Thirteen

By Randy Garbin

It's an old complaint. With all these college students, why doesn't Worcester have more of a college town feel? Some of the reason comes from simple geography. The city's three major colleges, WPI, Clark, and Holy Cross sit in three distinct parts of the city. Becker fits in so well with its neighborhood near Elm Park, it's almost invisible. Assumption's seclusion in Worcester's more remote corner would otherwise make it a perfect setting for rehabilitating rich alcoholics.

Over the years I've called Worcester home, the city has floated a few proposals. One city councilor suggested building student housing downtown. Of all the colleges, only Clark has taken any real proactive, enlightened measures to improve its surrounding community, thus stabilizing and reversing Main South's fifty-year decline.

While thirteen area colleges have formed a "consortium," as I see it, this organization exists mainly to fend off any attempts to strip them of the benefits of their non-profit status. For its students, it operates a shuttle that connects the campuses and the downtown library. The Consortium disseminates facts and figures proving their worth to the surrounding community, but people who live in the neighborhood of WPI (as I do) will quickly question the worth of watching more houses fall to make way for commuter parking lots.

According to the Consortium's figures, these 13 colleges enroll over 39,000 students, which actually exceed the student population in the Northampton-Amherst corridor. Yet in terms of economic and cultural vitality, there's no comparison. The student population in the Five College area makes itself all-too-obvious. Around here, we wonder where all the kids are.

What to do? First we officially recognize the enormous potential value of this particular asset by giving it extremely high priority in our marketing and strategic planning.

Then, we address the pitiful quality and availability of our public transportation system. A UMass student or local resident can hop a free bus in Sunderland and ride all the way to Belchertown or Northampton. The buses run well into the night and foster nightlife and retail activity almost forgotten in our downtown. The local transit authority funds this system through student fees and contributions from the towns it serves.

Second, the colleges have to better coordinate development efforts that look at the entire city as a kind of collective campus, and they should adopt Clark's example of community building. Then to encourage participation by the consortium members, the city should consider amending its property tax code to levy taxes on those institutions that do not make material investments in their surrounding neighborhoods. And I'm not talking about more parking lots.

Redefining Worcester's reputation as a college town must become a priority, because the long-term benefits go well beyond merely having more cafés. College towns don't just attract productive people seeking to improve their lives. They retain them as well.