^
I’ve only been on campus for a couple of lectures while I was at UC for a year, so take my opinion with a grain of salt.
UIC has a fairly defined campus for an urban school (closer to Northeastern than BU, so to speak), but yes, it has a pretty large population of commuters. Both UC and UIC get less safe as you move further out from campus, but that depends somewhat on which direction you’re heading. As with any urban school, it’s prudent to pay attention while walking around and not have your nose in your phone.