Time has not treated all commercial districts in Chicago as kindly as it has Six Corners. The triple intersection where Irving Park Road meets Milwaukee and Cicero Avenues has long been and remains one of the city's retail strongholds.

"This neighborhood never hit the skids like some have," said June D. Schmidt, vice president and director at Columbia National Bank's Six Corners branch, which anchors the northwest corner at Cicero and Milwaukee.

"It's a vital piece of real estate," said George Rosenbaum, chief executive of Leo J. Shapiro, a Chicago market research firm.

Indeed, Six Corners ranks among the city's top five shopping districts, with sales volume surpassed only by the Loop, North Michigan Avenue, Ford City Shopping Center (on the Southwest Side) and Brickyard Mall (on the Far Northwest Side), according to Jeannine Smentek, executive director of the Portage Park Chamber of Commerce. "That makes it the No. 1 neighborhood strip shopping district," she said.

Although there are many triple intersections in Chicago, this one, part of the Portage Park community on the Northwest Side, has been the only to capitalize on "Six Corners" as a marketing logo. The neighborhood gleaned its name from an old portage route used by Indians to transport canoes between the Chicago and Des Plaines rivers. In the mid-1800s, the area was incorporated as the town of Jefferson (which also included what today is the Jefferson Park community). In 1840, the Dickinson Inn was built a block north of the Six Corners intersection on Milwaukee and a town hall was built in 1862 where LaSalle Northwest National Bank stands today. Jefferson was annexed by the city in 1907.

Despite this stirring of commercial activity, the Six Corners neighborhood retained its rural flavor until the turn of the century, said Bill Tyre, president of the Irving Park Historical Society. A dairy farm stood on the northeast corner, where a Sears, Roebuck and Co. store stands today, and a cherry orchard occupied the southwest corner, now the site of Borovik Drug Co.

Yet the emergence of street cars on Milwaukee, Irving Park and Cicero in the early 1900s helped to spark retail activity and small shops began to replace barns and farmhouses.

When The Portage movie theater, an ornate brick building complete with an organ, was built in the 1920s, it became the major social attraction for the area.

"The Portage was the place to go," said Saundra Sandberg, part of the family that founded Sandberg Jewelers in 1919. The store's first location was adjacent to the majestic movie theater on Milwaukee Avenue. "Quite a few engagement rings were sold as couples stood in line," she said. The Portage now shows second-run movies for $2.

In 1938, Sears built a store at 4730 W. Irving Park Rd., anchoring the area as a retail center. Today, more than 150 stores and services can be found within a two-block radius of the triple intersection. A mixture of national chains-Pier 1 Imports, Payless ShoeSource, Blockbuster Video-and old family businesses including Sandberg Jewelers, Borovik Drug Co. (founded in 1922) and Werbner's men's store (founded in 1940).

Transportation has been a key factor in Six Corners' commercial success, observed Edward Marciniak, president of the Institute of Urban Life at Loyola University.

Cruising Irving Park Road each day are about 19,000 cars and 308 buses; on Cicero Avenue, 29,700 cars and 297 buses; and on Milwaukee Avenue, 10,000 cars and 288 buses, according to statistics from the city's Bureau of Street Traffic.

On top of that, Six Corners is bordered by a stable residential community of about 57,000 people in the Portage Park area. "There are a lot of walk-to buyers," adds Marciniak.

The residential community has been a boon to the commercial sector in other ways: "We have personal bankers that have been here 20 years," said Jack Macholl, vice president of marketing at LaSalle Northwest National Bank, 4747 W. Irving Park. Macholl said that a large number of employees at the Six Corners branch live in the neighborhood. "I think people take more pride in their work (when they do)," said Macholl.

Still, Six Corners suffered a slight slump as a retail community in the late 1980s. "Until 1985, our commercial vacancy rate was always below 1 percent," said Smentek. Vacancies shot up as high as 9 percent in 1990, but have dropped back down to 6 percent today, Smentek said. Not bad when you consider vacancies downtown (excluding North Michigan Avenue) are averaging about 18 percent and surburban vacancies are at about 10 percent.

Some businesses' loss proved to be others' gain as surviving players got a chance to jockey for better position by moving into shuttered storefronts. Payless ShoeSource, for one, moved last November from 4037 N. Milwaukee Ave. -a location it occupied for several years-to 3951 N. Cicero Ave.

Now anchoring the southeast corner, the shoe retailer has greater visibility plus a wider storefront, said Rick Nida, director of corporate communications at Payless ShoeSource headquarters in Topeka, Kan., describing the old store configuration as "narrow and deep."

Nida would not cite specific figures, but said sales have been "excellent" since the relocation, with "dramatic increases" in sales volume.

And how are newcomers to Six Corners faring?

- P.J. Phillips, a 25,000-square-foot women's apparel store, moved in last December at 4031 N. Milwaukee Ave. Currently, sales are running about 10 percent above projections, reported store manager Kenny Evans.

- Minnesota Fabrics, a 8,000-square-feet store at 4848 W. Irving Park Rd., debuted Sept. 30. Sales have been running about 10 percent above plan, said district manager Jack Stroede.

- Lots For Less, a 5,000-square-foot discounter of general merchandise, opened in October at 4070 N. Milwaukee Ave. Currently sales are on plan and the unit is expected to become a top performer, according to Gloria Dolan, office manager for the Cicero-based retailer, which operates 12 stores in the Chicago area.

- Pet Care Superstore, 4072 N. Milwaukee, opened at the end of September. Store manager Mike Ward dubbed sales as "pretty good, but still a little below plan. . . . People are buying more of what they need, like food, rather than toys and accessories."

Although Six Corners has long been a mecca for shoppers seeking moderate-priced goods, many believe the area is poised for a retail renaissance.

That may be because, even though Portage Park traditionally has been an ethnic neighborhood with a mixture of Polish, Italian and German accents, now younger, more affluent residents are moving into the neighborhood, spilling over from the Old Irving Park area, according to Jean Schulz, owner of Jean Schulz Realty.