ITRA GLOBAL Chicago

Following are a few interesting facts about Chicago and its commercial real estate market…

• The City of Chicago is the most populous city in the state of Illinois and the third-most-populous city in the United States.
• Located on the shores of freshwater Lake Michigan, Chicago was incorporated as a city in 1837 near. the portgage between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River watershed and grew rapidly in the mid- 19th century.
• Chicago is an international hub for finance, culture, commerce, industry, education, technology, telecommunications and transportation.
• It is the site of the creation of the first standardized futures contracts, by the Chicago Board of Trade, which today is the largest and most diverse derivatives market in the world, generating 20% of all volume in commodities and financial futures alone.
• Chicago produced the first Steel-frame skyscraper (1885), the first race car (1895), the first American Nobel prize winner (1907), and the first controlled atomic reaction.
• Chicago is home to several Fortune 500 companies, including Allstate, Boeing, Caterpillar, Exelon, Kraft, Heinz, McDonald’s Mondelez, United Airlines Holdings and Walgreens. 
• Along with Boston, Chicago is the only city to continuously host major professional sports since 1871, having only taken 1872 and 1873 off due to the Great Chicago Fire.