Is UC's neighborhood and surrondings safe?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Chicago ✅
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<p>I applied early action to the school after I had made research and thought that it would be a great fit for me. Plus, UC nationally renowned for its excellence. But, the neighborhood and Chicago is what scares me the most. My parents are very worried about this and I don't know.... they're sending me on a "guilt trip" for my decision. Is the campus and surrounding area safe?</p>

<p>I am aware of how to carry myself in a big city-- I'm from Los Angeles-- but I don't know much about Chicago.</p>

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<p>Hyde Park is pretty safe. It’s where the richer people live.</p>

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<p>Hyde park is where the richer people live? That’s not the impression that I got when I visited! Are you a student at UC, jubilee27?</p>

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<p>Well, Hyde Park is like any other suburb of a major city. You have your upscale areas, your median/middle class areas, and you have some lower income housing.
And like any other big city suburb, these areas frequently butt up against one another. And you do not have to venture too far out of Hyde Park to emerge in some dicey places. But if you know where to go and where not to go, then it’s not really a huge deal.</p>

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<p>And the President has a house about 8 blocks north of the school. You can’t get close to it, but I would imagine that it is where other “rich” people also live?</p>

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<p>Hyde Park is one of Chicago’s neighborhoods. It is not a suburb of Chicago.
Hyde Park itself is pretty safe. Many of the University’s faculty live in the neighborhood. If you go a few blocks west (i.e. west of Washington Park), you’ll see some pretty bad places. There are many instances of violence in the areas surrounding the neighborhood, but I have only heard of one involving a UChicago student (a grad student was attacked while walking alone at night). </p>

<p>If you use common sense (don’t walk alone at night, don’t wander too far off campus alone), you should be fine.</p>

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<p>It depends on which parameter you use. Chicago Public School categorizes Hyde Park as a Tier 4 neighborhood (the highest socioeconomic status possible for a neighborhood) with a mean income of about $90,400. However, Hyde Park’s mean household income is skewed by quite a large number of professors and physicians who live here. Hyde Park’s median household income is about $46,000. It is around the national average.</p>

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<p>By President, I meant the President of the United States :-)</p>

<p>And OK, Hyde Park is a neighborhood, my bad. I grew up in a city, and everything outside of the city proper we called a suburb.</p>

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<p>That sounds a lot like LA and the area where I live. I live in the suburbs, a pretty nice area-- not too rich, not too poor. If you go too far west though, you’re entering some pretty dicey areas. I’m suspecting its’ location to be a bit like USC’s here in Cali?</p>

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<p>Every urban major university has its own unique circumstances – Chicago, USC, Penn, Columbia, NYU, Northwestern, Brown, Georgetown, Harvard, MIT, etc., not to mention public universities like Berkeley, UCLA, Washington, Wisconsin, Texas . . . . What’s different between UChicago and USC is that USC is fairly close to traditional downtown Los Angeles, while UChicago is about six miles south of anything resembling “downtown” Chicago. Hyde Park is very leafy, a little sleepy, and under-retailed. No one passes through it on his or her way to anywhere else (although of course plenty of people pass through it on their way to things connected with the University, or to the Museum of Science and Industry. But it’s definitely part of the city. USC isn’t a bad analogy.</p>

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<p>The answer is very easy: Yes (3 hits on keyboard), or even easier: NO (2 hits).
Is 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, Washington DC, Mr. Obama’s current neighborhood and surroundings safe? <a href=“Web Page Under Construction”>Web Page Under Construction;
Same answer: Yes or NO.</p>

<p>[The</a> Most Dangerous Colleges To Go To | Elite Daily](<a href=“http://elitedaily.com/elite/slideshows/dangerous-colleges/?slide=10]The”>http://elitedaily.com/elite/slideshows/dangerous-colleges/?slide=10)</p>

<p>Rank in “The Most Dangerous Colleges To Go To”</p>

<ol>
<li>University of Pennsylvania</li>
<li>Temple University</li>
<li>Columbia University</li>
<li>Johnson & Wales University</li>
<li>Washington University in St. Louis</li>
<li>Morgan State University</li>
<li>Rutgers University-Newark</li>
<li>Harvard University</li>
<li>Tufts University</li>
<li>University of Michigan-Ann Arbor</li>
</ol>

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<p>I doubt the credibility of that list. Why is Penn on the list, yet Drexel isn’t?</p>

13

<p>That list is nuts. Not to be taken seriously at all.</p>

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<p>I don’t think USC is a good analogy. Unless things have changed a lot recently, faculty don’t live anywhere near USC, and lots of USC students commute, too. Some of the commuter students are living with their families to save money, but many moved away from campus just to be in a nicer neighborhood. Lots of UChicago faculty and staff, and most of the off-campus students live in Hyde Park</p>

