Best Cambridge College For Engineering?

Hello all,
The Cambridge college system confuses me a bit. I applied for a MPhil in Engineering and put down Christ's as first choice, Trinity as second. I am unsure if this was the right decision.
I see we can request a college preference change before given admission and I've been on "under review by department" for over a month since my interview so don't know what's up with that.
Anyways, is my college preference fine? In terms of proximity to engineering buildings and getting around centrally, are these good choices? What else to keep in mind when choosing college?
Thanks

Hello all,

The Cambridge college system confuses me a bit. I applied for a MPhil in Engineering and put down Christ's as first choice, Trinity as second. I am unsure if this was the right decision.

I see we can request a college preference change before given admission and I've been on "under review by department" for over a month since my interview so don't know what's up with that.

Anyways, is my college preference fine? In terms of proximity to engineering buildings and getting around centrally, are these good choices? What else to keep in mind when choosing college?

Thanks

Depending which particular area of engineering you're focusing on you may spend more time on the west sites than centrally. Different bits of engineering have been moving over to the west sites across the last 10 years or so, to newer, bigger, and fancier buildings. However the west sites is fairly accessible with regular buses and also by cycling as I understand (which unsurprisingly seems to be the most popular method of transport to and from the west sites).
In any event for postgrad applications college preference is just that, a preference. Admissions are determined by the department and then confirmed by the college (seemingly a reverse of undergraduate applications) and if your preferenced choices are unable to accommodate you, as I understand you are just assigned more or less randomly to another college. There's no guarantee you'll be placed in either of your preferences.
If you're happy with your preferences (recognising you may well end up at an entirely different college) there's no call to change them. If your application is under review by the department then changing your college preference seems unlikely to impact this as it would be the department the application is sat with.

I understand changing college won't impact the rate they make a decision, I mention it's "under review" so I am likely not getting a decision that soon, meaning I have time to change. As for my engineering, I'm in electrical engineering.

CAPE is on the west sites so I imagine you'll probably be more out there at least in terms of research? Teaching (lectures) may still be central though.

Someone said to consider Churchill for west site, do you agree? What college do you recommend on the west side?

Churchill and Fitzwilliam are closest but even the central sites aren't that far away. Pretty much any college that isn't Homerton isn't overly far. I've walked from town to the west sites and back before, it's a bit of a slog if the weather isn't great but not too bad normally and if you have a bike I imagine pretty quick. Plus there are regular buses.