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Community area in Chicago

Edgewater transitioned from agriculture and small settlement to residential development around the 1880s with summer homes for Chicago's elite. Today, it provides the northern terminus of both Lincoln Park and Lake Shore Drive. With the exception of pockets acknowledged as historic districts (like the Bryn Mawr Historic District), east Edgewater (Edgewater Beach) has a skyline of high rise apartment buildings, condominium complexes, and mid rise homes. To the west, Edgewater is characterized by single family homes; and two , three , or four story flats, including the historic village and now commercial district of Andersonville.

Developers began buying up orchards and truck farms, and cutting down the dense woods in Lake View Township (of which Edgewater was a part) in the 1880s to make way for future development. From 1870 to 1887 the population of the township, then north of the City of Chicago, grew from 2,000 citizens to 45,000. As a result, there was growing need of more public service access, and Lake View was annexed to Chicago in 1889 as a way of meeting those demands. In 1885, the northeastern section of Lake View was given the name Edgewater by prominent developer John Lewis Cochran. He built the first residential subdivision in the area. Many of his homes can still be found in the Lakewood Balmoral Historic District. After a few years, Edgewater was celebrated as a wonder as it became "the only electric lighted suburb adjacent to Chicago".

By the early 1900s, Edgewater was regarded as one of Chicago's most prestigious communities. Mansions dominated the lakefront, while large single family homes spread inland to the former farming village of Andersonville (then also called Somerdale). A prominent symbol of Edgewater's affluence and desirable location on the lake was the Edgewater Beach Hotel, which opened in 1916 at 5349 N. Sheridan. The famed "sunrise" yellow hotel was razed in 1970, though the remaining "sunset" pink Edgewater Beach Apartments building is still a landmark at the north tip of Lake Shore Drive. The Edgewater building boom peaked in 1926 and property values reached their height in 1928. Around 1900, the burgeoning affluent population grew so much that developers expanded Edgewater and renamed a portion of the neighborhood community Uptown (which still exists today). Uptown quickly became the commercial hub of the area, with storied nightlife, entertainment and tall commercial buildings. Thus, in the late 1920s, when Community Areas were first designated, the Edgewater area was included as a section of Uptown.

Edgewater Glen is located in the north central part of Edgewater. It was named from the streets Glenwood Ave. and Glenlake Ave. that cross in the center of Edgewater Glen. A local residents and businesses organization called Edgewater Glen Association (EGA), incorporated in 1972, invented the name. The association, which is still active (2024), determined the boundaries of Edgewater Glen as: the south side of Granville Ave (north), the west side of Broadway Ave (east), the south side of Norwood St (south), and the east side of Clark St (west). EGA hosts and participates in neighborhood annual events and programming, including public forums with elected officials, plant swaps, corner beautification, the Edgewater Yard Sale, and the EGA Garden Walk which celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2023. EGA also is notable for its work to maintain the tree canopy within Edgewater, including regular inventories and coordination for the planting of parkway trees. In 2022, EGA embarked on an effort to catalogue old growth parkway trees resulting in the publication of a study of the heritage trees (50 years and older) of Edgewater Glen as well as a toolkit that can be used by any organization to identify and track heritage trees. An exhibit was held to feature the toolkit and study at the Edgewater Historical Society on Arbor Day, 2023 which marked the kickoff of an effort by the Edgewater Historical Society to work with the Edgewater Environmental Coalition and all Edgewater Block Clubs to inventory ALL of the heritage parkway trees in Edgewater.

Broadway (along with Andersonville's Clark St., to the west) is the main commercial street running North and South through Edgewater. It separates the Edgewater Beach area (dominated by highrises and apartment buildings) to the east, from Andersonville and Edgewater Glen (dominated by single family homes) to the west. In the 1920s, Broadway became a center of the new automobile trade with elaborate stylized showroom buildings. While these businesses are now gone, the street maintains commercial trade and at least one of those car palaces remains. In addition, a wide array of dining is available including Ethiopian, French, Japanese, Thai, and fine American, as well as pubs, fast food, and pizza.

Sheridan Rd., which follows the lakefront in eastern Edgewater is the main North–South thoroughfare for traffic to/from Lake Shore Drive. Lake Shore Dr. at Hollywood Ave. where all traffic is routed onto either Hollywood Ave. or Sheridan Rd. As it is the north end terminus of Chicago's scenic Lake Shore Dr., this part of the neighborhood is sometimes congested with traffic along 4 lane roadways such as Clark St., Broadway and Ridge Avenues. The area around Sheridan Rd., west to Broadway Ave., is called Edgewater Beach. The neighborhood beaches are Foster Beach and Osterman (Hollywood) Beach. This area includes the northern reaches of Lincoln Park, Chicago's largest public park. North of Ardmore Ave. (5800 N) to Devon Ave. (6400 N), there are 4 lakefront parks, Osterman (Hollywood) Beach, George Lane Park, Berger Park, and a newly unnamed park just south of Granville (6200 N) between the Tiara & El Lago condominiums. There is also a park on the southwest corner of Thorndale and Sheridan. Accompanied by uniformly tall, grand old locust trees lining the road, Edgewater's portion of Sheridan (North of Foster Ave., south of Devon Ave.) is a dense section of high rise residential buildings on both sides of the Sheridan Rd. corridor. These include, Park Edgewater Condominiums, Hollywood Towers, Horizon House Condominium, 6030 N. Sheridan, The Malibu, Malibu East, East Point Tower, The Tiara, El Lago, Granville Beach, Granville Tower, Shoreline Towers, Sheridan Shores Condominiums, Sheridan Point, and Park Tower and Mall. Many of these towers were built in the late 1950s to early 1970s. TV's fictional characters Bob and Emily Hartley of The Bob Newhart Show called this area home, residing in the Thorndale Beach North Condominiums, 5901 N. Sheridan Rd. There are a handful of mansions still remaining on Sheridan Rd., remnants of the 1880s to 1920s. Many of the original lakefront mansions that once lined Sheridan were razed with landfill added along the shoreline to make way for the high rise buildings that exist there today. A few notable exceptions are Colvin House, at Thorndale Ave., Berger Park. and Sacred Heart School at Granville Ave., as well as two belonging to nearby Loyola University Chicago. To the South, at Sheridan, near Foster, there also remains a private tennis, pool and three par golf club, from the days when this area was dominated by mansions and the Edgewater Beach Hotel.

