Rutgers Day Celebration Held Across New Brunswick-Piscataway Campuses

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ–Rutgers Day is being celebrated today. This fifth annual event, a festival involving the College Avenue, Cook/Douglass, and Busch campuses, also includes much older traditions including the New Jersey Folk Festival, and Cook College’s Ag Field Day.

The three campuses involved – Busch, College Avenue, and Cook/Douglass – each have their own specialties or “themes”. 

Piscataway’s Busch campus, which largely developed in the mid to late 20th century, is the engineering, physical science, and medicine campus. Also, it is the sports campus, and for Rutgers Day it hosts the “Scarlet vs. White Football Game,” a practice scrimmage between Rutgers football players, starting at 4 pm in Rutgers Stadium.

Across the Raritan River in New Brunswick are the cultural campuses, College Avenue and Douglass.  College Avenue Campus is the oldest part of Rutgers University, and the oldest part of the current campus is the Old Queens campus, which dates back to the early 19th century. 

On College Avenue, one can expect international exhibits, university history, and the liberal arts. 

The two halves of Cook/Douglass Campus each have their own specialties. The New Jersey Folk Festival, which predates Rutgers Day, dominatesthe Douglass section of the campus, along with environmental sciences, women’s topics, and liberal arts. The Cook section, meanwhile, hosts Ag Field Day, which is centered around farming.

A visitor to the Rutgers Day festivities can expect to do plenty of walking, as it is often the best way to get from one location to another, due to heavy pedestrian and automobile crowds.

There will also be a special bus route in serveice today stopping at the following locations: Werblin Recreation Center, Busch Campus Center, Student Activities Center, Zimmerli Art Museum, Liberty Street/Rockoff Hall, and Douglass Campus Center.

During previous Rutgers Days, this loop was often bogged down in the n0torious George Street traffic. 

A feeder bus route from “Livingston Plaza” (somewhere not too far from Lucy Stone Hall and the Livingston Student Center, apparently), to the Busch Campus Center, has joined this loop.

Rutgers University got City Council approval to close Hamilton Street, between College Avenue and George Street, and Senior Street, between College Avenue and Sicard Street.  A parade is being held this morning featuring Rutgers University’s Marching Band and golf-cart floats.

Rain is expected from 2-3 pm onwards, leading to the potential for disruption from the weather. In addition, the ground is already soaked and muddy from the downpour last night.