Oak Park vs Evanston? (Chicago, Schaumburg: condos, travel, income)

[fiestymama]

Both have been reccommended to me as liberal and family friendly suburbs that would be an easy commute. Taxes in the area are much higher than we're used to in WA, so I'm guessing we would have around $600,000 or a little more to spend on a house. We would like good schools, easy commute to the city, and liberal atmosphere and hopefully some diversity. Thoughts on which is better, or other suburbs we should look at? Husband will also have to do some travel, so good access to airport would be a plus. Thanks.

[sukwoo]

We live in Oak Park, and like it a lot here. Its a very family friendly suburb, comprised mostly of SFH populated with middle to upper middle class professionals. OP is known for being fairly liberal, gay-friendly, and diverse (22% AA) and with an excellent school system. 600K will get you one of the nicer houses in town. I'm not too familiar with Evanston, but what I can tell, its somewhat similar to Oak Park but bigger and with lake front access. Houses in Evanston will be pricier than Oak Park.

The major drawback of Oak Park is its proximity to some not very nice parts of Chicago (to the east). As a result, our crime rate is higher than some are comfortable with (although the vast majority of crime is non-violent, property crime). You can mostly avoid this risk by living in western Oak Park (most people say west of Ridgeland Ave).

Airport access is excellent. Its probably 30-40 minutes at most to both O'hare and Midway even when traffic is bad.

[fiestymama]

Thanks for the info. Oak Park sounds nice, I'd like to get more info on Evanston too. Any other liberal suburbs I should consider?

[ahava]

Originally Posted by fiestymama

Thanks for the info. Oak Park sounds nice, I'd like to get more info on Evanston too. Any other liberal suburbs I should consider?

La Grange. At 88% white it may not meet your diversity requirement, but it fits your other criteria perfectly. The Metra trip to downtown is 25 mins (less on an express train), and La Grange is located equidistant from O'Hare and Midway. The schools are better than in Oak Park and Evanston too.

[kewpie1957]

I grew up in Evanston and also lived very close to Oak Park just before I got married. I would definitely reccomend Evanston over Oak Park and not just because I'm from Evanston. Oak Park, as has been mentioned here is very close to the west side of Chicago. Quite frankly, I don't want to be on the west side unless I am in a car moving pretty fast. The crime index in Oak Park is higher because of this proximity and that's unfortunate because OP really is a cool, kind of eclectic town. Evanston has good schools, diversity of race, religion and income. Lots of trees and for the most part is very clean. Its located close to Lake Michigan and the beaches are all well maintained during the summer. Its a great city for walking and has bike/jogging paths that run for miles along the lake front. As far as liberal...the current mayor is a Black woman and people seem to love her. I've seen bi-racial, gay, black, white people in Evanston and no one seems hung up on that type of stuff. If you want to buy a nice house, admittedly it is going to cost you a pretty penny...Evanston is not cheap. On the other hand, there are some great homes in Oak Park as well...again, not cheap. Evanston has wonderful libraries, Northwestern U., the north side of Chicago which also has Loyola University. There are loads of good restaurants in Evanston. The commute to downtown Chicago can take anywhere from 20 minutes up Lake Shore Drive or 45 minutes on the train to an hour or more depending on the time of day you leave home. The same thing goes for getting to O'Hare airport. It can take you 30 minutes straight up Touhy avenue or about an hour and a half on public transport. Evanston has changed alot since I was a kid. There used to be a Marshall Field's in the downtown area which is now restaurants and condos. Its still a good place but has kind of lost that small town feel it had many years ago. If I had to list a downside to living in Evanston it would have to be that parking isnt all that great in downtown.

Some other nice suburbs of Chicago to consider are Northbrook, Schaumburg, Bollingbrook, Willmette, Winnetka and if you want REALLY high end - Lake Forest.

[sukwoo]

Another option to consider is River Forest. This town is directly west of Oak Park (thus further away from Chicago) but share a common downtown district with OP as well as the same high school. Houses tend to be bigger in RF than OP so 600K will be on the low end in RF.

[kewpie1957]

Silly me...River Forest is where I lived before I got married. Other than living directly across the street from the fire station, it was great.