Worcester
Worcester Union Station
About Worcester
The City of Worcester – a five-time recipient of the All America City Award – is located in the heart of Massachusetts. As New England’s second largest city, with a population of 185,000, Worcester combines the historic charm of a small town with the conveniences and attractions of a thriving metropolis.
Centrally located, Worcester is 45 minutes west of Boston and north of Providence, Rhode Island. Home to the newly renovated DCU Center Arena and Convention Center, Worcester also offers a myriad of unique venues for meetings, conventions, and all types of events, along with a number of boutique and branded hotel properties.
Worcester boasts 10 colleges and universities and 60-plus parks, as well as picturesque Lake Quinsigamond, host to competitive rowing championships, such as the Eastern Sprints and U.S. Rowing Masters.
With more than 70 cultural venues, including world-class museums, concert halls, theatres, and delicious eateries, Worcester offers visitors plenty to do and see in this central location with convenient access to all of New England. An innovative city with a rich history, Worcester has emerged as a leader in education, health care, biotechnology and life sciences, and financial services, with more than 5,000 businesses located in the city.
About Worcester (retrieved from: http://www.destinationworcester.org/worcester/)
Fast Facts
Population in 2014: 183,016 (100% urban, 0% rural)
Population change since 2000: +6.0%
Median Resident Age: 32.7 years
Estimated median household income in 2013: $45,011 (compared to MA: $66,768)
Estimated per capita income in 2013: $23,626
(retrieved from: http://www.city-data.com/city/Worcester-Massachusetts.html)
"Long a College Town, Worcester Now Looks the Part" (New York Times, 2015)
"Although College of the Holy Cross was founded here in 1843, and eight other prominent institutions of higher learning followed, it has taken most of the last two centuries for this sizable New England city to consider itself a college town. It does now. From one end of the city’s 245-acre central core to the other, Worcester is attending to the 35,000 college students who study and live here, and its primary boulevards are steadily filling up with the civic amenities that attract new residents. They include a busy public transit hub, comfortable and affordable housing, new restaurants and watering holes, computer stores and coffee shops, a performing arts theater, biotech research facilities, incubators and office space for start-up companies, and renovated parks — including one alongside City Hall with an ice rink larger than the one in Rockefeller Center. The newest project in Worcester’s revitalization portfolio is CitySquare, a $565 million, 12-acre mixed-use development just east of City Hall. It replaces a two-story, one-million-square-foot downtown shopping mall that took up almost 10 percent of Worcester’s central business district."
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