Chicago has about 77 communities / neighbourhoods broken down into about 9 police districts. There are about 20 bad communities in Chicago and about 5 of them consistently make the news for crime. About 15 years ago there was about 30 bad communities. Thus, the drop in the number of bad neighbourhoods from 30 to 20 is due to gentrification as it condensed the wave of crime in more vulnerable communities. By the way, the image you posted is outdated from the 1940's that was run by the Crime Syndicate (Italian Mafia) that had a strong fist like oppression on the community called south side. Essentially, White Gangs lived in nearby wealthier communities and control the minority communities...today the Black / Latino gangs have taken over. There's a big battle between those ethnicity groups and the Latino gangs are winning...slowly pushing out the black gangs from the south side. That oppressive control lasted about +60 years from the early 1900's and today they estimate will take another 10 - 20 years to root out that oppression via gentrification although in reality its just moving a few ethnicity groups out to build expensive condos and homes. It lasted so long due to the mismanagement and corruption by the CHA and HUD. Today, that area of the south side you selected for persecution has actually undergone gentrification many years ago...less controlled by the corrupt CHA and HUD. In fact, I believe the city block that image you selected...below is what it actually looks like today. Gentrification is a very slow process and its pushed the south side further south into a more condensed area of crime and south west into a well known crime area called Englewood. I believe the less control the CHA and HUD has in Chicago...there will be less poor neighbourhoods and less crime. Parts of South Indiana Ave is a testament of such as it slowly transforms. I've heard its a 50 year redevelopment process of the Chicago's south side...largest redevelopment in the United States. I think it begun in the early 2000s. I grew up in the Evanston suburbs (north of Chicago). We would see those neighbourhoods from the Dan Ryan Expressway and South Lake Shore Drive that separates the beautiful parts of Chicago from the bad neighbourhoods whenever driving by there if our school qualified for the state basketball tournament. Our school would send bus loads of us students to cheer our basketball team...then it would become almost silent on the bus when driving by the south side because everybody was looking out the window as we went past that community. The gangs down there aren't the real enemy. wrbtrader