Abandoned McMansions make pretty cool dorms in Merced

[Liberal_in_LA]

Abandoned McMansions make pretty cool dorms in Merced



Hey college kid: Why share a stinky, only marginally clean little coffin-sized room with three other dudes (all of them also stinky and marginally clean)? Why indeed, if you’re going to college in Merced? Because Merced, a California city slammed by the foreclosure crisis, is littered with empty McMansions, acres and acres of abandoned homes, all of them huge and luxuriant in comparison to even the most posh of dorm rooms.

And now, UC Merced students are taking them over.

Nationally, RealtyTrac places Merced the third highest American city for foreclosures in the nation, behind only Las Vegas, NV and Vallejo, CA. Ironically these ubiquitous rows of new-construction “McMansion” style homes were built for the expected commerce and community that would serve the same students who now occupy them. The New York Times writes that the ”speculative fever that gripped the region and drew waves of outside investors to this predominantly agricultural area was fueled in part by the promise of the university itself, which opened in 2005 as the first new University of California campus in 40 years.” Unfortunately, the instant bustling college town dream didn’t come true, due to the economic and real estate melt down felt so strongly in the Central Valley.

Merced then found itself on the one hand with too many homes and no buyers who could afford them. On the other hand, UC Merced offers only 1,600 dorms though enrollment this year was over 5000 students. Speaking to the Times, former Merced mayor and real estate broker Ellie Wooten summed up the answer to this little math problem simply: ”Five students paying $200 a month each trump families who cannot afford more than $800 a month.”

http://blog.sfgate.com/ontheblock/2011/11/22/1349/?tsp=1

[Xithras]

1. Upside: College kids get cool dorms. Down side: It's Merced.

Ever been to Merced? It makes Stockton look good.

The UC is excellent though. Still, the auto-free recreational opportunities for the students are limited to swimming in the canal-water "lake", and cow tipping. There's a pretty awesome nickel arcade across the street from the community college too.

[Liberal_in_LA]

2. car broke down in Merced. Had to spend the night. Reminded me of Bakersfield

[Xithras]

3. Merced is worse than Bakersfield

Gangs, right-wing politics, and gut-wrenching poverty.

Building the UC in Merced was an attempt at social engineering. They did it hoping that it would help to improve what has traditionally been one of the poorest, and most conservative parts of California. Because the area has double digit unemployment when the economy is GOOD (and roughly 20% unemployment right now), there was also some hope that having a UC might spur more companies to invest there and help to turn around their economic situation. So far, the UC hasn't changed much of anything.

[formercia]

4. Perhaps the developers were trying to drive land prices upward

and make it un-affordable for the poor folks to stay around.

[KamaAina]

5. Also, there had never been a UC in the Central Valley

UC has the franchise on awarding doctoral degrees; CSUs only go up to Master's. Fresno State had to get an exemption from this due to the lack of doctoral opportunities in the Valley, prior to UC Merced.

Also note: UC "Merced" is actually about seven miles away from Merced itself. Hence, students need not experience the "gangs, right-wing politics and gut-wrenching poverty" (unless, of course, they're the ones taking over the McMansions).

[Xithras]

9. At one time, maybe.

But, thanks to the speculative investors, Merced has grown. There is now housing all the way out to Bellevue, only about a mile from the UC campus. A lot of that housing may be empty, but you can now see the town from the campus, and the university is slowly losing that "nobody out here but us cows" feel that people used to joke about. It's still surrounded by farms, but it's not quite as far out into the sticks as it once was.

As to the social engineering bit, I was referring to building it in Merced itself. The plan was always to build it in the Valley, but there was originally some serious consideration given to building it in Stockton, Fresno, Mapes Ranch (Modesto), or even Los Banos or Coalinga (some were considered more seriously than others). As I recall, the final options came down to Lake Yosemite or Mapes Ranch, which would have put it near I-5 west of Modesto, near Tracy. Merced was selected because it was thought that they would "benefit" most from the university.

[Brother Buzz]

7. E&J Gallo School of Management

You can't get more conservative and ethically challenged then that; a Freeper wet dream.

Interesting, I don't see Craig McNamara stumping for the school anymore.

[trumad]

6. Pretty small mansion.

[Liberal_in_LA]

8. That's why they are called McMansions

[Raine]

10. My mother was born and raised in Madera. We used to go there

all the time but I haven't been there in at least 30 years. That area used to be agricultural and smallish townish, I can only imagine how much it's changed. x(