Segregation in the City of Chicago

John Hagedorn has created a nifty little .gif file that plots the racial divide within the city of Chicago across the 20th Century, it is available here. To someone unacquainted with Chicago's history it might seem strange how drastically the ethnic makeup of the city's 77 community areas changes from decade to decade. The map is read as follows: blue denotes majority white population, red denotes majority black population, yellow denotes majority Latino population and green denotes majority Asian population while purple denotes no single ethnicity is in the majority. The black population grows from a corridor along South State St. following the Great Migration during World War I to a much bigger swath following the Second Great Migration during World War II to an even bigger area that includes much of the West Side after many (white) returning veterans took advantage of federal loans that encouraged home construction in new suburbs and particularly in "racially homogenous areas". This phenomenon is commonly referred to as white flight. In class it was pointed out that these policies were short-sighted as they effectively changed the makeup and economic vibrancy of the city in many ways.
In the last 3 decades of the 20th Century the segregation of the city changed from a purely black/white paradigm to one that included pockets of Latino population (particularly in Pilsen, Little Village and Humboldt Park), one community area becoming mostly Asian (Armour Square, which includes Chinatown) and many community areas, particularly in the North Side, having no ethnic majority by the end of the century. Some such as Rogers Park are the result of neighborhoods consisting of various ethnic groups sprang up in close vicinity and thrived while others such as West Town (which includes Wicker Park and the Ukrainian Village) and Logan Square have lost ethnic majorities due to gentrification, which usually consists first of young artists and students (typically white) and then of young professionals (again, typically white).
This map is using data that is already 8 years old and as such, it is slightly outdated.