What are the boundaries of Oak Park/Forest Park/River Forest? And what's FP like? (Chicago: real estate, renter)

[Magpie1127]

Whenever I'm in OP/RF/FP, I can never figure out where I am. One can literally stand at the corner of Harlem and Lake and gaze into downtown Oak Park to their East and River Forest plaza to their west (all while looking up at that big Forest Park water tower). What are the boundaries to these towns, and do you think they are all interconnected? For example, is the majority of Forest Park walkable to OP?

Secondly, what to do you think of Forest Park? While, I'm familiar with Oak Park, not so much with FP. Is it just as nice? It seems like a better deal in terms of home costs...

[cubssoxfan]

Do Forest Park students attend Proviso or Oak Park-River Forest HS, or split? That would be a possible concern. Not as familiar with the k-8 schools.

[oakparkdude]

Originally Posted by cubssoxfan

Do Forest Park students attend Proviso or Oak Park-River Forest HS, or split? That would be a possible concern. Not as familiar with the k-8 schools.

Forest Park goes to Proviso East.

[chet everett]

Originally Posted by cubssoxfan

Do Forest Park students attend Proviso or Oak Park-River Forest HS, or split? That would be a possible concern. Not as familiar with the k-8 schools.

The miserableness of Proviso is well documented and THE MAIN REASON that Forest Park lags far behind Oak Park or River Forest in desirability.

The same situation exists with Berkley, Bellwood, Broadview, Maywood, Hillside and Westchester being served by this miserable excuse for a high schools district. If progress were made toward efforts to address the short comings of this situation it would do much to improve the entire corridor along the Eisenhower but like other "politically motivated" decisions it is all but impossible for ANYONE to actuallly run a campaign that would be successful in getting a sufficiently like-minded BOE elected across so many town, most of which are filled with "low information voters". Efforts to fight sprawl, improve transportation and law enforceent are VERY fragmented in that near west Cook region...

There are some similarities between the "scale" of things in FP and OP or RF, but even if you don't have kids the "panache" that even I have to admit exists in all but the crummiest parts of Oak Park is head and shoulders over even the nicest parts of FP...

[JacksonPanther]

Forest Park is only a "deal" if:
- you don't have kids (cause the schools suck)
- you don't want to or have to resell in a hurry (cause the schools suck, you will have a harder time selling than someone in OP/RF)
- you understand that FP is not as nice as OP/RF - smaller houses, smaller lot sizes
- you want to live close to the Madison St bars

And only a small portion of FP is walkable to anything in OP. Use google maps to show you the boundaries of FP. Most of FP is far away from OP/RF.

[chet everett]

JP: I don't think it was your position that "Oak Park is uniformly lovely no matter where in the 100% delightful town you live" (though I think you know who has said this...) but you can't really say "most of FP is far away from OP" when the two towns share common borders for a solid 1/3 or more of their boundaries...

Don't get me wrong, I totally agree with your highlighted points (though I know I can find a handful of oversized lots in FP to toss against a handful of undersized lots in OP...) but you gotta admit that there are parts of FP that are close to the core than some spots inside OP's border. Of course that still would not make me wanna own something in FP, though for a renter it might be a decent trade off, especially if the rest of your highlighted points are weighed....

Originally Posted by JacksonPanther

Forest Park is only a "deal" if:
- you don't have kids (cause the schools suck)
- you don't want to or have to resell in a hurry (cause the schools suck, you will have a harder time selling than someone in OP/RF)
- you understand that FP is not as nice as OP/RF - smaller houses, smaller lot sizes
- you want to live close to the Madison St bars

And only a small portion of FP is walkable to anything in OP. Use google maps to show you the boundaries of FP. Most of FP is far away from OP/RF.

[Magpie1127]

Man, that's really too bad about the schools being so terrible! I wonder why change isn't happening there, especially with OP and RV being so popular..

That said, my Dad grew up in RV and went to a private school in the area (St. Luke's at first, then a different one later - I can't remember the name of the second one, though), so at least there are other options. Still, buys probably feel that if they're going to shell out for private education, they might as well live in the city.

[chet everett]

People choosing private schools in River Forest are generally doing so the different cultural experience of a parochial school, not about money.

There are paracohial schools available to those who wish to avoid Proviso but in the main it is not a situation where folks would be choosing the city -- it is pretty much that same sort of "value" calculation that cause folks to choose Hinsdale or Winnetka over a similarly priced home in Lincoln Park: the total package is a better value / fit. The modest real estate values in Maywood or Broadview are below that in even really awful parts of Chicago and as bad as Proviso (East or West) is the high schools in Chicago are like 10x worse...

[ToriaT]

It seems to me that the boundaries generally of Oak Park are North Ave to the north, Austin Ave to the east, Roosevelt Rd to the south and Harlem ave to the west. I am no expert on this area so maybe others will chime in.

[Hatchetman]

Oak Park is a rectangle. Not too hard. Forest Park is oddly shaped. You can see it here:

File:Forest Park IL 2009 reference map.gif - Wikimedia Commons