Beginning in the 1990s, Edgewater's population of lesbian couples significantly increased. Residents named the relocation of the Andersonville feminist bookstore Women and Children First from Lakeview as a major catalyst, though others also sought to escape gentrification in Lakeview and Lincoln Park. Lesbian bars and other lesbian centered businesses opened in Andersonville, and for a period of time the neighborhood was sometimes referred to as "Girlstown," an alternative to Boystown in Lakeview. However, by the late 2000s, rising rents and the subsequent closing of many of those businesses led to a decline in the lesbian population. At the time of the 2000 United States Census, the proportion of same sex couples in Edgewater was 6.6% in the 60660 zip code and 8.0% in the 60640 zip code. This compares with the US national average of 1.1%. Starting in the 2000s, rising rent and gentrification in the Lakeview and Boystown neighborhoods caused many LGBT people to move further north. In 2012 Trulia rated Edgewater as one of the ten gayest neighborhoods in America. In 2017, Trulia and dating website OkCupid stated that Edgewater had the highest percentage of gay single people in the city, more than Lakeview and Hyde Park/Kenwood.

Recognizing the proximity to Chicago's Lakefront and access to the Red Line elevated train, an influx of new residents have relocated to Edgewater over the past 20 years. Many of Edgewater's new residents are immigrants from the Horn of Africa and the former Yugoslavia. The area has a great density of Bosnian, Serb and Croat residents. These people, troubled by civil war and tough conditions in their homeland, have been encouraged to settle in the area. Ethiopians, Eritreans and Somalis from the Horn region live and socialize in Edgewater. The city is known for accepting new, thriving enclaves of ethnicities in centuries past. This new settlement is a modern revival of that tradition. Of recent, many new residents have come from the neighboring Lakeview and Lincoln Park neighborhoods, due to the affordable housing and Edgewater's proximity to the city's rapid transit (CTA) system which allows for an easy commute into the city's downtown. On the streets of Edgewater, one can encounter women in traditional dress and grandmothers strolling with their grandchildren, while the middle generation is out making a living in the new world of Chicago.

The Edgewater community area has supported the Democratic Party in the past two presidential elections. In the 2016 presidential election, the Edgewater cast 22,676 votes for Hillary Clinton and cast 2,546 votes for Donald Trump (86.07% to 9.66%). In the 2012 presidential election, Edgewater cast 20,028 votes for Barack Obama and cast 3,083 votes for Mitt Romney (84.67% to 13.03%).

Edgewater is home to several Chicago Public Schools (CPS) campuses. The local public high school is Nicholas Senn High School, established in 1913. In addition, four of the neighborhood's elementary schools — Hayt, Swift, Peirce and Goudy — achieved a level 1 (excellent) status from CPS in 2013. Those schools feed into Senn, which will help it maintain its ranking. There are several Catholic and other religiously affiliated schools also in the neighborhood including Northside Catholic Academy's primary school campus at St. Gertrude church. The Edgewater Branch of the Chicago Public Library serves the area, and the nearby Bezazian Branch in Uptown also provides services to people in Edgewater. Loyola University of Chicago's campus borders northeastern Edgewater and has crossed into the area. The college established itself on the lake at the north end of Sheridan Road, where it crosses into Rogers Park, in 1906.

A majority of Edgewater's public transportation needs are met by the Chicago Transit Authority, which provides resident and visitor access to the Red Line service of the Chicago Elevated railway rapid transit. The Red Line runs north to the city limits and south to Wrigley Field, the downtown Chicago Loop, Guaranteed Rate Field and ends on the South Side at 95th Street. Edgewater's elevated Red Line tracks run next to Broadway Avenue, and its four stations are Berwyn, Bryn Mawr, Thorndale, and Granville. Along Edgewater's western border are the commuter rail tracks of Metra's North Line, with stations in the nearby surrounding community areas at Ravenswood and Rogers Park providing transit to downtown or to Chicago's North Shore Suburbs. The Chicago Transit Authority also operates numerous bus routes in Edgewater, with several running along North Lake Shore Drive with express services to downtown Chicago, including the Loop, via North Michigan Avenue and its Magnificent Mile. Private entities also offer many transportation services. The areas is served by car sharing services such as I GO and Zipcar as well as bicycle sharing services such as Divvy. Taxi and limousine services are plentiful in the area. Bicycles and rickshaws can be found in the summer for rent near Foster Beach. Bike paths are also available on some major streets. Manicured walking and running paths are found throughout the parkland near the lake, including the Chicago Lakefront Trail, which is also popular with bicycle commuters.