Cofifa-Question re. off-campus housing

[HeavenUniv.]

Cofifa, Might be too early to ask this,but are there any approximate numbers regarding Rutgers students living off-campus this year with the thousands of new dorms built on Livingston and College Avenue the past few years? Is there a slight decline which hopefully means some of the firetraps,umm, I mean houses, around New Brunswick will be torn down/renovated and become single homes (hopefully keeping some Rutgers staff in town) ?

 

[Korbermeister]

Cofifa, Might be too early to ask this,but are there any approximate numbers regarding Rutgers students living off-campus this year with the thousands of new dorms built on Livingston and College Avenue the past few years? Is there a slight decline which hopefully means some of the firetraps,umm, I mean houses, around New Brunswick will be torn down/renovated and become single homes (hopefully keeping some Rutgers staff in town) ?

anecdotal evidence suggests that many of the fire traps/houses behind College ave. are being bought, torn down and combined with other neighboring parcels for the purpose of building private dorms/apartments and a fraternity or two

 

[Korbermeister]

anecdotal evidence suggests that many of the fire traps/houses behind College ave. are being bought, torn down and combined with other neighboring parcels for the purpose of building private dorms/apartments and a fraternity or two

easton ave. remains the worst looking st. in brunswick

 

[ScarletKid2008]

easton ave. remains the worst looking st. in brunswick

Agreed Easton Ave should be the business center and vibrant jewl of the town (after George St) and its still far from that, but Easton certainly has made some recent progress in last 3-4 years. Still feels like the same 2-3 families own the whole street and properties and refuse to spruce the places up. Easton Ave definitely could use a new and larger bar/restaurant concept. Would be nice to put some pressure on the existing bars which haven't changed or updated a single thing in 30 years.

 

[SF88]

Agreed Easton Ave should be the business center and vibrant jewl of the town (after George St) and its still far from that, but Easton certainly has made some recent progress in last 3-4 years. Still feels like the same 2-3 families own the whole street and properties and refuse to spruce the places up. Easton Ave definitely could use a new and larger bar/restaurant concept. Would be nice to put some pressure on the existing bars which haven't changed or updated a single thing in 30 years.

The City utterly neglects Easton Ave. They plant trees and leave them to die. They put grates around the trees and they are left broken and weed infested. They don't pick-up the public trash containers enough and when they do they don't bother to clean the area around them. They are garbagemen....that's their job. Yes, the property owners and businesses deserve some blame too. Yes, there are a couple of families that own a lot of the property. I would be embarrassed if it were mine. The empty Teresas/Cafe52 has been as eyesore for over a decade.

Would love to have walking cop on the beat.

PROVIDE PARKING for that area. How can merchants thrive when there's limited convenient parking at 10 minutes for a quarter. The City sold the small metered lot to Boraie for the Aspire. That lot is now empty and a dump. They remove all the metered parking on Easton of B1G football game days??????.. It's a college town-embrace a college football weekend, don't chase the people away

Anyone have a pile of $$$$$, put that cool bar where NJ Books was. 18 to enter and 21+ upstairs

 

[SF88]

Cofifa, Might be too early to ask this,but are there any approximate numbers regarding Rutgers students living off-campus this year with the thousands of new dorms built on Livingston and College Avenue the past few years? Is there a slight decline which hopefully means some of the firetraps,umm, I mean houses, around New Brunswick will be torn down/renovated and become single homes (hopefully keeping some Rutgers staff in town) ?

There are several answers here. RU has increased the enrollment over the years. However, with all the increased campus housing, I've seen a slight reduction in demand for the house/firetraps ( I am an owner of several of these ) Currently what was once mostly students all they way out to Louis St is trending non student the further out you go, especially between Hamilton and Somerset. The future is the new, apartment style buildings going up all over off-campus. New Bruns relaxed some of the restrictions to building the larger buildings since the whole area is zoned residential. The hurdle is to put enough properties together to create a viable project.. Even then, the costs are enormous for construction and operation. The city won't let you build higher than 3-5 stories, but will require a lot of parking. The only way to do that is subterranean parking....which costs a fortune. Another hurdle is the massive property tax burden. For example, the beautiful apartment building on Bartlett street pays well over $200,000 per year in city taxes.

Single family homes will never happen because there's no financial incentive to do so. The construction costs are simply too high. I can't imagine Rutgers staff wanting to live next to a bunch of loud, inconsiderate college kids either

 

[ScarletKid2008]

@SF88 thanks for the insight. I really sense a strained relationship between the New Brunswick politics and Rutgers University. From the little I know/read it sounds like the police forces are constantly bickering and seemingly neither is doing a good job because of this non-cohesion. The lack of clean-up and care on Easton is embarrassing if true on the city's part. I can't imagine the city makes anything easy to do for Rutgers .. DEVCO has seemingly done all the positive work around town recently on behalf of RU. Can you shed more light on the relationship and politics at play between RU & NB ???

 

[HeavenUniv.]

Cofifa and Steve,
Some questions--if housing aimed at keeping some Rutgers staff in NB were to be built,what section (s) would be the best ? --How does Rutgers not have enough pull to get Easton Avenue spruced up ? How many zillions of dollars do the employees,students, and sports fans pour into the town each year ?

 

[e5fdny]

The City utterly neglects Easton Ave. They plant trees and leave them to die. They put grates around the trees and they are left broken and weed infested. They don't pick-up the public trash containers enough and when they do they don't bother to clean the area around them. They are garbagemen....that's their job. Yes, the property owners and businesses deserve some blame too. Yes, there are a couple of families that own a lot of the property. I would be embarrassed if it were mine. The empty Teresas/Cafe52 has been as eyesore for over a decade.

Would love to have walking cop on the beat.

PROVIDE PARKING for that area. How can merchants thrive when there's limited convenient parking at 10 minutes for a quarter. The City sold the small metered lot to Boraie for the Aspire. That lot is now empty and a dump. They remove all the metered parking on Easton of B1G football game days??????.. It's a college town-embrace a college football weekend, don't chase the people away

Anyone have a pile of $$$$$, put that cool bar where NJ Books was. 18 to enter and 21+ upstairs

@SF88 thanks for the insight. I really sense a strained relationship between the New Brunswick politics and Rutgers University. From the little I know/read it sounds like the police forces are constantly bickering and seemingly neither is doing a good job because of this non-cohesion. The lack of clean-up and care on Easton is embarrassing if true on the city's part. I can't imagine the city makes anything easy to do for Rutgers .. DEVCO has seemingly done all the positive work around town recently on behalf of RU. Can you shed more light on the relationship and politics at play between RU & NB ???

This is the vibe I get too. Since the 80's when I was a student.

Seems like the Hub City folks think, "Easton? That's Rutgers problem. We have other things to worry about."

Whether true or not that's what it feels like.

 

[Cofifa]

I would like to focus on family housing in the blocks closes to the park

 

[Scarlet Craig]

I would like to focus on family housing in the blocks closes to the park

I agree, that would be a wonderful spot for family housing - assuming you mean across from Buc Park on Easton Ave....especially if there was easy access to the park (walking bridge, e.g.).