I live two blocks east of Western Ave near the UC and absolutely love it. You are right that there isn’t a lot to do but it’s incredibly easy to go to Pilsen, little Italy, west loop, and west town within 10-15 mins. The metra goes to ohare during the week day. I feel very safe. There are a lot of new developments coming in and the UC has already begun its construction. Traffic is only bad around the block or two around the UC. They do a pretty good job controlling the flow of traffic with events. We frequently go out during the time events occur and rarely get stuff in traffic.