Video Gaming in Chicago's 29th Ward — bars, licensing, status

History

Austin began in 1865, when developer Henry Austin bought 470 acres for a temperance settlement called Austinville. Improving railroad service drew steady growth, and in 1899 residents of the rest of the township voted Austin into Chicago. German and Scandinavian families came early, followed by Irish and Italian ones. By 1920 street railways ran to downtown every half mile. In the early twentieth century, north Austin filled with brick two-flats and bungalows. Columbus Park, designed by Jens Jensen, dates to 1920 and featured a lagoon, a golf course and athletic fields.

Galewood grew from Abram Gale's land, subdivided into a suburb in 1870. A golf course there was cut into home lots in 1927, and a chocolate factory went up at the edge of Galewood Estates in 1928. Montclare was annexed in 1889 and grew first in 1912, when the Grand Avenue streetcar line extended service there; bungalows came to predominate. From the late 1960s Austin changed: by 1980 the population was predominantly African American, housing sat vacant or came down, and jobs and commerce were lost. Neighborhood groups such as the Organization for a Better Austin worked to stabilize the community.

The area today

Ald. Christopher Taliaferro represents the 29th Ward from a ward office at 6272 W. North Ave. Block Club Chicago reported that Taliaferro was first elected in 2015. The ward is mostly Austin, on Chicago's western border, and the Sun-Times lists Montclare and Galewood among its neighborhoods. Galewood spreads along North Avenue in the north, with Galewood Park two blocks north of the street. From there a corridor between Austin Boulevard and roughly Central Avenue runs south, past the Green Line's Austin station, to Madison Street and Columbus Park.

Bars and restaurants here

If your room is on Chicago Avenue near Austin Boulevard, you are on a stretch the City marked as rebuilt in May 2025, from Austin Boulevard to Central Avenue, with wider sidewalks, street trees and upgraded lighting, the first of three planned phases of the Soul City Corridor. The Encyclopedia of Chicago names Madison Street, Chicago Avenue and Lake Street as the lines along which Austin's commerce grew, and all three run through the ward. On North Avenue, the regional planning agency describes the stretch from Austin Boulevard to Harlem Avenue as once a thriving commercial corridor, the subject of a revitalization plan. Block Club Chicago covered a reservation-only restaurant moving into a once-vacant building near Austin Boulevard.