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There are no places on my current university's campus that are open 24 hours
At the first university I attended, the student center was open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Sure, the vendors weren't open, but at least the building was. You could actually crash there if you wanted.
All the computer labs were also open 24/7. And one of the libraries had a corner that was open 24/7.
Also, my department had its own lounge, and even its own undergrad lounge. You could crash in the undergrad lounge too.
At the second university I attended, the student center was open until 1 AM except on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights on which it was open until 3 AM.
However, my department had its own lounge, which was kept closed on weekends though you'd have a key if you were a student. You could crash in the lounge if you really wanted to, though just be aware that someone would come and open the door if you were there on a weekday morning. Still, it had two longer sofas, and a comfy reclining armchair on which you could crash. (Heck, I once slept on one of the tables.)
The computer lab in the student center would close with the student center, but the main library was open 24/7. Can't exactly crash there very easily, but at least you can go in anytime to study.
At my current university, the student center closes at midnight or 1 AM on weekday nights and maybe an hour later on weekends. Computer labs close earlier than that. And my department doesn't have its own lounge, apart from a few chairs in the hallway.
Comments
Wait, there are universities that have spots open 24/7?
Some have libraries that are like that provided you have a pass.
I think I can get into the building housing my department's offices anytime, but those are just offices, not even any study space other than a few chairs in the hallway.
This is just a guess, but did any of those schools you mentioned have closed campuses? I would think that it might be easier for them to have 24 hour stuff since they would not need to worry as much about people coming in from outside the school. Maybe the school without 24 hour things is worried about crime rates around campus or had previous "incidents" or something when they did allow late night access.
Anywho, it seems like it would be nice to have 24 hour campus access, but hopefully you will be able to plan stuff out well enough that it will not become a problem to not have it.
My undergrad place had a semi-open campus. The main bunch of academic buildings were always accessible after dark, but only from a limited number of doorways--the main entrance always works, but some side doors are locked. However, some buildings, such as the Tower of Earth, Stars, and Winds and the Alchemy Laboratory, are inaccessible unless the lock system recognizes your ID card as one with entry permissions.
(Okay, those aren't the names, but I like them more.)
Anyone can get onto outdoor campus grounds anytime (except for those surrounded by buildings).
Most dorms and the student center are across a major street from campus. The dorms also each have their own separate buildings, despite being located in a row, along with a few frat houses. (Only a pair of adjacent dorms are connected via underground tunnel, mostly because one of them has a convenience store in the basement.) The dorms require visitors to sign in and be taken in by a resident.
Now this place was located on the banks of a river across from a major city in New England. Still urban, but not insanely dense.
The second place I talked about is a nearly-closed campus, located on Manhattan Island in New York City. After hours, you need keycard access to get into most buildings. The buildings are themselves tightly squeezed into a relatively small six-street-blocks-by-one-avenue-block area, and surrounded by fences; all fence gates are open during the day but all but two of them are closed at night. In fact, even building exits that go directly out to the street are closed at night--you can't even leave the building through them!
You can go around outdoors without keycard access, though you can't do much else. Same applies to the weekends. Now, with a card, you can access all the general-purpose buildings.
The main library is an odd exception: You technically don't need a card to physically get through the entrance detector thingy...but there's a security guard there who will watch you and will ask you to swipe your card. That building is open 24 hours a day, and has 24-hour security.
The undergrad dorms are, along with a few more buildings, on a nearby smaller "bloc of blocks" that is accessible via skybridge from the main campus bloc. I think similar rules apply; there's one gate that's closed after dark, though I haven't personally tried any direct-onto-street exits. For these dorms, visitors need not only be signed in and escorted by a resident, but front desk also holds visitors' ID cards.
Both of my colleges had the library and computer lab open 24/7 during dead week and finals week. The library would usually let you hang around after hours outside of that as long as you had student ID.
My undergrad had one of the libraries open 24 hours during the week. My current university I'm not sure about though.
^^ I think I have some sort of official scheduling like that. As opposed to actually trying to stay in the libraries after hours...I haven't actually tried pushing it yet...
SJSU has a 7-11 across the street, and the library is open 24 hours during finals week.