West Humboldt Park comprises an area of approximately three and a half square miles. Bounded on the east by Kedzie Avenue (3200 west) and by Cicero Avenue (4800 west) on the west, the east - west length is sixteen blocks or two miles. WHP is bounded by Lake Street (200 north) on the south end and North Avenue (1600 north) on the north end for a north-south length of approximately 14 blocks; the actual distance is somewhat less than 14 blocks as Lake Street angles slightly to the north as it runs west.1
Approximately 60% of the area of West Humboldt Park, the northern half, is within zip code 60651, and it occupies approximately 60% of that zip code. Another 35% is within zip code 60624, and it occupies approximately 37.5% of that zip code. The remaining 5% in the southwest corner is within zip code 60644. The area shares borders with zip codes 60647 and 60639 along North Avenue, and with zip code 60612 along Kedzie from Lake Street to Chicago Avenue (800 north). Just outside of WHP, zip code 60622 covers the area east of Kedzie along the one mile stretch from Chicago Avenue to North Avenue.
Chicago is laid out with arterial streets generally occurring every mile or half-mile, so the primary north-south commercial retail streets in West Humboldt Park are Pulaski Road (4000 west) and Cicero. The primary east-west commercial retail streets in WHP are Chicago Avenue and North Avenue and, to a lesser degree, Division Street (1200 north). The area west of Pulaski Road, spanning one mile to Cicero, is heavily industrialized with numerous pockets of non-retail commercial clusters mixed among the residential areas.
West Humboldt Park is readily accessible via public transportation. The streets with bus routes are Chicago Avenue, Division Street, North Avenue, and Grand Avenue for the east-west streets (Grand runs on a diagonal) and, Kedzie Avenue, Homan Avenue, Pulaski Road, and Cicero Avenue for the north-south streets. An elevated train runs overhead down Lake Street through downtown Chicago.
The Harris Illinois Industrial Directory for year 2000 lists approximately 134 manufacturing businesses within West Humboldt Park and 39 of those are listed as having 25 or more employees. The employment sizes range from several companies with one employee to Strombecker (60624) with 600 employees to a Unilever facility (60651) with 1700 employees and Brach's Confections (60644) with 1800 employees, for a total manufacturing employment of 7,425.2 Even this may be understated as the companies that are listed as having only one employee may be family firms where all the current workers are corporate owners and the secretary, office clerk, or janitor is the only official employee. Also the figure probably does not include temps and contractors.
The Illinois Services Directory for year 2000 lists approximately 39 service businesses within West Humboldt Park and 12 of those are listed as having 25 or more employees. 3
The Sorkins Directory of Business and Government for 1998 lists approximately 100 additional non-government enterprises within West Humboldt Park, and 51 of those are listed as having 25 or more employees. 4
Yet the above numbers still underrepresent the potential opportunities. There are a slew of small (and maybe some not so small) retail establishments that are not included in any of the above listings. In a sample visual survey of Chicago Avenue along the half mile from Central Park Avenue (3600 west) to Pulaski Road through a predominately African-American area, I counted 60 establishments (excluding 13 churches), only 2 of which are listed in the above directories.5 In a similar survey on North Avenue along the same half mile through a predominately Hispanic area I counted 67 establishments (excluding 3 churches), and the above listings only included 8 of those businesses.6