<p>is troy a nice city?</p>
<p>was it once or is it an industrial town?</p>
<p>clean city? nice roads? stuff to do?</p>
<p>Easy answer in my opinion is no.</p>
<p>While troy is an urban area, some Rensselaer students have admitted to me personally that going out past midnight is very sketchy. They try to avoid having to go out after dark unless they are able to drive themselves or simply can't spend the night where they currently are. This however is subjective. I met with one student who said he thought the campus safety wasn't that much of an issue for him after dark. He said he had a harder time in Philadelphia then he did in Troy.</p>
<p>Downtown Tory tends to be the worse area of the school. Pretty much anything down the hill from the campus in downtown troy is pretty sketchy. There are several boarded up homes and the area is pretty heavily poverty stricken from what I heard. The campus itself is nice and clean, but Downtown Troy seems to be the complete opposite. When I went to visit Rensselaer, I almost changed my mind and turned around after almost a day of driving because downtown Troy looked so bad.</p>
<p>Troy itself however didn't seem to be that bad. When I got a little glimpse of it, it didn't seem to have the most to offer. I can't say with full certainty because I didn't see much of troy past downtown Troy and the campus. However, it definitely is not the worse college town ever. It seems like it would get annoying that you have to go around Downtown troy to get out of the bad area, but if you go across the campus and down the hill, you can just turn into the better area of the city.</p>
<p>The only other thing I can remember about roads, is that not every road seemed to be marked.</p>
<p>As far as things to do, you really are not going to need to leave campus. There is a lot of things on campus to do.</p>
<p>Actually, there is some pretty good urban renewal stuff going on in Troy. Search Troy Architectural Program, Joe Fama, Urban Design Center in Syracuse, and Dean Biancavilla. If you happen to be interested in architecture, historic preservation, or new urbanism, Troy is a busy place! They've done some really good stuff there - but they have a lot of work left too.</p>
<p>I didn't know there were urban renewal programs going on. The campus is not a deal breaker in my opinion. After all, I'm going to apply there still. It definitely is not close to being similar to a major city and most smaller surrounding cities of large cities. (even with Albany around from what I've heard). </p>
<p>You normally will not be seeing Downtown Troy because you'll never leave campus. Most students stay aware of the area they are in, because they usually don't feel safe walking around past midnight from what I've been told. This is just due to the fact they are not in the best part of Troy.</p>
<p>A lot of students really don't like Troy. Troy overall is not bad, just the area of Troy surrounding Rensselaer is what has shaped most students opinions of Troy.</p>
<p>I'm trying not to sound too negative when typing all this, so I hope I'm keeping this balanced well enough.</p>
<p>In my own case I havn't had any problems with Troy. I mean its not like there are major attractions like there would be in Boston, but it hasn't impacted me negativly in any way. This is probably because I am happy spending most my time on campus.. there is plenty going on on campus to keep me quite busy. I think this applies to a lot of students here. </p>
<p>The only times I have left campus and gone into Troy were during orientation when we went to an event at the riverside park, and to eat a few times at different places nearby, which havn't been bad at all, and to go the Troy City Music Hall, which was pretty cool because it is one of the most acoustically perfect music halls in the world.</p>
<p>Oh and by the way it was once a very big industrial town, and one of the richest cities in the US.. but that was probably over 100 years ago. I've heard theres a lot of historical stuff in Troy, but that stuff has never interested me much at all.</p>
<p>Are there any good things about Troy? Like good restaurants or good places to shop around? Is there a diversity of people in Troy?</p>
<p>The greater Albany area has a metro bus system that is free to RPI students with their student ID. The bus stops at RPI and has routes to shopping malls and other places of interest in the Capital area.</p>
<p>We just got back from Parents Weekend at RPI where our son is a freshman. In the two months he has been there I think he has only left campus a few times. Once to work on a Habitat build project, took the Walmart shuttle a couple times for some shopping, and went on a couple frat-organized lazer tag and paintball trips. Beyond that he has been really busy with his friends doing stuff on campus. He tells us he has not gone downtown for any reason except for a special event downtown during orientation week. We have driven around Troy several times and it is certainly a city with its run down neighborhoods. Some of the downtown areas have been nicely revitalized and are lovely. But, as in all cities, common sense says that the students should not be walking around Troy alone at night. My son says that the university regularly posts information about muggings in the area near campus at night. But since he does not go around on his own at night he did not show concern about this. All in all, he is really happy at RPI.</p>