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<p>Not sure what you mean by “the city proper.” The Loop area of Chicago is the city proper - but so is Rogers Park, and Lake View, and Wrigleyville, and Hyde Park, and Beverly, and all kinds of different neighborhoods in Chicago. There are lovely areas in Hyde Park / Kenwood, including where Obama lives, and there are some not-so-nice areas bordering it. Personally, I think USC’s surrounding neighborhood is a lot worse (relatively speaking).</p>

<p>And WashU? “Dangerous”? Please. We should all be able to afford some of the housing in upscale Clayton, MO. St. Louis has dangerous areas, but they aren’t where WashU is, unless you consider the price of a room at the Clayton Ritz Carlton to be a crime.</p>

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<p>@ammi2013 You said you live in Los Angeles. As someone who lives on the Westside of Los Angeles, trust me–Hyde Park is a lot nicer than the neighborhood around USC–aesthetically and in every other way. I never really enjoy going down to USC, though I did go to ride the new light rail. (I do like the Museums by USC but the Museum of Science and Industry in HP is also nicer.) </p>

<p>[USC</a> Halloween shooting suspect charged with attempted murder | Fox News](<a href=“http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/11/05/usc-halloween-shooting-suspect-charged-with-attempted-murder/]USC”>USC Halloween shooting suspect charged with attempted murder | Fox News)</p>

<p>If your parents would feel comfortable with your going to USC (campuswise) then they have no reason to worry about UChicago. People don’t seem too freaked out by USC in LA, though they know it’s not the greatest neighborhood. I probably wouldn’t go wandering around either neighborhood at 3 am.</p>

<p>As others have pointed out, the President lives close to UChicago, and the Mayor sends his kids to school there. Hyde Park itself is not really the problem, it’s the areas on the South Side surrounding it, where, truthfully, most UChicago students don’t go.</p>

<p>This website has some crime statistics:</p>

<p>[The</a> Campus Safety and Security Data Analysis Cutting Tool](<a href=“Campus Safety and Security”>Campus Safety and Security)</p>

<p>Columbia, Penn, Yale, Duke, etc. all have their neighborhood issues. Here is a note from Wikipedia about East Palo Alto:</p>

<p>“In the past, East Palo Alto experienced profound crime and poverty, especially during the 1980s and early 1990s. In 1992, it had the highest homicide rate in the country with 24,322 people, and 42 murders, equaling a rate of 172.7 homicides per 100,000 residents.[6] Since then the city’s crime problems have subsided, and the murder rate in particular has declined to a typical urban level. In 2006, East Palo Alto experienced a comparatively low 6 murders. There were 7 murders in 2007, and only 5 in 2008.”</p>

<p>[East</a> Palo Alto, California - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Palo_Alto,_California]East”>East Palo Alto, California - Wikipedia)</p>

<p>People in LA are always talking about what great schools UCLA and USC (despite its neighborhood issue) are. UChicago can make the same claim easily.</p>

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<p>I would note that East Palo Alto is actually a pretty long way from the Stanford campus – several miles, at least – and what’s in-between is one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in America. What’s more, as with Harlem and Washington Heights in NYC, the enormous pressure of real estate values in Palo Alto and its surrounding communities is gentrifying EPA to a significant extent (which the Wikipedia article reflects).</p>

<p>Hyde Park is a nice neighborhood, and no one should think that Chicago is unsafe to any meaningful extent. By the same token, there is crime on the Stanford campus, and students there lock their doors and take care walking at night like people all over the world. But if living in an urban environment makes you feel uncomfortable, Chicago may make you feel uncomfortable, and Stanford won’t.</p>

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<p>This is a bit of a bump but I feel I can offer a useful answer.</p>

<p>Yes, it is safe. I have a good friend going to UChicago, and she is living in the house furthest from campus. She is typically at the library (Harper?) until 12-2AM, and walks home every night afterwards. I’m guessing her house is about a half mile from the library or so, I’m not entirely sure. Anyways, she has not had any close encounters, nor has she felt the least bit intimidated at anytime. She has gone downtown a few times and she usually takes a pretty tight hold of her purse, but, otherwise, she has been okay.</p>

<p>Hyde park is very pretty in the fall, according to her. The campus is along something called “the midway.” And near campus is some elementary school that rich kids go to, so there are plenty of upper class people around. </p>

<p>There have been, however, 3-4 security alerts so far this quarter. They have all been violent muggings on the street. One guy was taken into an alley, beaten, and had his backpack stolen. Another was mugged at gun point. I don’t remember the others, but, there have been a few encounters on or around campus this quarter. </p>

<p>In the end, however, your safety really depends on your common sense.</p>

19

<p>No, the neighborhood is an extremely dangerous war zone, which is why the President of the United States has his house here and sent his kids to school here and will probably build his Presidential Library here.</p>

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<p>Sapling lived in his dorm by the MSI four years, experienced zero crime.</p>