Just a few years ago residents and business owners in Westfield were ecstatic about the prospect of hundreds of Westfield State University students living in the downtown and creating a vibrant atmosphere. Fast forward to the present and some people are complaining that those same college kids can be, get this, drunken and rowdy. Who knew?
You can’t have, you won’t have, the dynamism and energy of a real downtown, even in a relatively small city, without some of the inconveniences which are endemic to festive behavior. Do you want to be a city? There will be noise…and some urine and regurgitated stomach fluid. Go Owls!