Moving to North Chicago (Wilmette, Lincoln: apartments, lease, crime)

[nessatar]

My family (me, husband, and our 4 daughters) is moving to Chicago in late August/ early September. My husband will be working in Wilmette but we want to live in the city. (Lots of reasons: I want to work for CPS in the near future, diversity, not needing a car, etc.) We need to live in Northern Chicago to make his commute (via train) as easy as possible.

Our friend lives in Rogers Park and likes it. Looking through the threads here, I am not sure that it is the neighborhood for us. When we mentioned looking at Ravenswood, he said he didn't think that was a great area. Again, after looking through the threads here, I am confused!

We are considering Lincoln Square/ Ravenswood/ Andersonville because we have found a few schools that seem good (on paper, anyway), they are affordable (3 bedroom apts for less than $1800/ mo), they seem fairly walkable (I hate driving and do not want to need a car), and their proximity to Wilmette-bound trains.

We don't care at all about nightlife and rarely eat out. If there is a decent grocery store and a farmer's market, our food needs will be met. Really, the schools are the biggest factors for us. (Although I am finding the whole "neighborhood school" thing to be confusing. I have no idea if the apts. I am looking at are in the districts for the schools we like!)

To sum up, I am looking for a little reassurance (or warnings!) that the this area will meet our needs. I've never been outside of the Loop myself and we don't have a lot of time left to decide. I've spent the last month on the 'net and am still as unsure as when I started.

[chet everett]

I think you might want to listen to your friend.

Four kids in any apartment is going to be quite a handful. I don't think I would be exaggerating to say even the most family friendly neighbor will be a challenge given that the City is not ideally run in regard to many things that families expect. Ravenswood has quite a range of offerings, and apartment ads are notorious vague -- upbeat to the point of deception... Similarly, though many people also consider Lincoln Square and Andersonville fairly desirable areas for families, the official boundaries routinely get stretched in ads.

Where are you moving from? Are used to Chicago's weather? Are the kids school age? What grades? Quite a lot to handle.

There are quite a few areas that are going to be more family friendly and if you can afford $1800 you should focus on getting the most you can afford and still be able to get by with a nice short commute for your husband and a most walkable area for yourself. The City has some neighborhoods that are quite literally block-by-block.

YOU MUST get out of the Loop and start really looking at the actual addresses that have vacancies. If you are serious about an apartment you had better be be sure it is safe and close enough to parks,schools, healthcare and shopping to meet your
"car free" desires. Many of the posters hear who are MUCH bigger fans of the City than I routinely decry the distances that they must travel for these things and I do not recall any of them having four kids...

As to schools in Chicago looking good on paper, what paper are you looking at? Generally the tests that Illinois administers to elementary students are pathetically unchallenging. The data is not very telling as to how poor the average experience is... If you have a need to get any of the girls in school for this fall you are likely facing an not good list of options...

Things are much different in the close in Chicago suburbs than you might expect in other regions. If you have not left the Loop you may not be aware that there are quite walkable suburban areas that are in areas such as Wilmette and DesPlaines that may be withing your price range. The schools are far easier to deal with and almost certainly higher performing. The commute for your husband would likely be very acceptable.


I cannot believe that anyone to whom "schools are the biggest factors" would not be focusing on the significant advantages offered to those willing to outside the kingdom of corruption...

[Drover]

So your friend, who lives in Rogers Park, thinks Ravenswood is not a good area. Do I have that right? If so, your friend is at least as confused as you are. I'll grant that Rogers Park definitely has more of that funky urban vibe with enough grit thrown in to give its residents "slummin' it" cred... but given the choice between RP and Ravenswood, I'd pick Ravenswood any day, and I'd gladly pay the 20% rent premium over RP to do it.

[nessatar]

Thank you Drover, that is what I was thinking but I wanted to hear it from someone in the know.

[chet everett]

If the question was "Is Rogers Park better/worse/about the same as Ravenswood?" I think is Drover is mostly accurate, though I would be darn sure that the apartment is NOT "uptown being sold as Ravenswood", in that case Rogers Park probably wins, though there are still quite a few blocks in Rogers Park that are much more gang-bangery than even uptown. Bums are one thing, bullets another.

Being anchored in the Loop is a bad idea. If you are serious about getting a place for you and the four kids you need to be putting on the full court press unless you want to just show up at school that is crap in person, despite look "good on paper anyways".

