western suburbs known for open-mindedness? (Chicago, Aurora: 2013, new home, schools)

[chet everett]

Housing stock in Buffalo Griove itself is not aging very well. Lots of "semi-custom" tract homes from the 80s are in subdivisions with no real charm. The town lacks any "core" and efforts to redevelop a "town center" have been ineffective.

I would much rather concentrate on Barrington where the core of town is authentic and has some really attractive features that keep appeal much higher.

[florenzia]

This is such useful information! I really am so grateful to all of you for your valuable insights. I'll share these with my daughter and her husband to help them with their decision. I also trust that they will try the commutes and see what its like. I suspect well-chosen routes can help reduce travel times, so thanks for the specifics LK! And Chet, I think a job change may be in the future but as of now, it is not on the drawing board. They are just getting up to ramping speed in their professions and neither wants to put the brakes on just yet. H., thanks for telling me about the Congregation Etz Chaim. That is very important.

One last comparison question for you: How does Arlington Heights compare to Glen Ellyn? What's their character?

Thanks again to everyone -- you're so kind!

[chet everett]

Arlington Heights is nice enough, it is a big town that stretches out over a rather lengthy distance from the Lake-Cook border down nearly to into DuPage Co near Itasca. The core is nice, the fringes not as much...


Glen Ellyn is more compact. The core is even more upscale than AH. The fall off to the fringes is pretty dramatic -- areas near College of DuPage have lots of big apartment complexes.


AH is gonna be rougher getting to Maywood and not really convenient to Elgin. I feel Glen Ellyn is going to be "equally painful" to get to Elgin or Maywood and would not be my top choice for a two earner family with kids..

[aga412]

Batavia? It's roughly between Elgin and Maywood (going up 31 to Elgin and taking 88 to Maywood). Huge Catholic churches in the area, as well as the temple in Aurora/Naperville. Cute downtown and other cute downtowns nearby. Great schools. Two Metra stations nearby and near highway 88 (in fact, the Geneva metra goes to Maywood).

[chet everett]

Originally Posted by aga412

Batavia? It's roughly between Elgin and Maywood (going up 31 to Elgin and taking 88 to Maywood). Huge Catholic churches in the area, as well as the temple in Aurora/Naperville. Cute downtown and other cute downtowns nearby. Great schools. Two Metra stations nearby and near highway 88 (in fact, the Geneva metra goes to Maywood).

If your goal is to draw a huge triangle then, yes, towns south of Elgin would help accomplish such a goal. That said the commute would be horrible for both partners and the added hassles along Fox River, where backups due to limited bridge capacity lead to congestion would make not just rush hour but even weekend drives a special challenge.

Towns so far west would be a special hardship for grandparents trying to help with childcare too.

Further, towns closer to Elgin, like St Charles, really strain the commute to Maywood and even town closer to 88, like Batavia, make for a bottomless pit of misery up to Elgin...

The odds of the OP feeling comfortable riding the UP-W line to Maywood, where the station is in the most run down part of town, an inconvenient bus ride away from the medical campus, is a huge negative...

[ToriaT]

Honestly I'd hate to be Jewish and live in Wheaton. You would be very rare here indeed. I would think Naperville would be better, the old section near the town has some charming houses....and they have a temple there. Naperville attracts many out of state transplants as well as Chicago and Illinois natives and they have a more diverse population.

[florenzia]

Hi -- Chet I'm glad you raised the point that Glen Ellyn would make the commute to Maywood easier than AH and leave the Elgin travel time unchanged. That's important in the decision process as it is important that they both keep their jobs right now. Batavia is a great place too A. Its got a little more of an OP feel, but I am making that assumption from a very cursory drive through.

[chet everett]

Originally Posted by ToriaT

Honestly I'd hate to be Jewish and live in Wheaton. You would be very rare here indeed. I would think Naperville would be better, the old section near the town has some charming houses....and they have a temple there. Naperville attracts many out of state transplants as well as Chicago and Illinois natives and they have a more diverse population.

I see Kosher food in the speciality aisle. It is big town with a broad respect for ALL RELIGIONS and to suggest otherwise is at odds with reality. In fact, these days it politically / culturally it has no real connection to the large Evangelical Wheaton College that is as likely to have kids intersted in being a regular old teacher as any kind of missionary.

That said the drive to either Elgin or Maywood would not make it a top slot on my list...

[holl1ngsworth]

There are definitely Jewish people in Wheaton and Glen Ellyn... albeit not in as great of numbers as some communities north of the city. And I'm sure the Jewish community out here would love to add to their congregations.

Regarding Wheaton College... The senior rabbi at Etz Chaim, Steven Bob, along with Wheaton College leadership and other Chicagoland rabbis, founded the first Evangelical-Jewish theological dialogue in the United States: JUF News : Building bridges of understanding. Rabbi Bob is also a professor at Wheaton College and serves as the chairman of the DuPage Interfaith Resource Network.

Regarding the commute... To have both parties involved commute 35-40 minutes to work -- a perfectly reasonable amount of time, and well below the Chicagoland average -- makes more sense to me than putting one party six feet under to shave ten minutes off the other's commute.

[CatWarmer]

A quick note re Etz Chaim and the future - Rabbi Bob will be retiring in July 2016 and the congregation is currently on a search for a new senior Rabbi. One candidate is the current assistant Rabbi. The congregation is very family and interfaith friendly.