Life in college towns after PhD mandatory coursework

[Exequiel Caceres]

 

I am considering applying to several top schools in college towns and I was wondering if is popular among PhD students to move outside the main area after you complete your required coursework (in my case the first 2 years) and have pure research onwards

As far as I know in cases where the main city is quite near the university, such as Downtown Boston for Harvard and MIT, is quite popular among grad students to move because is actually quite near. However, what about cases where there is a greater distance, for instance:

Do Stanford students move near downtown San Jose or San Francisco?

Do UC Berkeley students move near downtown San Francisco?

Do Northwestern students move near downtown Chicago?

As for Princeton and Yale, although both have some reputation of being relatively close to NYC I am pretty sure graduate students are required to stay in the college town for all the program.