Austin's eastern boundary is the Belt Railway located just east of Cicero Avenue.

Its southernmost border is at Roosevelt Road from the Belt Railway west to Austin Boulevard.

Austin, a businessman and real estate speculator, developed the namesake Austinville subdivision.

[4] However, by the 1890s, the heavily populated Austin area dominated town politics, but did not constitute a majority of voters.

The Austin-controlled township government allowed the Lake Street Elevated to extend into Oak Park.

Outraged, the other residents of Cicero Township voted to allow Chicago to annex the Austin area in an 1899 referendum.

[3] After the arrival of African Americans during the Great Migration, race-related prejudices such as a case of the White flight movement, with a dramatic decrease in White residents, White-owned businesses, equal city services support and resources, racially motivated realtor practices, and industrial jobs.

These trends of a decline in city services and resources and jobs would continue for the rest of the 20th century with Austin.

[10] During the development of the property, then-Alderman Ike Carothers solicited a bribe to allow the permitting process and zoning changes to move forward.

The subsequent trials created a political scandal,[11] and ended with the conviction of the developer and Carothers on various felony charges.

The area is a historically Italian-American community with a sizable population of Chicago city employees.

[15] Since the 1980s, it has seen an increase in African-American and Latino residents, but this integration has occurred peacefully in contrast with other areas of Chicago.

[21] It encompasses roughly a square mile and its western and southern borders are to the suburbs of Oak Park and Cicero, respectively.

It is further isolated from the rest of Austin by an industrial corridor to its east and railroad tracks and Interstate 290 to the north.

Politically, the area went heavily for Jane Byrne in the Democratic primary and for Edward Vrdolyak against Harold Washington in the 1987 mayoral election that broke down on racial lines.

It is bordered by Division Street to the north, Austin Boulevard to the west, Roosevelt Road to the south, and Cicero Avenue to the east.

According to a 2016 analysis by the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning, 99,711 people and 32,277 households were residing in the area.

The Austin Town Hall City Market is held to stave off the food desert complex.

L. Nicole Trottie, founder and publisher of West Suburban Journal, is the first black woman in Illinois' 190-year history to found an accredited weekly newspaper.

Trottie is also the first African-American woman ever elected to serve on the Illinois Press Association's executive board of directors in its 150-year newspaper-rich history.

Both papers are published on Wednesdays and distributed in stores, office buildings, and recreational venues throughout the community.

[51] At the local level, Austin is located in Chicago's 28th, 29th, and 37th wards represented by Democrats Jason Ervin, Chris Taliaferro, and Emma Mitts, respectively.