A Bit of History…
Welcome to New Haven! Founded by English Puritans in 1638, New Haven is known as the Elm City, so called for the many elm trees that were planted on the downtown green in 1686. New Haven is the first planned city in America and was originally designed in a “nine-square plan,” with its famed New Haven Green as the central square (Source). Check out the drawing below of New Haven from 1641.
New Haven began as a farming town but quickly evolved into an industrial center, claiming Eli Whitney (yep, that guy who invented the cotton gin) among its prominent industrialists. As you will learn when you arrive here and begin to explore the city’s offerings, there is a wealth of restaurants and shops and museums and theatre to discover. Don’t worry, we’ll cover a lot more detail on all of that culture in future posts!
At the center of modern-day New Haven’s industry sits Yale University, the city’s largest employer and a central part of the city’s economy. Officially chartered in 1701, Yale (then called the Collegiate School) was founded to be a place “wherein Youth may be instructed in the Arts and Sciences (and) through the blessing of Almighty God may be fitted for Publick employment both in Church and Civil State.” In 1718, the school was re-named Yale College after Elihu Yale, who donated some money, books and a portrait of King George (Source). Must have been quite a portrait of old George!
Yale’s mascot is the English Bulldog Handsome Dan. The first Handsome Dan was purchased for $5 from a local blacksmith in 1889 to compete with Princeton’s (real) tiger cub mascot and Harvard’s “orange man” mascot, meant to represent John Harvard somehow. Whatevs, Harvard!
Yale is now on its 18th Handsome Dan. Here’s a pic of him when he was just a little puppy last year…. awwww…… I could go on about Yale and New Haven history/fun facts so I’ll stop here – but feel free to google and you will also learn more during BTFO!Getting Around
There are many ways to get into, out of and around New Haven. Your first stop in figuring out your transportation options (other than reading this blog, obviously!) is Yale’s Transportation Options webpage. There you will find links to all sorts of information about how to get in, out and around our fair city.
Airport transport
Need to find a way from Bradley Airport in Hartford to New Haven that’s cheaper than Lyft? Check out the page’s Fly tab which has links to airport shuttle services and more.
Trains 
Looking for info on how to get to/from New York City? The Train tab has links to Metro North (to NYC) as well as links for the Shoreline East line (to eastern CT) and the new Hartford Line rail service that just started up recently. Amtrak is available too! All trains come in and out of Union Station (and some out of State Street Station), located downtown.
Yale Shuttle and Public Transit
As for getting around New Haven itself, the Yale Shuttle will take you almost everywhere on the Yale campus, which stretches from the Divinity School to the north, down to the Medical School in the south and out to Yale West campus, in West Haven. It’s totally FREE and you don’t have to show your ID to ride. You will learn more about the shuttle when you get here, but you can download the TransLoc app to see the many shuttle routes, maps and live shuttle tracking.
For public transit off of campus (and from New Haven to other cities), check out CT Transit’s page with details about schedules, maps and fares for their bus system which serves New Haven and most of western CT.
Walking and Biking
New Haven is also a great city for walking and biking. Not only can you walk downtown from YDS in about 10-15 minutes, but Yale also hosts a bike share program and keeps an updated online map of the many bike racks and bike repair locations throughout campus (including at YDS).
Driving and Parking
For those with cars who will be living in the YDS student apartments, there was info about parking in the letter you received about your housing. For those living off campus near YDS or in East Rock, there’s a fair amount of street parking available if your housing does not include parking. Downtown there are metered spaces as well as a plethora of parking garages (More info on Park New Haven’s site).
For car-less folks, there is Zipcar, which is an hourly car rental service that you can use to go grocery shopping, run errands, etc. There’s a Zipcar location with 4 cars right next to YDS at 393 Prospect St. And of course, Uber and Lyft are ever-present here in New Haven to ferry you around as needed.
Next post: Yale-at-large: learning all the stuff that’s available to you as a Yale student!