Are Rogers Park and Humboldt Park now fully gentrified? (Chicago: taxes, live)

[Larry Siegel]

Originally Posted by Aleking

...minus the single most important factor in historic Chicago gentrification patterns.


And I don't find the housing stock in Rogers Park any worse than Avondale

The single most important factor being proximity to an already redeveloped area? Good rail transit service? Your post implies that this factor is known and agreed upon by all...

Yes, Avondale is pretty unattractive.

[eevee]

Originally Posted by Drover

You'd think the Ground Zero of Avondale hipsterization would be somewhere around the Belmont/Kimball intersection where the L stop is. Instead it's been the Belmont/Elston/California intersection which is near... well, nothing.

It's near Kuma's, Hot Doug's, and The Pork Shoppe. I wonder how much of a role these places play i the gentrification of the neighborhood.

[Drover]

Originally Posted by eevee

It's near Kuma's, Hot Doug's, and The Pork Shoppe. I wonder how much of a role these places play i the gentrification of the neighborhood.

They obviously play a huge role in the visible gentrification of the neighborhood, along with Square Bar, Dragon Lady Lounge, Jai-Yen II, Orbit Room, and Urban Belly. Throw in the forthcoming Honey Butter Chicken in the former La Finca space for good measure. These places are leading the sort-of "cultural-business" gentrification (or at least hipsterization for now) of the neighborhood. And they're all within a two-block radius of the Belstifornia intersection. (I think I should trademark that sh*t before the area gets super-hot and license it to developers after it does.)

Responding to your question has actually helped me answer my own. The reason why the most visible hipsterization/gentrification of Avondale has centered around Belstifornia is because the built environment around there is more amenable to the type of business/retail streetscape that hipster/gentrifiers look for: zero-lot-line and mostly attached storefronts. That's not universally true since many of the businesses mentioned are actually in detached buildings. But compare to the retail development near the Blue Line stop which is mostly postwar-style mini-complexes with mini-parking lots and a big-box complex with a big parking lot, the kind of thing gentrifiers eschew. Furthermore, the strip of Kimball south of the station is almost entirely residential so that limits how much streetcape-storefront critical-mass can be achieved near there absent serious zoning changes.

So I see the gentrification of Avondale playing out in two separate and slightly disconnected phases: the cultural-business gentrification happening around Belstifornia with residential gentrification around there following; and then later, residential gentrification happening around the Blue Line stop.

[Aleking]

Originally Posted by Larry Siegel

The single most important factor being proximity to an already redeveloped area? Good rail transit service? Your post implies that this factor is known and agreed upon by all...

Yes, Avondale is pretty unattractive.

It's L stops...every single major gentrified neighborhood has had excellent transit access. HP does not and it's a major hurdle.

[Plzeň]

Originally Posted by Aleking

It's L stops...every single major gentrified neighborhood has had excellent transit access.

Ukrainian Village doesn't.

Pilsen does, but the gentrification began nowhere near them.

Generally speaking I agree with you, but those two exceptions immediately come to mind, and I'm sure there are others.

[Vlajos]

In general, access to the L and/or being near other gentrified areas seem to be the drivers.

[TBideon]

Didn't the city actually remove the green line tracks by Jackson Park and Stony Island to promote gentrification (in addition to that wacko minister and his constituents wanting silence during their rituals). That seemed/seems awfully counter-intuitive.

[Chi-town Native]

Originally Posted by Drover

And they're all within a two-block radius of the Belstifornia intersection. (I think I should trademark that sh*t before the area gets super-hot and license it to developers after it does.)

Oh good god, just stop your cultural carpetbagging.

Avondale needs more pretentiousness like we need Lake View property's taxes.

[Chi-town Native]

And for the record, these outsider-impressions of how Avondale is developing aren't worth the bytes they're occupying on the Interwebz.

It's beyond obvious the L stops are the drivers. I mean, BEYOND OBVIOUS.

It's also beyond obvious that land values & property taxes & rents are major drivers, again, beyond obvious.

Restaurants are so distant from being leading indicators it's not even funny. Hot Doug's for example, was "hot" when it was in Roscoe Village, and for all we know it will move again. Kuma's has enjoyed years of syndicated episodes of Check Please. It's good, but is it driving anything? Questionable.

Note that nowhere in Drover's "expert" opinion is there any mention of anything beyond what a single guy stuffs in his mouth. Sorry dude, you are not the demographic changing or driving anything. If anything Late Bar is pulling people west of the expressway who formerly stayed east of it.

Follow the single women. The women (the ones who get followed) follow the artists/night life, but for the most part, only if it's perceived to be at least somewhat safe. A little dicey is OK, but only if escape routes are obvious -hence the importance of the L stops.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by Plzeň

Ukrainian Village doesn't.

Pilsen does, but the gentrification began nowhere near them.

Generally speaking I agree with you, but those two exceptions immediately come to mind, and I'm sure there are others.

I think the lack of "L" access in most of the Ukrainian Village has probably delayed or slowed the gentrification of that neighborhood a bit. Some people just rule it out because of this. It's probably why I myself never lived there, and stayed closer to the Damen and Division Blue Line stops (and eventually Uptown).

But in the end, the location is still just too central and close to the Loop to resist for some, and people are willing to take buses down Grand or Chicago. Or bike. Or drive.