If you want to know where Chicago is headed, watch where it pulls permits. Building permits mark the paperwork stage of change. They are filed before cranes rise, concrete is poured, and new neighbors arrive. We pulled every new-construction permit the city issued in the first half of 2026 from Chicago’s open data portal. The city issued 698 of them, up 4.8% from the same period last year. Where they landed says more than the total.
Community areas with the most new-construction permits
The leader is less a surprise than an acceleration. The Near West Side, which includes the Illinois Medical District, the United Center area, and the blocks west of the Loop, jumped from 31 permits in the first half of 2025 to 53 this year. That was the biggest count in the city. The rest of the top five, the Loop, West Town, Lake View, and Lincoln Park, were also near the top of last year’s list.
West Side neighborhoods also ranked in the top ten
The more interesting rows are further down the list. North Lawndale (27 permits) and East Garfield Park (24) both placed in the city’s top ten. They ranked ahead of Near North Side, Bridgeport, and every South Side lakefront neighborhood. Neither typically appears near the top of Chicago construction rankings. Two quarters of permits do not establish a turnaround, and North Lawndale’s count is down from 35 a year ago. Still, both posted 20-plus permits in each of the past two first-halves. That is the kind of signal worth tracking rather than assuming.
Logan Square (31, up from 21) and Lower West Side, Pilsen, (22, up from 15) posted the next-biggest percentage climbs in the top ten after Near West Side’s 71%. Their increases were 48% and 47%, respectively. Permit flow does not promise price appreciation, but it is one of the few forward-looking public records showing where builders are committing money.
What permit counts can and cannot show
These numbers have limits. A permit is authorization, not construction. Some projects stall or never break ground. One permit can cover a garage or a tower, so counts measure activity rather than units or dollars. Six-month windows in smaller areas are also noisy. A single development can move a neighborhood several places up this list. That is why we’ll revisit these counts as the year closes rather than draw conclusions from one snapshot.
Data source and methodology
- City of Chicago Data Portal — Building Permits dataset. Method: permits of type “PERMIT – NEW CONSTRUCTION” with an issue date from January 1 through June 30, grouped by community area; 2026 compared against the same window in 2025. Every permit in both windows carried a recorded community area at pull time, so the totals are complete citywide counts. Data pulled July 16, 2026.
Analysis by KCM Desk from the city’s public dataset; counts reflect the portal as of the pull date and can shift as records are updated. Spot an error? Corrections come first.
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