Lower Eastside Neighbors, Inc.

Can anyone tell me why there is so much opposition against converting Columbia Hospital into Dorms? I don't get it. It is perfect in terms of structure, i.e., the rooms are already designed and each room will have it's own bathroom. The students will have more supervision than they currently do in rented flats which translates into better noise control.

I keep hearing that MHN residents are against this and I'm wondering if you really are. Is it at the discretion of the alderperson that students are being shunted to the other side of the river. Wouldn't have a dorm at the current Columbia site ease some of the parking problems?

I can only assume that MNH residents really don't want to work with the students but would rather they go away, a notion that seems to be in favor with local and university politics. What a shame.

Columbia Dorms

How would having more students on the East Side with their cars ease the parking problems?

I do not live in the immediate vicinity of Columbia Hospital, but I can well imagine that as a hospital it is a whole lot quieter than it would be as a dorm.

Your assumption about residents is wrong. Many of us are tired, however, of students who insist that the whole East Side is their campus -- which has happened explicitly in my presence several times.

Baffled by residential attitudes toward students? Take a look at all the trash at the curbs ever spring and fall and at the unshoveled sidewalks in the winter, I try to put yourself in a property owner's shoes.



By M. J. Hill