And you thought the Annex was bad.
Undergraduates currently participating in the Duke in New York program lost their housing on the campus of New York University and have been relocated to a hotel one student described as reminiscent of "One Flew Over The Cookoo's Nest." The hotel is almost four miles away from NYU's campus.
"I was on the elevator with a man who lives here and he said, `Thank God the students came, because before, it used to be like living in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest,"' said Trinity junior Lisa Attman.
An undergraduate housing crunch at NYU brought on the housing crisis. More than 400 NYU students have been put up in hotels or placed on waiting lists while they live at home, said William Boulding, associate director of residence life at NYU. The overflow stems from NYU's oversized freshman class and an increased number of transfer students, Boulding said.
Students participating in the Duke in New York program spend the fall semester in New York, taking two courses from a visiting Duke professor and one course from an NYU professor while working as interns at artistic institutions such as museums and dance companies.
Duke students enrolled in the program were housed in hotels until three years ago, when they started living on the NYU campus. This year's 18 students and one resident advisor participating in the program found out only days before they arrived in New York that they would not be offered the standard on-campus housing. Instead, they are living in the Broadway American Hotel at Broadway and West 77th Street.
NYU housing officials notified Duke administrators of the housing crunch in early August, said Kathy Silbiger, director of the Institute of the Arts. The institute administers the Duke in New York program.
Students were not told of the change until shortly before they arrived in late August, said Trinity senior Katherine Pasternak.
Initially, University officials had told students they would live in the hotel's efficiency apartments, which include private bathrooms and kitchens, but many were placed on floors with just one kitchen and several communal bathrooms. Since their arrival two weeks ago, students have gotten semiprivate bathrooms, but they are still waiting on private or group kitchens.
Some students were irate about the new living arrangements, which many said were unsanitary.
"There are lots of cockroaches," Attman said. "The [oven] burner is on 24 hours a day."
Attman also worried about the communal bathrooms.
"It's a crazy city, and you never know who could be waiting for you in the bathroom," said Attman, who hales from Baltimore.
The Broadway American Hotel was at one time a residential hotel and currently, about 25 percent of its residents are on public assistance, Attman said.
Nevertheless, "Let's Go: New York City 1994," a budget travel guidebook, gave the hotel high marks, calling it "cool, clean and ultramodernÉ if it were roomier, it'd be a corporate law office."
Regardless of the cockroaches and shared showers, students criticized the hotel for its location 70 blocks north of NYU's campus. Students take two classes from a Duke professor, which are held in the hotel, but some said the NYU class requires a long subway commute.
"It takes a 30-minute minimum to get to campus, and it can be more during rush hour," Pasternak said. The University has provided each student with a $200 stipend to cover the semester's transportation costs.
Students are also being reimbursed $100 to install personal telephone lines. They are still, however, paying the same $2,200 rent assessed for on-campus housing at NYU.
Silbiger said students were never guaranteed NYU housing, adding that the hotel "is really not bad."
"Students were only disappointed because it didn't meet their expectations," she said.
Several students said they had looked forward to living in Greenwich Village.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.