University of Illinois campus tour: the Main Quad and Green Street

The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign was founded in 1867 as one of the land-grant universities created to teach agriculture and engineering alongside the traditional subjects. It grew into one of the great public research universities of the United States, and it did so in an unlikely spot: two small neighbouring cities surrounded by the flat farmland of central Illinois. This guide covers the main sights, how student life is organised and how to get there.

The shape of the campus

The campus straddles the boundary between Champaign, to the west, and Urbana, to the east, and it runs a long way from north to south. In walking order:

The engineering campus: north of Green Street, around its own quad.
The Main Quad: the historic centre, between Green Street and the Main Library.
The South Quad: a second long lawn beyond the library, with a modern bell tower and the agriculture buildings.
The sports area: Memorial Stadium and the arena, to the south-west.

Green Street, which cuts across the campus from west to east, is the main commercial street.

The Alma Mater and Altgeld Hall

Start at the corner of Green and Wright streets, the traditional front door. Here stands the Alma Mater, a bronze group by the sculptor Lorado Taft, himself a graduate, unveiled in 1929. A robed woman opens her arms in welcome, with two figures representing Learning and Labor clasping hands behind her. New graduates queue to be photographed with her.

Directly behind is Altgeld Hall, a rugged stone building of the 1890s with a square bell tower. It was built as the university library and is now home to the mathematics department. Its chimes ring out over the quad during the day.

The Main Quad

The Main Quad is a long rectangle of lawn crossed by diagonal paths and lined with brick and stone buildings in a mix of styles. Two buildings close its ends:

The Illini Union, at the north end, opened in 1941. It looks like an outsized Georgian mansion with a white cupola, and it is the student centre, with places to eat, lounges and hotel rooms upstairs.
Foellinger Auditorium, at the south end, dates from 1907. Its copper dome and columned front make it the most recognisable building on campus. Inside is a large lecture hall that doubles as a concert venue.

Along the sides are the buildings where much of the teaching in the humanities and sciences takes place, including Lincoln Hall and the chemistry laboratories.

The Main Library and the Morrow Plots

Just south of the quad, the Main Library is a handsome brick building of the 1920s. It holds one of the largest collections of any public university in the country.

Beside the library is one of the more surprising sights on any campus: a small field of crops surrounded by university buildings. These are the Morrow Plots, established in 1876 and the oldest experimental agricultural fields in the United States. They have been cultivated continuously ever since, and they are so valued that a neighbouring library was built underground to avoid casting a shadow on the corn.

The engineering campus

North of Green Street, the Bardeen Quad is the centre of one of the best-known engineering schools in the world. The quad is named after John Bardeen, a professor here who won the Nobel Prize in Physics twice. Grainger Engineering Library closes its north end, with the Beckman Institute, an interdisciplinary research centre, beyond.

Illinois has a long record in computing. The first popular graphical web browser was written at the university's supercomputing centre in 1993.

Arts and sport

In Urbana, a few blocks east of the Main Quad, the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts has several theatres and concert halls under one roof. The university also has an art museum and a museum of world cultures.

Memorial Stadium, opened in 1923, is dedicated to the university's dead of the First World War; their names are carved on the columns along its sides. It is home to Fighting Illini football. Next to it is a striking saucer-shaped arena from the 1960s, where basketball is played. The university's colours are orange and blue.

Student life and Green Street

Undergraduates live in university residence halls on both the Champaign and Urbana sides of campus, and in flats, fraternity and sorority houses in the streets around it. The stretch of Green Street west of the quad, known as Campustown, is the everyday centre of student life, with restaurants, cafés, bars and shops. Downtown Champaign, about a kilometre and a half further west, has a wider choice of places to eat, and downtown Urbana, to the east, is quieter and more old-fashioned.

Arranging a visit

Like most universities, Illinois typically offers campus tours and admissions presentations for prospective students, and the quads are open to walk on your own. Schedules vary through the year, so check the university's official visitor page for what is currently available.

Getting there and around

By car: Champaign is a little over two hours south of Chicago by interstate, and about two hours from Indianapolis.
By train: trains from Chicago stop at the station in downtown Champaign, a short bus or taxi ride from campus.
By coach: coaches link the campus with Chicago and its airports.
By air: a small regional airport south of town has limited flights; most visitors fly to Chicago.
On campus: local buses run frequently along the main streets, and the central campus is easily walked.

Areas families usually choose

On or beside campus: a small number of hotels, including rooms in the student union, within walking distance of the quad.
Downtown Champaign: close to the station and to restaurants.
North Champaign, near the interstate: the largest choice of chain hotels, a short drive away.

Rooms are scarce on football weekends, at graduation and when students move in.

Tips for a smoother day

Start at the Alma Mater, walk the Main Quad to Foellinger, see the Morrow Plots, then head north for the engineering campus and finish on Green Street.
Winters are cold and windy on the open prairie; dress warmly.
Touring the Midwest? See our guides to Northwestern, the University of Chicago and UW–Madison.
Check the university's visitor page again shortly before you travel, as arrangements change.

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Cover photo: Beyond My Ken, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons