Little Village

*Believe it or not even though the image above the writing may be almost two years old, Little Village looks exactly the same.*

When you look up Little Village online, what is the first thing you look at in the news section? All you may see is crime, deaths, robberies, and poverty. This makes people have a second thought of visiting, however, they don't seem to notice the real beauty that is being hidden inside.

When you enter Little Village, you're welcomed by an Arc that has a "Bienvenidos A Little Village," saying "Welcome to Little Village." You are also welcome with many street vendors, who sell crackling, fruit in a cup, inflatable toys, and many more.

Little Village is known for being a neighborhood of many Hispanics, Black people, Latinos, Mexicans, and more. As well, it is known for having many people in poverty. If you were to look in the train tracks, empty buildings, parks, even in the streets, you will see many people living there.

There may be sadness in Little Village, but there sure is a lot of beauty. The colors in the buildings make beautiful color pallets. The banners that are hung in the streets lights. The Mexican food and the people are as well part of the beauty in Little Village.

Every year, there are celebrations made through Little Village. One of them being the Mexican Independence Day. On this parade, schools, marching bands, brands, etc. all participate to make this long parade that goes all the way through 26th Street. Another one is on Halloween, stores create a schedule on which they plan to give candy to children, adults, and teens who walk around 26th Street. This one doesn't seem as big, but when Mexico wins in the national soccer games, many people go out in their cars and wave the Mexico Flag around, creating small parades and screaming around.

Aside from the beauty in Little Village, there seems to be an issue that is almost as big as the crimes. Gentrification. As you may know, Little Village is a neighborhood with many people in poverty. This includes basically every single person living in Little Village. This includes, homeless people, people in cheap apartments, and people who have their own stores to make money.

You may ask "What does this have to do with gentrification?" Well, in Little Village there is a plaza. The plaza is called the Little Village Plaza. In this plaza, there are hundreds of vendors that make a living working there. In March of 2020, the plaza was sold. The new owner have plans to make the plaza more national, with examples of adding a target, or well known grocery stores. This leads to the stores in Little Village increasing their prices. And well this leads to the loss of jobs since they won't be making as much profits as they used to do. All due to the new modern plaza that has more national stores.

You may be also be asking "What else does gentrification have to do with Little Village?" Well, let's look at Pilsen, located in Chicago, Illinois. Pilsen had so many Hispanics and Mexicans living there. However, gentrification happened, this led for so many buildings to be bought and be turned to more modern buildings at an expensive price. This has led to so many people wondering if it is going to happen in Little Village as well. Others have realized that it is starting to happen.

On a Chicago Tribune article titled, "Little Village Discount Mall gentrification fears follow other signs of redevelopment in neighborhood" written by Laura Rodriguez Presa. There is a quote that states, " former Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced the plan to transform the abandoned BNSF railroad into a trail called El Paseo, running from the east side of Pilsen to South Lawndale." A small backstory is that this plan has been ongoing since 2016. Basically 5 years of gentrification happening/starting.

This is such a big issue in Little Village, many people live here. This is a neighborhood that shows a lot of representation of the past. With adding new stuff around that is expensive, this will have many people to leave and move somewhere else.

Otherwise, if we ignore all these issues Little Village has, it is such an amazing place. Many tourists during the summer come and visit. There is so many Hispanic and Latin representation that is shown around.