Neighborhoods

Chicago is a large city, and as such it contains a variety of methods of identifying areas. Wards and Precincts are set up to describe political and policing boundaries respectively. Chicago is also divided up into 77 separate Community Area. These areas were defined in the 1920s by a team of University of Chicago sociologists who created the map of the Chicago Community Areas as a tool in aiding urban planning. While still useful in describing a large urban area, many of the Community Areas are no longer representative of the population’s identity with their local area. Neighborhoods often intersect and overlap Community Areas. In some cases, they are one and the same, and in other cases, they may each exist with the same name, but with different geographical boundaries.

Similarly, exact boundaries and borders are often disputed. Click here to see Listings by Neighborhood.  Or, click here to send us a request to Search by Neighborhood.

Below is an alphabetical listing of both Community Areas and Neighborhoods. Items in blue represent neighborhood pages with links to separate maps and neighborhood information. Hopefully over the coming months, you will see a lot more blue (Neighborhoods and Community Areas with a separate page), and much less black (those without a page yet).

Chicago Neighborhoods and Community Areas

An alphabetical listing of Community Areas and Neighborhoods, with links to neighborhood descriptions and photo galleries, courtesy of Chicago Velo.  And if you have a chance, take a bike tour of a Chicago neighborhood with Lee.  It’s the best way to see Chicago.