Colleges in Cute Walkable College Towns

Smith College in Northampton, MA. It’s a very cute downtown only a few minutes’ walk from campus and has lots of funky little shops and cafes.

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The best college town!

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What about Chapel Hill or Athens, Ga?

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Fairfield University

I’ll try to add some outside the NE bubble.

U Oregon - Eugene is a nice area, walkable and bikeable with easy access to many outdoor activities.

Elon - Rural location but there’s a (very) small town with shops, coffee houses and restaurants across the street from campus.

U Colorado Boulder - Pearl Street (and all the activities Colorado has to offer)

U Montana -Missoula is a great college town (and the surrounding area offers countless outdoor activities)

Agnes Scott - easy walkability to downtown Decatur (suburb of Atlanta), which is full of shops, restaurants and clubs.

Clemson - nice little town just off campus and a nearby lake

Hopefully I’m not duplicating previous recommendations… several I would have mentioned have already been posted. Shoutouts to UGA and W&L. :smiley:

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William and Mary has a cute little tourist area right off campus.

JMU has a town with it - cute is at the discern of the visitor.

Mary Washington, UT Chattanooga…

Franklin & Marshall

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Drew University
West Chester University

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:face_with_hand_over_mouth:

I was about to! I loved Northfield, perfect college town size, lots of charm, but also only like 45 minutes from MSP/Twin Cities.

For a more urbanish option, Pitt is in the Oakland neighborhood in Pittsburgh, and CMU is immediately adjacent (basically across a gorge) in a neighborhood called Squirrel Hill. Chatham University is basically on the other side of Squirrel Hill from CMU, and Carlow University is on the other side of Oakland from Pitt.

For context, Oakland was planned as a civic center so has lots of major museums and such in addition to the universities, hospitals, labs, and so on. It is hard to describe if you have not been there, but to me Oakland, Squirrel Hilll, and the surrounding neighborhoods loosely known as the East End (where a lot of college kids live off campus) feel like a big college town despite being located in a major city.

It is all super walkable–characteristic of Pittsburgh, all of those East End neighborhoods in fact have their own walkable commerical areas, and there are also some great urban parks (basically when the gorge system is undevelopable, it is used for parks instead).
And then the East End is super convenient for bus/bike/Uber to other city amenities.

Now, of course “cute”/“quaint” is in the eye of the beholder. But I think most visitors to Pittsburgh are pleasantly surprised by what an attractive city it is–lots of historic architecture, lots of green space including the parks and riverfronts, again lots of walkable commercial districts at a variety of scales . . . .

Anyway, with four different colleges in the area (and incidentally, a fifth, Duquesne University, also has a cool location, although its walkability depends a little on how you feel about steps), that’s a lot of choices.

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Okay. I’ll go with that. I’ve always found the topic of Williams and Willamstown a bit amusing. Is it really a separate town or just a post office address? Williams people seem to embrace it. And it’s off the charts on the cuteness scale. So, okay.

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Love how Dickinson is well integrated with the town

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I did not intend for that to be a knock on Williamstown, which I thought was quite nice! I meant it more literally in the sense that Williamstown (at least the part that’s adjacent to campus) is basically one long street, whereas “downtown” Hanover extends for a few blocks in each direction. But I thought the two had a very similar feel, and my husband, a Tuck alum, agreed.

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Okay, then I guess we have to include Vassar and the tiny off-shoot of Poughkeepsie that is adjacent to the college and sort of reminds me of a small-scale Williamstown, MA.

Bloomington (home of Indiana University) has a walkable downtown area, and campus abuts one edge of it. And on other sides of the campus there are restaurants and shops and such, even if it isn’t quite as picturesque. Of course, IU has a big campus, so depending on where one is on-campus can mean that it could be a longer or shorter walk, but it’s all walkable.

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Lake Forest College is walkable to an adorable downtown and the metra to Chicago (about a 50 min train ride). It also has the added appeal of having a lovely beach equidistant to the campus (10 min walk to beach, 10 min walk to town).

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Has Auburn been mentioned yet? Great walkable college town.

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I agree! Super cute urban-residential neighborhood with bungalows, coffee shops etc. Very convenient to internships in both Minneapolis and St. Paul.

Other schools in the same general neighborhood include:

St. Thomas: about a mile away from Macalester. Gorgeous campus. Technically a small university (~6,000 undergrads, ~3,000 grad students) but maintains an LAC feel. Standout programs include business (the Twin Cities have many Fortune 500 companies), psychology, social work. Also ABET engineering with nurturing faculty and very good internship opportunities (many local medical device engineering companies.) Cross registration with the other members of the Associated Colleges of the Twin Cities (ACTC): Macalester, St. Catherines, Hamline, Augsburg. ~80% admit rate.

St. Catherine: St. Kate’s is a women’s college also about a mile from Macalester. Catholic but with a progressive activist feel-- you had best not underestimate the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet! Belongs to the ACTC. Standout programs include nursing and other allied health professions. ~92% admit rate.

St. Paul College: This community college is about 3 miles from Macalester, and within walking distance of the State Capitol for internships. A somewhat “grittier” neighborhood than the other 3, but still super cute and interesting. A quality CC with a lot of good majors. You can even do an entire ABET accredited BS in engineering there (first 2 years at the community college, and for the last 2 years you do classes on the campus that are taught by professors from Minnesota State-Mankato.) Essentially open access.

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Stetson, Princeton

There’s just many really.

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IU Bloomington, Virginia Tech, Clemson, Georgia, Penn State all come to mind.

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I was going to post this one - super cute little town.