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The Crimson has broadened its coverage area–it’s now taking a look at Columbia’s expansion, but only as far as Alma’s project relates to its own. Some of the paper’s conclusions, in Bwog’s expert opinion, turned out a little whack.
The Crimson calls Harvard’s proposed expansion an “even more ambitious plan” than Columbia’s (because all comparisons must turn into contests). But is it? OK, Harvard’s plans extend over the next 50 years. And yes, they plan to expand over 200 acres. Columbia’s plan happens to be 25 years and cover 17 acres. But Allston is no West Harlem. If Harvard really wanted to be more ambitious than Columbia, it would have expanded 200 acres into downtown Boston.
In its second botched conclusion, the piece goes on to say that Columbia’s $150 million community benefits agreement will pressure Harvard to offer more to the Allston community. Allston may have its share of problems, but because it doesn’t have the race factor or a history of an ugly relationship with the University, Bwog’s going to take a bet that Harvard won’t budge much. Harvard has other places to throw its cash around.
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21 Comments
@MAL What might be “whack” is the analogy in which the Bwog’s “experts” compare expansion into West Harlem to expansion into downtown Harlem. The Manhattanville section of West Harlem is the least densely populated neighborhood on the island of Manhattan. Anyway, why would Columbia want to outdo Harvard in magnitude of controversy, anyway. That the Crimson insists that our expansion is less ambitious than their is GOOD FOR US. Do we WANT more heat over this or are you guys at the Bwog just jockeying for attention?
@this is exactly why the future rests in unlikely places like uc davis.
@hmm well, harvard is planning to bury a whole expressway under its new property. with its own money. this took 20 years and over $15 billion for the government to achieve in downtown boston. so that’s a little ambitious. but yeah, other than that, it’s hardly the sort of hand-wringing fight that m’ville is for columbia.
meanwhile, stingy yale is expanding massively and stiffing the city of new haven on everything it asks for:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/business/06haven.html
@The King of Spain Cambridge and Allston are certainly not easy to build in, but the complexities are smaller in many aspects, mostly the social issues. Architecturally it might be a little more difficult.
And saying that Yale is screwing the city is a misstatement, and one that is pretty much wrong, unless you think that what UPenn has been doing should be normal.
@question “Architecturally it might be a little more difficult.”
why?
@ZvS Storrow Drive is already mostly underground, though, so that part probably isn’t that tough. Think of the Shaw’s over the Mass Pike, not I-93.
@huh you must be thinking of a different road. there’s one tunnel along storrow, which is for one of the sides of the road, and it last like four feet. AND it’s crumbling to bits which has the state in a panic. so yes, building tunnels in a watery city like boston is hard.
@1231209 Harvard may be buying more land, but along with our 17 acres, Columbia also bought up like 100,000 black people. That’s worth a lot. Columbia also assumed the white man’s burden upon buying this land. Yeah.
@actually... Assuming I’m getting my geography right, there’s not a whole lot in the parts of Allston that Harvard is expanding into, so they definitely face less challenges than CU does in Manhattanville.
@Cambridgite Agreed–and I wouldn’t call Cambridge “essentially unfettered when it comes to real estate.”
This post is pretty dumb. Do your research if you’re going to make such claims.
@hahaha I enjoyed this post…Harvard is a school for bonafied douches, which is why they felt the need to compare.
And the jokes…they are simply amazingly corny. Keep them coming!
@Bwog Sitting in China, I thought you should know that websites with the word “blog” in their names are almost always blocked by the govt. So kudos on naming yours “bwog”.
@Chinese not the last time I checked — all pages on blogspot used to be blocked, for example, but were made accessible in again in July 2006.
also, proxy server anyone?
@look http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/education/edlife/hunger.html?ex=1357275600&en=5525bdabd88b4aca&ei=5089&partner=rssyahoo&emc=rss
@alexw I wouldn’t call Cambridge, MA a “small suburban town.”
@cc '10 columbians also need to get over this inferiority complex shit. should a gossip like bwog give a shit about how much harvard wants to prove it’s better than us?
@200 acres? What the fuck do they need that much space for?
@what is The best beauty college?
Hairvard!
@what major American city was founded by an aluminum magnate?
Boss Tin!
@Clearly, If you examine the footprint of the institutional land on the Allston side of the river, Harvard is compensating for something.
@bwog be whack allston is in boston, yo. And to be fair, Cambridge is a decent sized city. I defer to my friends at wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge,_Massachusetts