There is a possibility that the trend we've seen in improvements resulting in high rent prices would bear out even if Chicago did revitalize the whole city and

There is a possibility that the trend we've seen in improvements resulting in high rent prices would bear out even if Chicago did revitalize the whole city and not just select areas. That'd be due to good old fashioned irrationality and greed on the part of local landlords who would see fit to raise their rents on par with the "gilded" neighborhoods that came before them. This is a whole other issue, which is that once rents go up, they really don't go down, even in the event of a major market crash. I'm not sure if there is a market-based solution for that.