When originally built in 1851, the Minneapolis campus overlooked the Falls of Saint Anthony on the Mississippi River, but it was later moved about a mile downstream to its current location.
Today's campus has buildings on both banks of the river, but the East Bank is the main portion of the campus. It contains six residence halls (the University administration believes the terms "dorm" and "dormitory" have negative connotations), and four of them are concentrated into a 4-city-block space known as the "Superblock." Next to the Superblock is a large medical complex that used to be operated by the University, but has since been sold off to Fairview Health Services, which operates a network of hospitals in Minnesota.
The historical center of the Minneapolis campus is Northrop Mall, a green space located about four blocks away from the Superblock. Several of the campus's primary buildings surround the Mall. Northrop Auditorium is to the north, and Coffman Memorial Union to the south. Four of the larger buildings on the sides of the Mall are the primary Mathematics, Physics, and Chemistry buildings, and Walter Library, which has recently been renovated to focus more on digital media rather than the printed word.
Additionally, the East Bank has a few buildings with unique architecture worth mentioning. One of the oldest buildings on campus is the Pillsbury Hall, built out of varieties of sandstone available in Minnesota. It has a unique color that is hard to capture in a photograph. In more recent times, Frank Gehry designed the Weisman Art Museum. It is a small example of his work with curving metallic structures.
The West Bank of the campus has been growing rapidly, first seeing major development in the 1960s. Music, theater, and art students can not pass through the University without spending a significant amount of time there. In addition to the arts, social science is a big area of research on the West Bank. The business school call the West Bank home, as does the University's law school. Wilson Library, the largest library in the University system, is also located there.
Students traveling between the East and West Banks will most likely use the Washington Avenue Bridge either on foot or via bus. This bridge is unique because it has two separate decks. The lower deck carries automobile traffic, while the upper deck is a pedestrian walkway. An enclosed walkway runs the length of the bridge, sheltering students from the wind, rain, and snow as they cross the Mississippi.
There are some subterranean passageways that students use to get from building to building when the Minnesota weather is too harsh to deal with. It is an ungangly network of circuitous routes that are confusing and don't always connect. Many people don't even know they exist. However, in recent years, effort has been made to map out these tunnels, and directions are now marked with signs reading, "The Gopher Way".
The Minneapolis campus is located near two interstate highways: I-94 and I-35W. It is bordered on the north by the Dinkytown neighborhood and by the Stadium Village neighborhood on the east.
The University's St. Paul campus is actually located north of the city of St. Paul, surrounded by the suburb of Falcon Heights. The campus is primarily associated with agriculture, and there is a significant amount of farmland maintained nearby.
The St. Paul campus also borders the Minnesota Fairgrounds, where the Minnesota State Fair is held every year. Minnesota's Fair is one of the largest in the United States, usually lasting about 10 days through Labor Day. Because of the heavy traffic associated with the Fair, classes do not start on campus until the day after Labor Day. This is also a rule that generally applies to Minnesota's public schools.
Sports teams associated with the Twin Cities campus of the University of Minnesota go by the Golden Gophers moniker. Most of the facilities that the teams use for training and competitive play are located on the East Bank of the Minneapolis campus. There are arenas for male and female basketball as well as hockey.
There used to be a football stadium on campus, but the football team started playing at the Metrodome near downtown Minneapolis once it was constructed. The former campus stadium was torn down and the area has since been developed with other University buildings. As of 2003, there is major ongoing discussion trying to determine if a new stadium can be built on campus.
The Twin Cities campus has a newspaper as well as a radio station. The newspaper is The Minnesota Daily, which is printed each weekday during the normal school season. The paper claims to be the largest student-run paper in the United States. It was first published on May 1, 1900. The Daily is operated by an organization of students, not by the university.
The campus radio station is KUOM "Radio K" and broadcasts during the day on 770 kHz AM as well as at night on 106.5 MHz FM. The station first went on the air on AM in 1993, and started broadcasting on FM in 2003. However, because the station only broadcasts on AM during daylight hours and because the nighttime FM signal is very weak (8 watts), Radio K additionally streamss content over the Internet.
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