Be aware that the mile in question is entirely uphill, on the shoulder of a busy road. You’d be walking in grass when it’s sunny, but mud (or rarely, snow) when the weather is bad. I would take the bus to school and walk back, personally.
Things are much flatter between Carrboro and campus, so biking is a much more appealing option from that direction. I would nudge you toward that area if there are any affordable options.
What are you studying? If you are doing business, law, or medicine then your classes will be away from the main part of campus. IMO campus is big enough that this is a consideration.
You’ll definitely want to check Hello Again’s link for the Student Health Service and see how much it will cost you to get your prescriptions through them. Neither Chapel Hill nor Carrboro have a Wal-Mart - the nearest one is in Durham in a shopping center called New Hope Commons, and the Chapel Hill bus system only serves Chapel Hill, so getting to a Wal-Mart to get your prescriptions filled will probably be a hassle (there are Triangle Transit Authority buses which serve Durham, but the system is much less convenient than Chapel Hill’s and it’s not free).
If you want to get your prescriptions through your insurance, Blue Cross/Blue Shield uses Medco as its pharmacy service and you can usually get prescriptions via mail order for less than if you use a regular retail pharmacy, but of course you need to be organized and order refills at least a week before you run out to make sure you get your refill in time (you can request a refill online). I used to use the mail order service for a beta blocker I take and a month’s supply was only a few dollars.
If you play your cards right they’ll take you back to their place.
The male-to-female student ratio is definitely in your favor, btw. I happen to work on campus and in our department alone the female students outnumber the men by quite a bit!
Well, I’d definitely do it in reverse – bus up the hill to school and walk back home, as awldune said. The hill is not super steep, but it’s steep enough and it’s long: a bit over a mile, uphill every step. And don’t underestimate the weather here either: It is hella hot in the summer for someone from a northern climate (I was born and raised in Montana), and the only way I’d toil up that hill on foot on a summer day would be with a gun to my head.
As for bringing girls back . . . the hottie undergrad girls are not going to be hanging out at the Glen Lennox apartments. Again, this is not the trendy part of town, not a social hot-spot area, not where the kids tend to congregate or hang out. That’s Franklin Street and Carrboro. Glen Lennox is a decent completely un-hip apartment complex convenient to the University. That’s it; that’s all it is. But it’s not like it’s hard to get from South Street to Franklin Street, so I don’t want to make it sound like Glen Lennox is Siberia or anything.
Thanks again for the advice - the depth of knowledge here on even the most obscure topic is incredible!
I think I’ll hang back on getting a place for now - I’m getting sucked into the ebay endgame of “I gotta bid now! Things are moving!” $330 isn’t such an unreasonably low price point that I won’t be able to find a deal like this again, I think.
What about the dorms? IIRC, there’s one dorm (Craige?) that has some rooms for grad students. That might be an affordable option at least for a bit though obviously in a dorm, the kitchen facilities are shared and insecure (I had someone swipe my leftovers out of the shared kitchen, grrrrr). Also I have no clue what the current costs are, or the availability of rooms. Back when I was a student, the undergrad dorms typically had long wait-lists. On the other hand, the location would be pretty convenient.
Graduate student housing is now offered in Odum Village, which is on the extreme south side of campus. Here’s the instructions on how to apply - if you can get a spot, you’ll still have a roommate, but you’ll have your own bedroom:
Wow - that’s quite a change from our days there. We lived in Odum Village for a couple of years as newlyweds. The location can’t be beat (except if you have to drive somewhere during a home football game, or when the ambulance helicopters buzz your building on their way to NC Memorial Hospital…). They’re not luxurious by a long-shot, and the rooms are small, but they’re quite a bit better than a dorm would be. The new student family housing looks quite a bit nicer than that! I’d definitely look into Odum Village if I were you!
The uphill part is correct, but as of this morning there were well-maintained concrete sidewalks on both sides of the road. So it’s not like you’re going to have to hitch rides on passing oxcarts, or anything like that.
