The American University as Community and Why it is Beloved

     The American University is an institution that, almost stereotypically, is looked back on as "the best time of your life" by most American citizens who were able to go. You hear this over and over, and I do not know that all who hold this sentiment break down to themselves just why they loved it. America is undoubtedly and pridefully a vehicular country. The general American would trade off all the greenspace and pedestrian infrastructure in the world for more planning around allowing them to go from home to destination all in the car without ever having to walk a distance between the two. However, these same people may hold that they loved the college experience. The college experience is one of the only times in many Americans' lives in which they live in a pedestrian-friendly "community". They are plunged out of a vehicular-centric town into a place with greens, pedestrian infrastructure between classroom and residence halls, and gathering spaces like student unions. This sets up a situation where they can walk, run into friends, have chance encounters, and just all around have a more pleasant and interesting day. So why are these people not getting out of college and fighting to implement this sort of planning in the rest of the country? Why do we believe that this sort of planning is only allotted to a place that you spend 4 years at in your twenties and never go back to?

    If we love the community that is gained in college, we can fight for this sort of pedestrian-friendly community planning to be implemented everywhere else, overall improving the quality of life within this country. We are so brainwashed into thinking that it is normal to live a whole life commuting only by private car, even though subconsciously we all know that public areas that are only for pedestrians like a collegiate quad create "the best time of your life". Most other countries and areas of the world do not look at this planning to be set apart into the university grounds niche, but as THE way to plan a community. We need to catch up and begin to heal our communities through planning.

  

Imagine, if every middle aged person could exist in a community that made them feel the way that they felt in college. Of course, part of the community experience will be perceived differently simply due to aging and life change, but id bet that through intentional pedestrian planning for cities and communities could get us a hell of a lot closer to that feeling through our lives if we plan communities for connectivity, encounter, and gathering than that of a community that is perpetuating the American philosophy of private property and vehicular transport to large strip malls with giant paved lots for our ford f250's. We are far too removed from how humans have successfully interacted with community forever, and this is surprising based on how fondly many look back on a time in their lives when they existed within the antithesis of the vehicular city.

Links for consideration

https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/wi1q6m/college_campuses_show_us_what_our_cities_could/

https://dailycollegian.com/2021/10/the-perks-of-a-walkable-city/