-contained urban campus was a huge draw for my son, too. </p>
<p>chicagoboy: Perhaps you could go run off and play in a different forum?</p>
<p>Yes chicagoboy, because Yale is full of drug-addicts who reuse dirty needles...i think you're relevant in answering the question about "New Haven," but you're also annoying because everyone knows the question implied New Haven's relationship to Yale. in this case, you are completely irrelevant and come across as even more immature. </p>
<p>chicagoboy denigrates Harvard in their forum as well. he has some kind of vendetta against some of the big-name schools.</p>
<p>It should also be noted that according to chicagoboy's link, NYC is #1 in AIDS rate, and cities like San Francisco (no surprise, I guess), D.C., Los Angeles, and Miami also have higher AIDS rates than New Haven. I expect this proves that nobody should want to live (or attend school in) L.A., D.C., NYC, San Fran, etc. I expect chicagoboy to immediately make his way to the USC, UCLA, Georgetown, Columbia, NYU, etc. forums to make that point.</p>
<p>Svalbard, if he goes according to the CDC's 2004 data, Chicagoboy would also want to start bashing colleges / people who live in Poughkeepsie and Philadelphia. </p>
<p>He would also want to bash every metropolitan area in the United States with more than 500,000 people, given the average rate for all metro areas of that size (which includes New Haven), nationwide.</p>
<p>He might also consider bashing all suburban and rural residents of the U.S.A., because their annual chance of death from a motor vehicle accident is exponentially higher than the urban AIDS infection rate. Even those who live in dangerous low-income housing projects in large cities are statistically much safer than those who live in quiet, leafy suburban neighborhoods and have to drive everywhere.</p>
<p>wow aids gets people very defensive.
and no, i wouldnt say that i have a problem with big name schools. i applied to princeton actually (waitlisted) and very strongly considered going to cornell for engineering. what i do have a problem with is arrogant people. well, not really a problem, i just like to bother their arrogance. such as when i said in the harvard thread that people had lied on applications- yes its true, sorry if it hurts your precious love and arrogance of harvard. and new haven does have an aids problem, and yale knows it. this is the reason they do an aids walk every year to raise money. plus, i wanted to see how "posterx" would take the aids info because according to him yale is perfect. new haven is the best collegetown in the east, yale is better for engineering than MIT, better than Princeton for math, and better than everyone at everything.</p>
<p>no one here is defensive. your glaring immaturity and worthlessness to this thread is what prompted responses.</p>
<p>so nobody at Princeton or U Chicago is arrogant, but everyone at Yale is arrogant. therefore one is justified in tearing down the institution as a whole...interesting. i learn something new everyday.</p>
<p>why don't you leave this discussion to individuals who actually live in New Haven? if you'd like, some of us can come over to the U Chicago forum and discuss the glory of that school's location.</p>
<p>Yeah man! You're all arrogant because you called me out when I said Yale has AIDS!! I hate the system!! By the way, I got into Cornell. That makes my opinion valid.</p>
<p>you like to twist words.
1) never said princeton wasn't arrogant
2) never said yale had an aids problem, i said new haven.</p>
<p>chgo: like I said in my initial reply, my reaction to your dated (1996) AIDS/HIV stat without any context is just weak evidence for the initial question.</p>
<p>AIDS/HIV rate is only one feature of a vast number of indicators to an area's overall livability -- especially since the OP wanted to know what the city relative to the campus was like. </p>
<p>As I said, median income, % HS graduation, teenage pregnancy rates, infant mortality rates, life expectancies -- are broader indicators of the effects of poverty in an urban area no? There's nothing wrong w/pointing out that AIDS/HIV has a definite presence among a slice of the population -- as for lending argument to the relative strengths and weaknesses of New Haven -- you just can't atomize stats -- I'm sure your professors next year will point this out to you as well.</p>
<p>Best of luck to you.</p>
<p>Chicagoboy, really? I don't know whether to laugh or be sad about your comment. </p>
<p>AIDS is very highly corollated with poverty. What that high AIDS rate essentially implies is that New Haven has a large number of impoverished people. This is no new revelation. It also has little if anything to do with the safety/quality of life in our city. "zomg, ppl use drugs near Yale!" Well, yes. Yes they do. Welcome to real life...there are lots of people in every big city who do. </p>
<p>And don't seem so surprised that people are taking offense at the mention of the high rates of AIDS as a reason that New Haven isn't so great. AIDS is often used to cruelly and unfairly stereotype homosexuals, the poor and members of minority racial groups. </p>
<p>I guess it makes me a little angry when people imply that the poverty around Yale is necessary connected to supposed "high" rates of violent crime. I mean yes, we have a lot of poor people near Yale, many of whom are minorities. Yes, some probably use drugs. Some probably have AIDS. This doesn't make New Haven a "bad" city or an "unsafe" place to live. Newsflash, poverty != violent crime. </p>
<p>Also, when you say that AIDS is "deadly and contagious"...oh yes, surely all of us students are going to catch AIDS through the air from that homeless guy on the corner. Once again, SOME New Haven residents engage in unsafe sex and drug use, but once again the vast majority are going to make it through life AIDS-free. It's certainly a problem, but it's more indicative of the poverty rate of a fairly big city (big surprise) than it is of New Haven's quality overall.</p>
<p>Sorry, that was long...New Haven just takes a lot more crap than it deserves, and I feel a bit defensive of my city!</p>
<p>P.S. Chicagoboy, I don't mean to imply that YOU are stereotyping anyone...I'm just pointing out that AIDS is a touchy subject because of its connections with racism/classism/homophobia! I know you meant no harm!</p>
<p>^^ He actually did mean harm; he is clearly and consistently anti-Yale/Harvard on these forums. He spends just as much time, and possibly even more, tearing down these schools than he does promoting Chicago.</p>
<p>See, T26E4 and mochamaven had very nice responses. thank you guys for not twisting my words or freaking our and saying that im trying to just tear down yale.</p>
<p>as for rd31, he is making large assumptions/generilizations. clearly and consistently anti-yale/harvard? i said 1 thing about harvard, and it was just that i knew a number of people that had lied on their applications. i do have some bad opinions about yale but they are related to a family experience that happened for 2 years betwen 3-5 years ago. </p>
<p>and i dont spend "just as much time, and possibly even more" tearing down those schools than promoting chicago. you pretty much just fabricated that. i have about a total of 5 posts in the harvard forum, as opposed to my total count of 570 posts. i spend a lot of time offering opinions and information to people in the college search & selection threads, and also spend a lot of time in the uchicago forum.</p>
<p>you actually have 10 posts on the "why Harvard? this is why?" thread alone; you have far more posts than I have time to count on Ivy League, Yale vs. Princeton, Yale vs. X school, etc...the time you spend giving negative comments on certain schools is rather frightening.</p>
<p>you are consistently anti-Yale/Harvard. you rarely, if ever, have anything positive to say about either school. i don't understand how a bad family experience provokes you to point out New Haven's AIDS rate (which is a pretty malicious, "low blow" attack)...the fact of the matter is, you DO tend to dissuade people from Yale based on personal biases. you also admitted that you posted on this forum so you could provoke Poster X (someone who avidly promotes Yale); you have very immature, questionable, and harmful intentions.
I would like to kindly ask you to spend less time with this and more time promoting Chicago.</p>
<p>LOL! So Poster X does not attack other schools. I guess you haven't been on the Harvard forums recently. It is well known that New Haven is a crime ridden dangerous city. If you go there plan to stay on campus or buy youself a bullet-proof vest....</p>