All but seven of the 29 original Knox Boxes—the grubby three-story apartment houses that attracted upperclassmen on a budget (as well as countless tiny critters)—are gone.
Toll Brothers Apartment Living in November demolished most of the original homes just off campus to make way for 1,493 beds in traditional double, suite-style and townhouse layouts, along with retail stores and restaurants.
Project Manager Dustin Kinney says the development is a big step in transforming College Park into a top 10 college town. Terrapin Row is scheduled to open in summer 2016.
Aerial footage by Edwin Remsberg
5 Comments
Matthew Walker
I am a Knox Box survivor from the late 70s. Those days will never be seen again. It was unsanitized fun and lively living in the student ghetto. Great comraderie, cheap and a coveted place to live. Pretty dingy even then and it will be a long time before the new housing has a soul.
Matt BSCE 1980
Danielle Dwyer Garavito
Knox Box living was a fantastic experience! Cheap, fun and neighborly atmosphere at its best. Constant chess game for parking, walking distance to class and Santa Fe, as well as keg parties that go down in history with hundreds of students standing in the streets. My roommates and I were lucky to have had a 3 bedroom Knox box apartment - I do believe it may have been the only one - two bedrooms on the first floor, a bath and kitchen and with an oversized living room with a bay window, as well as the 3rd bedroom downstairs in the basement (a firetrap with no exit or window). Those were the days!! My parents didn't see the place that I called "home" for two years until graduation day. My mom's reaction: I paid good money every month for THIS?!?
Cheryl Carrillo
I was there from 80 to 84 the two o'clock clubs coming out if the vous were sometimes in the Knox boxes streets full of kids headed that way when the vous closed and after a slice of purple pizza!! When I went there I considered College Park a great town because WE made it that way. It doesn't have anything to do with new or old buildings it what happens in those buildings it's people that make the college town top ten not buildings!! I considered the 70's and 80's the best time in College Park there was even a head shop!!
Sharon Dugan
L-O-V-E-D, loved our Knox Box!!!! Remember the JOY we felt when we found a 2 bedroom to rent. It was premium rental space...close to the 'Vous, Santa Fe, the Cellar and everything else. There was a certain feeling you got by being in a community of those roach boxes. Parties were open all around...Special club, no doubt...I'm not sure the new housing will give that same gritty atmosphere. Just as well, I imagine the new generation of students is not into the grunge living that the '80's provided. Ah, that was living!!
Matthew Walker
I am a Knox Box survivor from the late 70s. Those days will never be seen again. It was unsanitized fun and lively living in the student ghetto. Great comraderie, cheap and a coveted place to live. Pretty dingy even then and it will be a long time before the new housing has a soul. Matt BSCE 1980
Danielle Dwyer Garavito
Knox Box living was a fantastic experience! Cheap, fun and neighborly atmosphere at its best. Constant chess game for parking, walking distance to class and Santa Fe, as well as keg parties that go down in history with hundreds of students standing in the streets. My roommates and I were lucky to have had a 3 bedroom Knox box apartment - I do believe it may have been the only one - two bedrooms on the first floor, a bath and kitchen and with an oversized living room with a bay window, as well as the 3rd bedroom downstairs in the basement (a firetrap with no exit or window). Those were the days!! My parents didn't see the place that I called "home" for two years until graduation day. My mom's reaction: I paid good money every month for THIS?!?
Cheryl Carrillo
I was there from 80 to 84 the two o'clock clubs coming out if the vous were sometimes in the Knox boxes streets full of kids headed that way when the vous closed and after a slice of purple pizza!! When I went there I considered College Park a great town because WE made it that way. It doesn't have anything to do with new or old buildings it what happens in those buildings it's people that make the college town top ten not buildings!! I considered the 70's and 80's the best time in College Park there was even a head shop!!
Sharon Dugan
L-O-V-E-D, loved our Knox Box!!!! Remember the JOY we felt when we found a 2 bedroom to rent. It was premium rental space...close to the 'Vous, Santa Fe, the Cellar and everything else. There was a certain feeling you got by being in a community of those roach boxes. Parties were open all around...Special club, no doubt...I'm not sure the new housing will give that same gritty atmosphere. Just as well, I imagine the new generation of students is not into the grunge living that the '80's provided. Ah, that was living!!
Lauren Pitts
Agreed!