[nessatar]

I think we will have to agree to disagree on the subject of urban schools. I know a lot of people (most of my family for instance) that feel very strongly that urban schools are all terrible and suburban schools are all wonderful but that has not been our experience. My husband and I were both raised in the suburbs and don't like them or their schools as a general rule. Granted, Chicago will be a new experience for us, but we would rather give it a try. We can always move and/ or disenroll if we hate it. Surely, there are loving, responsible parents intentionally raising their kids in the city?

The schools we are looking at are in Ravenswood and Andersonville. I considered many many factors when narrowing our search to these areas based on schools: test scores compared with the rest of the state with upward trends over the past few years, overall enrollment (prefer a smaller school ie: less than 500 kids in prek-8th), student teacher ratio, and positive feedback from parents whose kids are enrolled in those schools. Our kids go to an urban school now and we like it very much. We made a choice to raise our children in an urban area and use public schools here and we will make the same choice in Chicago.

I used the CPS GIS map to figure out the boundaries for the schools we are interested in and we plan to visit them when we are in the city looking for apartments. I am mapping all of the apartments we are interested in to make sure that they are in the boundaries of the school district (and in the neighborhoods we like) because at this point in the year we know it will be nearly impossible to get out of district acceptance to our schools of choice. I've also been using walk score to see what else is around (groceries, libraries, etc.). I think I've done everything I can from four hours away. Luckily, my husband is living in RP throughout August and can wander around in the evenings and weekends scoping things out before the kids and I move in September.

I think my post may have been misunderstood? I am not in the Loop. I meant that it is the only place I have visited in Chicago and have never ventured into neighborhoods. We are moving from Michigan. We have zero intention of living anywhere near the Loop ever.

As far as space goes, we live in a city now and we have 3 bdrms with 1800 sq feet and a small yard. The places we have seen (and mapped) on the internet are equivalent to what we have and we find it to be quite comfortable and do not need anything bigger. One thing that we like about the neighborhoods we have chosen is the number of 2-flats for rent and they generally have a small yard we can run around in. We definitely do not want a high-rise or large building with no outdoor space.

[KSML]

I currently live in Ravenswood and I find it to be a very safe area. The nonprofit that I work for has a site in Roger's Park and from what I've seen, the area is a bit rough around the edges in some parts.

I moved here from Michigan around a month ago so I don't have much time here but what I've read in terms of the crime reports also shows that Ravenswood is a low-crime area.

[Avengerfire]

Here is the official City neighborhood map...

http://cityofchicago.org/webportal/COCWebPortal/COC_EDITORIAL/City_Neighborhoods_11x17.pdf (broken link)

[chet everett]

Good to know that you not stuck in a hotel -- I was worried that you were trying to judge Chicago from a location that is not really representative.

I have spent some time in Detroit, and frankly if that is your yardstick for urban schools Chicago ought to compare quite favorably. If, on the other hand, you are in basically any other urbanized area in Michigan I think you may be surprised to find that many area outside the limits City of Chicago are actually much more urban than you might imagine.

I do strongly support the notion that there are many inferior schools in suburban areas as well CPS -- the thing that really sets apart CPS is how institutionalized the underperformance of is and how resistant to real improvement much of the system is.

[nessatar]

We are not in Detroit schools systems but we are familiar with them. I have to say though that if even 5% of CPS schools are worth attending, they are better than Detroit. It's hard to compare the two cities. People flock to Chicago, both to live and visit. Not the case with Detroit. Most of the people I have met in college and after were from the Detroit area and none of them go into the city or would consider living there. (I know people will disagree with me on the state of Detroit. Lots of good people are working really hard to bring it back, and there are a few nice neighborhoods, but its going to be a very long time before that happens.) Michigan also has "schools of choice" allowing people to send their kids to the suburban schools for free on a space available basis and this has really hurt all the urban areas in MI.

But, like I said, if we don't like the school we enroll in, its not a permanent decision. We are completely flexible on that. Obviously, our lease will be a year long but we can always apply for another school out-of-district the next year.

My biggest issue/ concern with urban schools is that they go from good to bad (or vice versa) rather quickly, usually with a change of principal. The schools we are looking at for my second grader might not be worth attending by the time my baby starts school and that's going to be inconvenient. Three years ago, my daughter's school was HORRIBLE. Now, it has a new principal and a magnet Montessori focus and it's so great, it has a waiting list months long. We really love it and are sad to leave it. Of course, parent involvement is crucial as well.