Welcome to the city of Guelph, home of the jockstrap, the wire coat ...

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Welcome to the city of Guelph, home of the jockstrap, the wire coathanger and the very Canadian game of five-pin bowling.
Many of you readers, as students, may not be aware of this, butduring the summertime Guelph becomes a desolate stretch of pavedwasteland, starved of cash flow and youthful vigor.
With a base population of over 106,000 as presented on the City ofGuelph's website the student body by comparison seems staggering.The University's undergraduate student enrollment rate alone is16,561 for Fall 2008, according to the University's website, whichfigures out to just over 15 per cent of Guelph's population isadded or removed with a seasonal rhythm.
There are aspects of this city that thrive on the presence of allthose extra bodies and Guelph, as a University town has come toexpect the yearly return of the young and (possibly) ambitious 15per cent to come back and breathe life back into the city.
The Ontarion is not exempt from this pulse of the coming and going of students.Our production relaxes to bi-weekly in early summer and then diesdown to blank pages when navigating the deep end of July and thedead heat of August.
Though the Guelph Mercury continues on strong, focusing on the pulse of the city, they dorecognize the effect the student presence has.
Phil Andrews, the Mercury 's Managing Editor, was straightforward in this recognition.
"Guelph is a university town. A real volume of our news isgenerated and by student individuals, and the student body as awhole. Guelph is a university town and students really colour thenews in a certain way," said Andrews.
But what is Guelph without the University?
Founded in 1827 by popular Scottish novelist John Galt, Guelph wasoriginally set up as headquarters for the Canada Company, a Britishland development firm invested in the colonization of Upper Canada.
Throughout its long and rich history the city has played host toseveral notable Canadian names: Elinor Glyn, pioneer of the popularerotic novel; Thomas F. Ryan, inventor of five-pin bowling; poetand WWI veteran, John McCrae; Olympic gold medalist Victor Davis;novelist and broadcaster Thomas King. Not to forget the myriad ofother great names who have made Guelph their home.
Since its founding, the City has grown steadily while managing tomaintain as much of a quaint small town feeling as a city can soclose to the Greater Toronto Area. With historic architecture andrich green spaces it's also a city that isn't hard to look at.
Recently, Guelph has made a name for itself as one of the upcomingbig names of admirable Canadian communities. In April 2007, Moneysense magazine rated Guelph fourth in a survey of Canada's best placesto live. We were also recently singled out in the Sept. 8 Maclean's city survey as Canada's most caring city, netting a 69.7 per centvolunteer rate amongst citizens. We also scored a fourth placeranking in the Maclean's survey of Canada's smartest cities.
So does such a grand city even need a university and all thestudents that come with it to stand out above the crowd?
Well, going back to the glib history lesson of Guelph we couldrecognize that the University of Guelph's earliest incarnation asthe Ontario Agricultural College in 1873, giving the University apart in 135 years of Guelph's now 181 years of history.
As Guelph has grown, so too has the University. Now more than everthough it seems that the University and its students are anundeniable part of what informs the city as a whole.
Guelph's ranking as the fourth smartest Canadian city by Maclean's could likely be attributed at least in part to the presence of theUniversity, which ranked this last year as Canada's topcomprehensive University in another Maclean's national survey.
As Guelph's second largest employer (with over 3700 employees),second only to the Linamar corporation (with a staggering 8000+),the University has undeniably entwined itself with the economicwell-being of the city.
But alongside the reputation of the University as a strong culturaland economic influence and partner in the development of the localcommunity, there is also the apprehension in accommodating theyearly influx of almost 20,000 student bodies, especially in thoseparts of town which see the heaviest student traffic.
So how does the city feel about the student presence? Guelph Mayor,Karen Farbridge had two perspectives to offer.
"What I notice as a citizen in this city is that the energy andvibrancy of the community kicks up a notch in September," she said."Certainly some of the excitement of the move in and for peoplecoming in to a new city there's a lot of, um, enthusiasm sometimesin the evenings you do hear a little more about that from theresidents."
The responses are certainly mixed. As a native Guelphite myself,I've certainly heard the mixed bag of comments and accusationsleveled against the University's student body. The harmless passingcomments about inconveniences suffered by motorists at the mercy ofhordes of jaywalking students, noise complaints and questionableeccentricities of more unusual students which upset the good tasteof normal citizens can certainly just be seen as fair play andultimately unthreatening.
Dan Paill