Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Campus

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Campus

168 acres (68.0 ha) MIT campus covers about a mile of the north side of the Charles River basin in the city of Cambridge. The campus is divided roughly in half by Massachusetts Avenue, with most dormitories and student life facilities to buildings and academic West east. The bridge closest to MIT is the Harvard Bridge, which is known for being marked on a non-standard unit of length - the smoot. Station Kendall MBTA Red Line is in the far northeast of Kendall Square campus. The Cambridge neighborhoods surrounding MIT are a mixture of high tech companies occupying both modern office and rehabilitated industrial buildings as well as socio-economically diverse residential neighborhoods.

Each building has a number (possibly preceded by a W, N, E, or NO) designation and most have a name as well. Typically, academic and office buildings are referred to primarily by number while the residences are known by name. The organization of building numbers roughly corresponds to the order in which the buildings were built and their location relative (north, west, and east) to the original cluster center Maclaurin buildings. Many of the buildings are connected above ground as well as through an extensive network of underground tunnels, providing protection from the Cambridge weather as well as a venue for roof and tunnel hacking.

In the MIT campus nuclear reactor is one of the most powerful nuclear reactors university based in the United States. The prominence of the reactor's containment building in a densely populated area has been controversial, but MIT maintains that it is well secured. Other notable campus facilities include pressurized wind tunnel and towing tank for testing ship and designs the structure of the ocean. Wireless network throughout the MIT campus was completed in the fall of 2005 and consists of nearly 3,000 access points covering 9.4 million square feet (870,000 m2) of the campus.

In 2001, the Environmental Protection Agency sued MIT for violating Clean Water Act and Clean Air Act with regard to its procedures for storage and disposal of hazardous waste. MIT settled the suit by paying a $ 155,000 fine and launching three environmental projects. In connection with capital campaigns to expand the campus, the Institute has also extensively renovated existing buildings to improve their energy efficiency. MIT has also taken steps to reduce its environmental impact by running alternative fuel transfers campus, subsidizing public transportation passes, and building a cogeneration plant low emission that serves most of the campus electricity, heating and cooling.

MIT Police, with state and local authorities have investigated eight allegations of forced sexual crimes, 5 robberies, 9 aggravated assaults, 409 burglaries, 2 cases of arson, and 15 cases of motor vehicle theft, which affects a community of about 13,000 students and employees.