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Park Forest, Illinois

17 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1930 and the latest in 1998. It stands in Rich Township. It lies in ZIP code area 60466. The Survey maps it on the Steger quadrangle. 21,687 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 712 feet above sea level.

Park Forest within Cook County

Population over time

2 figures

Park Forest fell from 21,975 to 21,687 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.

YearPeople Change
201021,975
202021,687-288 (-1%)

Topographic sheets covering this place

9 surveys from 17 printed sheets

Matched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.

Mines and quarries near this place

1 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 1 working within 5 miles of Park Forest: 1 past producer. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Where SiteCommodity StatusRecorded
Chicago Hghts City EngStone, Crushed/BrokenPast Producer

Every working recorded in Cook County

Storms near this place

16 since 1994

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Park Forest in 16 storm reports between 1994 and 2020: 7 hail, 3 thunderstorm wind, 2 flash flood, 2 heavy rain. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

WhenEvent Place namedHarm What the report says
June 2008Tornado (EF1)Park Forest$1,000,000A tornado touched down in South Chicago Heights in the Schubert's Woods Forest Preserve just north of Sauk Trail and west of Forest Preserve Drive. This tornado then tracked northeast across the forest, eventually emerging from the forest near Euclid and west 26th Streets. At this location, large trees were uprooted and portions of a roof were lifted off a large warehouse building. The tornado continued northeast across residential areas north of 26th Street and west of Chicago Road. In this neighborhood, several homes sustained minor damage with two houses sustaining significant damage from large trees falling onto the homes. The tornado continued northeast across Chicago Road eventually lifting near 16th Street and Center Street. Damage to trees was noted all along the path including several large uprooted or snapped in half.
January 2020Heavy RainPark Forest-Rainfall of 2.01 inches was reported.
August 2020Thunderstorm WindPark Forest-A private weather station measured a wind gust to 72 mph on Fir Street.
June 2019Heavy RainPark Forest-Storm total rainfall of 4.11 inches was measured.
June 2019Flash FloodPark Forest-Several cars got stuck in flood waters on Sauk Trail east of Western Avenue. One water rescue was reported where a fire truck was positioned for a driver to step into the truck.
June 2014Flash FloodPark Forest-Around six inches of flowing water was reported on downtown streets of Park Forest.
June 2014Thunderstorm WindPark Forest-A large tree branch and numerous smaller branches were blown down.
August 2007FloodPark Forest-One foot of standing water in a low spot on Western Avenue.
July 1994Thunderstorm WindPark Forest-Tree limbs were blown down and shingles were peeled off roofs through a one-half mile wide path.
May 2019HailPark Forest-no account filed
January 2013HailPark Forest-no account filed
May 2012HailPark Forest-no account filed
April 1999HailPark Forest-no account filed
April 1996HailPark Forest-no account filed
April 1996HailPark Forest-no account filed
April 1994HailPark Forest-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Cook County

Nearest settlements

The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.

Map PlaceDistance Sheets
Olympia Fields1.5 miles25
Indian Hill1.6 miles25
Richton Park1.6 miles17
Matteson2.2 miles25
Graymoor2.3 miles25
Chicago Heights2.3 miles25
Steger2.5 miles17
Crawford Countryside2.9 miles25

Elsewhere

Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.

Wikipedia article on Park ForestAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q949596The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0).

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 415383. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.