Chicago contains 77 neighborhoods outside its downtown Loop district, and the Bloomingdale Trail, a 2.7-mile elevated linear park opened in June 2015, offers the best way to explore the four interesting neighborhoods it crosses. This is not a narrow, rough trail for nature walks but a straight, 25-foot-wide, paved path for locals and visitors of all ages, with beautiful plantings, trees, water features, benches and art installations. The trail, constructed with the support of the City of Chicago, The Trust for Public Land conservation group and others, follows a former 1915 elevated rail line, with 13 ramps providing easy access for bikers, runners and walkers. If the physical description sounds similar to New York City’s popular High Line, it is on purpose, and Chicago’s version creates the same buzz and the same increase in property values for homes and businesses bordering the trail. Although New York’s real estate is pricier, Chicagoans boast their park is longer (2.7 versus 1.45 miles), nearby restaurants are better and less expensive and bicycles are allowed on their elevated trail. Chicago’s Bloomingdale Trail is also called The 606, after metro Chicago’s zip code prefix, an umbrella name that encompasses the five ground-level neighborhood parks which will link to the trail, a planned observatory, a skate park and numerous art installations. The 606 website offers an interactive map and trail information. The 606 bisects Logan Square and Humboldt Park at its western end. Logan Square, a business and residential neighborhood accessed by several CTA Blue Line subway stations, features James Beard Award-winning restaurants, a popular music scene and a Sunday farmer’s market. Pick up local maps at City Lit Books; get lunch at Lula Cafe; visit Felt, an upscale women’s designer boutique; or have drinks and dinner at Analogue, a trendy Cajun-influenced cocktail, lunch and dinner venue. The farm-to-table restaurant and bar Longman & Eagle offers six upscale/casual guestrooms on its second floor. Humboldt Park displays a proud Latino tradition, with some buildings decorated in great splashes of colorful murals. Enjoy numerous Caribbean and Latin American restaurants like Bullhead Cantina, serving slow-roasted brisket tacos and grilled sweet potatoes. Scofflaw, a popular gin-centric cocktail bar, opens weekends and midweek nights, and be sure to grab something sweet at Roeser’s Bakery, opened in 1911, the oldest family-run bakery in Chicago. The well-heeled neighborhoods of Bucktown and Wicker Park border The 606 at its eastern end. Stop at the RSVP Gallery hip clothing boutique or Dove’s Luncheonette, an eclectic Tex-Mex diner serving three meals daily. In Wicker Park, Chicago’s hipster neighborhood, find artisan doughnuts and the popular Double Door concert hall. The installations at Damen Arts Plaza integrate art along the trail. This month, Wicker Park expects the opening of a 75-room boutique hotel by Mexico-based Grupo Habita, to occupy a historic Art Deco building near the trail.