Why is/did the population decline in Chicago? (Bridgeport: apartment, neighborhoods)

[BonafiedPuertoRican]

I don't understand. Well, I can't really make any judgments because I don't live there, but, Chicago seems like such a great city! More affordable than NY and just as much to do. Why is/did the population declining?

[Chicagoist123]

Originally Posted by BonafiedPuertoRican

I don't understand. Well, I can't really make any judgments because I don't live there, but, Chicago seems like such a great city! More affordable than NY and just as much to do. Why is/did the population declining?

Mostly due to two reasons:

1. Chicago has been gentrifying, so the poor are moving out. The poor are REALLY moving out. Things like the projects were torn down and that made a lot of poor people move from the city. A lot of these poor people also had larger households (think 3-4 people per apartment).

2. The people thare moving into to Chicago are mostly younger, professional and most cases single or smaller families.

So basically, the poor are moving out. So let's say a head of household of a poor family has a family four. Well they move out and there goes four, and then on the other end you have someone moving into the city, young professional, however they are only one and by themselves.

Another issues to is while I have seen improvement in this, a lot of these young professionals move to the city, when they finally do have children, they move out to the suburbs to raise their kids.

So the decline really has nothing to do with Chicago being a bad city or anything like that, but more so that there is a shift in demographics.

[Attrill]

Originally Posted by Chicagoist123

Mostly due to two reasons:
Things like the projects were torn down and that made a lot of poor people move from the city.

About 20,000 public housing units were destroyed per court order, so that was certainly one factor.

The NYT has a good interactive tool that shows the population loss down to the census tract level. You can see some tracts south of Loop along the Dan Ryan that lost most of their population. Those are the ones most affected by the changes in public housing (they lost as much as 88% of their residents). If you look at parts of Logan Square, West Town, and Bridgeport you can see areas that had much smaller decreases - Wicker Park saw the same thing in 2000 and then saw an increase in the 2010 census.

[ChiNaan]

Originally Posted by Chicagoist123

Mostly due to two reasons:

1. Chicago has been gentrifying, so the poor are moving out. The poor are REALLY moving out. Things like the projects were torn down and that made a lot of poor people move from the city. A lot of these poor people also had larger households (think 3-4 people per apartment).

2. The people thare moving into to Chicago are mostly younger, professional and most cases single or smaller families.

This is correct, though those are really two sides of the same reason.

Originally Posted by Attrill

About 20,000 public housing units were destroyed per court order, so that was certainly one factor.

That would be the real second reason.

[ChiNaan]

Originally Posted by Chicagoist123

Mostly due to two reasons:

1. Chicago has been gentrifying, so the poor are moving out. The poor are REALLY moving out. Things like the projects were torn down and that made a lot of poor people move from the city. A lot of these poor people also had larger households (think 3-4 people per apartment).

2. The people thare moving into to Chicago are mostly younger, professional and most cases single or smaller families.

This is correct, though I wouldn't say those are two separate reasons, just two sides of the same coin.

[emathias]

The vast majority of Chicago's population decline is explained through demographic shifts in household sizes. Only since 2000 has the loss of poor families been a significant part of the explanation. If you look at number of households in the city of Chicago, it rose in every census except the 2010 one, when it declined slightly.

[Alacran]

Wtf is a professional?

A person that cleans elephant **** at the zoo is a professional at that

[Irishtom29]

Originally Posted by Alacran

Wtf is a professional?

A person that cleans elephant **** at the zoo is a professional at that

A couple visited the elephant walk at the circus and observed a worker cleaning up the elephant dung while bitterly cursing the nature of his job.

"If you dislike the job so why don't you quit?" the husband asked.

The worker gave them an incredulous look and replied "What, and leave Show Business?!?"

[Chicagoist123]

Although didn't Chicago see a bump in population from 2010-2012, or more so some "estimates" have suggested that?

[Ace Rothstein]

In addition to what has already been mentioned, you have the bombed out neighborhoods like Garfield Park and Englewood, amongst others, that were responsible for the large drops from the late 60's through the early 90's.