Kingston Student Ghetto - Housing

Housing

The majority of the houses are pre World War I era construction. Generally houses are owned by private individuals and are rented to groups of four to eight students In addition some houses are owned by a co-op, and the University itself.

Unfortunately some of the landlords, sometimes referred to as 'slumlords', fail to maintain even basic property standards but due to geographic location the houses are still rarely vacant, allowing some of the properties to become progressively worse. After years of complaints from students and permanent residents the City continues to fail to enforce property standards. A few years ago the Municipal Affairs Commission of the AMS started awarding Golden Cockroach awards to bring the situation to the forefront. However, this award was not presented in 2008 due to a lack of qualifying landlords. Instead, a "Key to the Ghetto" award was presented that year to Robert Reid for his positive contribution to student housing.

The student housing area in Kingston is large relative to those in comparable university towns; a majority of undergraduate students live either in the ghetto itself or on its outskirts. There are numerous reasons for this:

• Queen’s University only has enough undergraduate residences for a small number of students after first year. This may change in upcoming years, as extra spaces were created to accommodate the one-time surge in enrollment due to Ontario’s double cohort year.
• The level of local transit infrastructure, including roads, public transit system, and on-campus parking make it impractical for thousands of students to commute every day.
• The city of Kingston limits developers’ ability to build large apartment buildings near the city’s core; there is currently only one building that noticeably stands above the city’s skyline, which was constructed before the bylaw took effect.
• The University's Student Union does not allow undergraduate students to be members of a fraternity or sorority, so the lodging commonly provided by such houses in the United States is non-existent within Kingston's core.

In the fall of 2006 demolition began on the "Clergy Block" of the Ghetto to make way for the building of the new Queen's Centre; a modern student life and athletics facility which will compliment the existing facilities located in the John Deutsch University Centre (JDUC), the Physical Education Centre (PEC) and Jock Harty Arena. The block is bordered by Division Street to the east, Clergy Street to the south, University Avenue to the west, and Earl Street to the north. The block was home to some infamous ghetto houses, notably the Barber Shop (a cinder block with porch pillars painted blue, white and red). The block also contained the historic Kingston Curling Club which has since relocated to a brand new facility in the west end of Kingston.