How far to venture out?? (Chicago, Lincoln: condo, neighborhood, buying)

[sigmasix]

Our family is getting to where we travel to Chicago a few times a year and always stay in the Loop or River North . It is an area we like and can see ourselves buying a condo and eventually moving to that area when our kids graduate.

We usually walk or take the red line everywhere we go. I have never felt unsafe on the L or walking (except for the time that an E Lake St. parking garage exit spit us out on a lower level street and there was a group of "gentlemen" waiting there when the parking garage door opened).

Anyway, daughter is wanting to venture down to Chinatown this time and I thought we could just hop on the red line down to Cermak(which I understand you can't go south of now because of construction). We've never traveled down that way before.

Smart thinking or no?

Any thoughts on what to do down there?

[rparz]

If it's daytime, I wouldn't worry about being there.

[marothisu]

Chinatown is fine if that's what you are talking about. I've been on the red line at 3am from Chinatown and it's fine. But yes you're correct, the red line is "down." You can ride to Roosevelt and catch a shuttle bus there OR you can take a water taxi to Chinatown. Anyway, Chinatown is safe.

Other areas you may want to branch out to, if you haven't already: Wicker Park (Blue Line to O'Hare - Damen stop), Pilsen (Pink Line, get off at 18th - don't look like a tourist ;-) ), Logan Square (Blue Line to O'hare - Logan Square stop), Lincoln Square (Brown Line to Kimball - Western stop), Argyle (Little Vietnam area - Red Line to Howard, Argyle stop), West Loop (Green Line - Morgan Stop), etc.

[chet everett]

You can put Hyde Park to the list too, though CTA express buses down Lake Shore Drive or Metre Electric line service trains are the ticket to get you there, as the Green Line is on the fringe of scaryland....

[snoylekim]

While the weather's nice , if you go to Chinatown during the day/evening , try the Water Taxi . It's very cool way to get there with a different perspective on the scenery . Leaves every half hour both directions until around 9:00 PM . You can catch it in at the Madison Street Bridge Water Taxi dock . I forgot about this , but had to take it today, because I foolishly drove to Chinatown this morning for the Dragon Boat Races, and , because of various events in the neighborhood ( including a road race) , Cermak and a few other streets were closed, the main parking lot was absolutely full. Drove back to the West Loop and used the WT .

[sigmasix]

Hey, thanks guys and gals for all of your tips.

The water taxi sounds like the way to go.