Queen's students present strategy on improving town-gown relations

Yesterday graduate students at Queen's University's School of Urban and Regional Planning presented their report on how to improve housing and town-gown relationships in neighbourhoods near the university. The students studied 9 university cities in Canada and the US, including Syracuse, New York, where students and residents engage in activities such as tree-planting and barbecues to improve neighbourhood relations. Fostering that kind of relationship in Kingston is among the recommendations listed in the report. Other recommendations include establishing a permanent town-gown committee; the city and/or Queen's purchasing ailing residential properties, rehabilitating them, and selling them back to responsible landowners; and Queen's building new forms of student housing, such as smaller residences, apartments, row houses, and mixed-use buildings. Kingston Whig-Standard