Mount Holyoke or Bryn Mawr?

Corbett
Sat, 03 Dec 2016 19:24:40 +0000

I haven’t visited MHC, but I did visit BMC, which my daughter. Coming from a high-density city, (in case you are too) BMC had virtually no services around the campus.

There aren’t many services immediately adjacent (like across the street) to the BMC campus. However, the campus is a short walk from Lancaster Avenue, a commercial strip with numerous shopping options. I searched for coffee shops on Google Maps near “Canaday Library, Bryn Mawr College”, and got the following hits (all on Lancaster Ave):

Starbucks, 12 minute walk

La Columbe Coffee Roasters, 12 minute walk

Hothouse Coffee, 14 minute walk

Gryphon Cafe, 19 minute walk

Since this is about the town, I am not including BMC’s two on-campus coffee joints. I am also excluding places on or near Haverford College (although in practice, HC is easily accessible from BMC).

The three coffee shops at MHC sound much better than what the town offers at BMC.

You only get to three at MHC if you include the two on-campus options. If you look at the town itself, you are down to one, Thirsty Minds.

I am not suggesting that the number of local coffee shops or other services should be a deciding factor in a college decision. Plenty of people have great experiences at Williams College, for example, and Williamstown offers fewer services and is more isolated than either South Hadley or Bryn Mawr. But the OP did specifically mention “coffee shops and that stuff in walking distance”. And by that criterion, Lancaster Avenue in Bryn Mawr has a lot more than College Street in South Hadley. Look at both on Google Maps or Google Street View and draw your own conclusions.