Living in Troy, and what moving here is actually like
The best nineteenth-century streetscape in the region, and the narrowest staircases. Both halves of the same fact.
Troy, New York sits on the east bank of the Hudson across from Watervliet and north of Albany, and is known for one of the best-preserved nineteenth-century downtowns in the United States, RPI, and a Saturday farmers market that closes the streets. Its historic housing stock means narrow rowhouses, steep staircases and tight street parking, which makes moving in harder than in the surrounding suburbs.
What Troy is like
Troy kept its nineteenth century in a way almost nowhere else did. The downtown is largely intact brick and cast iron, close enough to the river to feel like a river city, and small enough to cross on foot. Film crews come here when they need a period American street and do not want to build one.
It has RPI up the hill, a serious Saturday farmers market that takes over the streets, and a food and music scene that punches above the size of the city. It is also, block for block, more variable than Albany: streets change character quickly, and the difference between two addresses a few minutes apart is real.
The housing, and what it means on moving day
Most of what people want in Troy is a nineteenth-century rowhouse or an apartment carved out of one. That is the appeal and it is also the whole difficulty.
- Staircases are narrow, steep, and usually turn at least once. The turn is what stops furniture, not the width.
- Many buildings have no elevator and never will, so an upper apartment is a genuine walk-up.
- Doorways and hallways are narrower than modern standard, and the door frames in a historic building are not the kind you force a sofa past.
- Street parking is tight, and on a market Saturday parts of downtown are closed entirely.
- Some blocks have no off-street parking at all, so the truck sits on the street and the carry is longer than you would guess.
None of that is a reason not to live here. It is a reason to measure your sofa and to tell whoever is moving you the truth about the staircase before the day.
The measurement that actually matters
People measure doorways. Doorways are rarely the problem. What decides whether a large item gets upstairs in a Troy rowhouse is the diagonal clearance at the turn in the staircase, and the height of the ceiling above that turn.
If you are buying furniture for a Troy apartment, buy things that come apart. Bed frames, modular sofas and apartment-packed wardrobes exist for exactly this housing stock. A one-piece three-seat sofa is the classic thing that gets carried up, fails at the landing, and goes back down again.
The student calendar
RPI shapes the rental market here the way the university shapes Pine Hills in Albany. Leases cluster, late August is intense, and the streets below the campus are at their busiest in the same ten days as everywhere else in the region.
If your Troy move is in late August, that is the moment to book early rather than the moment to shop around.
Getting around
Troy is close to almost everything in the Capital Region. Watervliet is straight across the river, which happens to be where we are based. Albany is a short drive south, Schenectady is west, and Saratoga Springs is a straightforward run north.
That proximity is a real part of the case for living here: you can have a walkable historic downtown and still be a quarter of an hour from the region's employers.
Common questions
Living in Troy, and what moving here is actually like: the short answers
It suits people who want a walkable historic downtown, an independent food and music scene and older architecture, and who are not looking for a driveway and a lawn. It varies noticeably block by block, so it is worth walking a street before committing to it.
Its nineteenth-century downtown, which is among the best preserved in the country and is regularly used as a film location, along with RPI and the Saturday farmers market.
Harder than a suburban house, yes. Narrow turning staircases, no elevators and tight street parking are the usual combination. It is very manageable with a crew that knows the housing stock, and it is what defeats a self-move.
A short drive south along the river, and closer still to Watervliet directly across it. Most of the Capital Region is within about half an hour.
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