River Forest & Forest Park

River Forest and Forest Park sit west of Oak Park along the Des Plaines River and could not be more different. River Forest is a village of estates and Wright-era houses on wide lots, with Dominican University and Concordia University Chicago and a reputation for privacy. Forest Park, south of it, is a working town with a long Madison Street strip of taverns, restaurants and shops, the western end of the Blue Line, and cemeteries that hold more people than any other town in Illinois. River Forest shares Oak Park’s high school; Forest Park has the bars.

Where it is

On the map, River Forest runs from North Avenue south to Madison between Harlem Avenue and the Des Plaines River; Forest Park continues south from Madison to Roosevelt and the Eisenhower, with the cemeteries filling its southern half. The Blue Line’s Forest Park terminal at Des Plaines Avenue and the Green Line’s Harlem terminal serve both towns, and Metra’s Union Pacific West line stops at River Forest on Thatcher, 20 minutes to Ogilvie. Harlem Avenue and Des Plaines Avenue run north-south, and the Eisenhower ends its city stretch at Forest Park.

What to know if you’re moving here

One is estates, one is bungalows and condos, and the tax bills track the difference.

• Housing is large homes and estates in River Forest and bungalows, two-flats and condos in Forest Park, built from the 1890s on, with typical prices of roughly $250,000 to $1.5 million as a broad editorial estimate as of September 2026.
• Parking is driveways in River Forest and a mix of street, alley and village permits in Forest Park.
• Public schools are River Forest District 90 (feeding Oak Park and River Forest High School) and Forest Park District 91 (feeding Proviso Township high schools, including Proviso Math and Science Academy).
• River Forest’s property taxes run with Oak Park’s; Forest Park’s are lower, and so are its prices.
• The Blue Line terminal has a large park-and-ride lot, and Forest Park is one of the cheapest places to live at the end of an L line.
• The drawback is that Forest Park’s Madison Street noise reaches nearby blocks on weekends, and River Forest has almost no commercial street of its own.

What to do if you’re visiting

Madison Street in Forest Park is the walk, a few blocks north of the Blue Line terminal or south of the Green Line at Harlem, and most of the stops below sit within three blocks of each other.

• Madison Street from Harlem to Des Plaines Avenue has a mile of taverns, restaurants and shops, and the 7300 block pairs Todd & Holland Tea Merchants, a loose-leaf shop with about 250 teas and a free sample bar, with Kribi Coffee, where Cameroon-grown beans are air roasted in the cafe.
• Dinner on the strip means the thin crust pizza and homemade pasta at Jimmy’s Place, an Italian restaurant at 7411 Madison St since 1998.
• Dessert is next door at The Brown Cow Ice Cream Parlor & Creamery, which makes ice cream in house in an 1886 building that became the first movie theater outside Chicago in 1914.
• Toward the west end of the strip, Team Blonde is a boutique and spa in one storefront, with eco-minded clothing and gifts up front and facials in back.
• Forest Home Cemetery on Des Plaines Avenue holds the Haymarket Martyrs’ Monument, a National Historic Landmark.
• Thatcher Woods and the Trailside Museum of Natural History on Thatcher Avenue in River Forest are free forest preserve stops along the river.