Hookahs, late-night coffee bars and organic markets were among the suggestions for Catonsville and Arbutus from a recent survey of staff, students and faculty at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

"I know some people haven't heard of a hookah since reading Alice in Wonderland," said Lisa Akchin, assistant to University of Maryland, Baltimore County, President Freeman Hrabowski. "But it's a current trend."

She spoke to members of the Arbutus Business and Professional Association's economic development committee during a March 27 meeting in the basement of Paul's Restaurant in Arbutus.

Akchin said the university received multiple requests for a hookah bar -- a place where customers eat and chat around a communal, table-top smoking device filled with flavored tobacco -- were among the 1,415 responses to the online survey on what kinds of businesses should be developed in Arbutus and Catonsville.

The ABPA and the Greater Catonsville Chamber of Commerce partnered with the university to create the 17-question online survey, which was sent out in an e-mail to the university community on Feb. 23.

The purpose was to gauge the best way for the two towns to tap the economic power of the university community, ABPA leaders said.

Akchin, who will make a similar presentation on the survey to the Catonsville chamber in coming weeks, said she hopes the results will help "maximize the synergy between the campus, the town center in Arbutus and the town center in Catonsville in terms of economic development."

She said the university has, in the last few years, earned status as a "solidly residential campus," with 75 percent of freshmen living there.

The survey showed "a lot of interest on our campus in off-campus shopping, dining and entertainment options," she said.

In addition to a hookah bar, interest was shown in a variety of new businesses.

Respondents said they would most likely use casual restaurants, a discount gas station, a used bookstore, a bakery and an Internet coffee cafe.

One even requested a "non-alcoholic nightclub that specifically targets the (17- to 21-year-old) crowd."

They specifically asked for college-oriented bars, late-night coffee venues, markets such as Whole Foods and Trader Joe's, clothing stores and franchises such as Starbucks and Chipotle.

They also asked for restaurants that serve ethnic foods, which makes sense considering the university is home to students from almost 200 different countries, Akchin said.

Of the school's 12,268 graduate and undergraduate students, 880 undergraduate students and 193 graduate students responded to the survey.

Of the 1,610 faculty and staff members, 245 staff members and 96 faculty members responded.

Just one person responded from 1,250 who work at companies at the bwtech@UMBC research center, which also received the survey.

Because the 1,415 responses amount to a response rate of only about 10 percent, Akchin said it would be more appropriate to look at the survey results as a "conversation with 1,400 people" rather than as a scientific data pool.

Still, the results are valuable, she said.

The survey found that while 71 percent of respondents were familiar with the location of Arbutus and 85 percent were familiar with the location of Catonsville, some stayed away from the towns because they found them unattractive, unappealing or unsafe.

Undergraduate and graduate students who live within five miles of the campus reported shopping or dining in the two towns the most, with 46 percent of those undergraduates and 42 percent of those graduate students reporting doing so every day.

In comparison, 67 percent of undergraduates and 55 percent of graduate students who live on campus reported visiting the two towns fewer than three times a week; 74 percent of university staff members and 83 percent of faculty members reported the same.

Close to 25 percent of all respondents reported their weekly budget for off-campus meals and entertainment to be between $20 and $29, while 20 percent reported it to be between $11 and $19 and about 17 percent reported it to be under $10.

More than half of the respondents reported having access to a car and a substantial percentages reported never using the UMBC Transit shuttle to get to the campus -- despite the fact that university transit officials have reported the shuttle lines to the two towns have increased in popularity recently.

More than 80 percent of all respondents said they would be somewhat or very likely to use a bike path to get to the Arbutus town center, and one respondent requested a similar path be built between the university campus and Catonsville.

One respondent reported being unaware that so many places in the two towns accepted the Red Card, a university-based debit card.

Brian Frazee, a UMBC sophomore and Akchin's community and governmental relations assistant who helped work on the survey and who attended the meeting, suggested the group use the online social networking site facebook.com to advertise to students.

He said before walking down the street to get to Paul's that morning, he hadn't known that the Hollywood Theater, which is next to Paul's, even existed.

With a little advertising, local business leaders could draw more students into town without building a thing, he said.

Business leaders at the meeting said they would focus on making Arbutus seem more attractive and safe, and on expanding their advertising efforts to make students more aware of what's already available in the town.

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