Mount Prospect - Downtown Area and Family Living (Chicago, Arlington: lenders, how much)

[CDI]

What is Mount Prospect like as a suburb for young families? (Particularly neigborhoods around the downtown area like Lions Park, Country Club, Triangle, etc.) Also, I know Mt. Prospect's downtown area will never be as large as Arlington Height's, but do you think Mt. Prospect's downtown will grow and develop over the next several years?

[chet everett]

The downtown development is a wild card -- the window of change may be shutting a bit, compared to the scope of change in DesPlaines it is very dramatic. The developers got a lot of help from the city of DP and must have hit the right lenders for some serious cash. MP was not as lucky to hit things right, but time will tell what can be achieved. It is was never as bad a DP and they still have some pluses by NOT having manufacturing so close to deal with.

Personally I think Arlignton Heights has "over urbanized" and I think more than a few people are going to regret just how much thru traffic there is not just at rush hour but all_day_long... They have a bunch more railroad grade crossing, which is a plus in some ways, but can also lead to more cross traffic.

Mt. Prospect does not have as good a lay out of downtown streets as DP or AH with respect to the parking lots and "triangle blocks" -- DP really worked hard to get better realignment and frontage for the tenants. I think that will make it harder for MP to get as nice a mix downtown.

That said the town in general has some great parks, the neighborhoods have a lot to like as far as quiet tree lined streets and the schools are mostly good. The rec center is too far south, but that was a compromise made a long time ago. The biggest drawback for "young family's" may be that there has been such a long run up in prices that majority of house that are not sky high now have some negatives such as fronting a busy street -- certainly nothing unique to MP about that. I can't think of single town in Chicagoland where traffic is not a big negative.

[rose125]

Well it was rated #1 place in the nation to raise children by Business week.. so they must be doing something right.