Alex
October 23, 2017 07:56
The way this place is run and maintained makes it feel like someone's basement gym that you're "allowed to use." The apathy on display by the staff quickly leaches into the general vibe of the place. People in general are pretty careless, and the gym's proximity to UMass doesn't help.
Everything is generally dirty, and if you go at night you'll have to deal with hordes of people and power tools. They're really making an effort to keep problems fresh, which is great, but new problems are set at peak hours. I really wonder if it's the larger Rock Spot company that slave drives these people until they're callous husks, or if there's really no oversight, allowing the place to slowly decay into something that only slightly resembles a functioning rock gym.
Bouldering, as others have said, is the primary attraction at this location, but the problems are often inconsistently rated and frequently overlap with one another, further adding to the congestion. From what I've gathered, there are enough VB to V1s to keep the walk-in crowd happy, and spending money, and enough >V6 to keep the place busy, but there's very little in between. "All abilities welcome" is a great slogan, but far accurate.
At the end of the day you probably should only come here if you have a few years under your belt and need a place to boulder, are here for a day pass, or live close by, but otherwise go to one of the other great places in Boston. At a certain point there is no excuse for running anything this poorly, so to management: either let it be a "co-op" or tighten up!