(Somewhat OT) OK, Happy Ann Arborites
More reason to feel good about your/ourselves. Results of an aggregate of surveys puts A2 at 6th most contented city in the US.
But I guess we already felt pretty good, according to the data.
There is a Columbus in the miserable cities list, but it's in the wrong state.
Link: http://247wallst.com/special-report/2014/03/25/americas-most-content-an…
March 25th, 2014 at 11:20 AM ^
Does this study include North Campus?
March 25th, 2014 at 11:32 AM ^
March 25th, 2014 at 11:32 AM ^
March 25th, 2014 at 11:41 AM ^
Been a few years but,
North campus is fine. The biggest thing is it is pretty quiet (not as much happens there). I would guess that the unhappiness is tied to grad/engineering/architecture students that live and work up there moreso than the location. Other than that I thought it was easier studying at the dude and the dorms were a bit quieter. Living just off of north campus was nice too (I stayed a couple years at huron towers).
If you want to run around screaming COLLEGE at the top of your lungs, then it's probably not the place for you.
March 25th, 2014 at 12:29 PM ^
other than North Quad. But, it was still built in the early 70's (I believe), and definitely is in need of major renovation. Most of the central campus dorms, other than Markley have been redone or are in the process of major renovations.
March 25th, 2014 at 12:38 PM ^
It's been 20 years since I lived there with my wife and infant son while in grad school, so I'm sure it's much different today, but it was fine. Between the city bus and the campus bus sevice it was always easy to get to class and work. And it was quiet, which you will definitely appreciate. I actually preferred the private housing options to the grad family options, even though they cost a bit more they were in much better shape back then. I moved from family housing to Willowtree, which at the time was much nicer. It was mostly families back then, maybe different today.
has become much more habitable. The Duderstadt Library helped a lot. And there's been a lot of new development of shopping along Plymouth Road which helps. The NCRB is still a crap hole, but hopefully they're going to be renovating it soon. My oldest daughter stayed in one of the Northwood units a few years ago, and aside from being pretty dated, it was fine especially compared to some of the student slums on the central campus.
I worked at the NCRB during high school through college. Crap hole, yes. But it's quiet, you can get the machines you want, when you want them, and there's almost always a good pick up bball game or two to get in on. The level of talent in said pickup games, however, often makes it quiet obvious you are in North Campus, which is good for one's ego.
Edit - They've been saying they were about to start renovating there ever since I was working there 10 years ago. I'm convinced they'll tear the thing down before they ever actually update the place.
My brothers and our friends often played bball up there. Way easier to get a court to play on. Unless there were major renovations to the CCRB and IM building over the last 10 years (which very well could be) I found the facilities to be comperable.
and the dumbbells/free weights are on different floors. DIFFERENT FLOORS.
March 25th, 2014 at 11:35 AM ^
Your avatar is quite fitting...
March 25th, 2014 at 11:50 AM ^
Awesome! If only there were affordable renting options for single dudes like myself. The market is in desparate need of rental units that are not student high-rises and not McKinley based (protip: when looking on Craigslist for rentals, if you want to avoid McKinley's blatant flooding of the site, search with '-mckinley' . Though prepared to be shocked at how high the percentage of rentals in AA are mckinley owned.
But I fall into pretty much every metric they listed. Love living in AA.
March 25th, 2014 at 11:57 AM ^
Wait until Ann Arbor-Saline Road and the I-94 entrances/exits get closed for several months this spring and summer. The contentment index might fall a wee bit.
Anybody who shops at Meijers coming from central and north campus should be aware of this:
http://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/index.ssf/2014/03/road_commission_a…
March 25th, 2014 at 12:12 PM ^
With all the luxury student housing being built around town do these students even do their own shopping? Let alone be caught dead at a Meijer.....Whole Foods maybe, but Meijer just screams "Flyover State".
Things have changed since I was young and I don't like it! And it will happen to you tooooo.....
Anyone who lives on North Campus and shops at the Ann Arbor-Saline Road Meijer is directionally moronic.
I was bracing myself for some combination of Detroit, Flint and Saginaw to be on the unhappy list, Good to see they weren't.