Optimist Park.

Optimist Hall, the food hall in the 1892 Highland Park Mill, anchors the neighborhood with more than 25 vendors. The Little Sugar Creek Greenway runs along the neighborhood's edge toward Uptown. The LYNX Blue Line stops at Parkwood station. Camp North End is about a mile north; NoDa is next door; Uptown is about a mile and a half.

28206 is a young, mostly renting zip code: about two-thirds of households rent and the median age is in the early thirties, per the Census Bureau. New for-sale homes here are mostly bought by people already living in the area's apartments, and by buyers who want Uptown access without a yard.

Buyers ask, so here is the honest answer. CMPD publishes citywide numbers (overall crime down 16 percent and violent crime down 8 percent at the 2026 midyear report) and Blue Line ridership crime fell sharply in 2026 after patrols were added following the 2025 attack on a train far south of here. CMPD does not publish neighborhood-level statistics, so any Optimist Park-specific number you read online is not from the police. Our suggestion is the one long-time residents give: walk it on a weeknight evening and judge it yourself.

New construction here sells well above the zip's median home value, which is a way of saying the neighborhood is changing. New townhomes range from the high $500s to the mid $700s depending on size and position. Resale townhomes from the 2010s and early 2020s trade lower per square foot; new homes carry a warranty, current systems and finishes chosen once.