I guess flying to Newark (you know, in the same state as Rutgers) and taking the train would have been too simple.
I am not sure "unreachabowl" was an insult. I think it was meant as a description of the cost and time involved to take a train from Seattle to New Brunswick NJ. Might as well be "unreachable".
That was stupid. My wife actually works at UW and quite a few people mentioned to her how great it was to travel to Rutgers back in 2017. They were able to visit NYC and take a quick train ride to New Brunswick.