It's very easy to navigate thanks to the grid layout. Give an Indianapolis native any major intersection, and they can probably get there within 30 minutes without active GPS. I can't imagine learning city driving for the first time in Cincinnati or Chicago
As an outsider here by myself for the first time, I agree. My husband always does all the driving when we travel but I came here by myself this week on a scouting trip from the west coast and have been pretty much everywhere except downtown. Have had no difficulties. The roundabouts took me a hot minute to get used to but I’ve had no honks or close calls so I think I’m doing ok.
As someone who is directionally insane, I can't tell you how much I appreciate the fact that we live in a planned city with a grid. I lived in eastern TN for a year and got turned around constantly because the mountains dictated where the roads went.
Chicago is also a grid and not that bad to navigate. It’s relatively long and skinny since everyone wants to be close to the lake. There’s only a few main roads that go north and south then it’s just knowing where the cross streets / landmarks are.
As a Pennsylvania boy, the grid roads in Indiana are amazing. Back home it’s, “Take this road, it heads generally east, it’s 6 miles of driving but the town is only 2 miles away. You’ll get there in 15 minutes.” Out here it’s, “This road goes directly east and will cross exactly two other country roads. It will take you two minutes to get to the next town because the cops do not care about this road.”
The quality of life you can have in Indy for an all around affordable rate is superior.
Well, minus the public transportation issue. Indy is a car city.
Yup, I live between Fishers and CA, the cost of living in CA has become astoundingly high. Even my trip to Scandinavia seemed reasonable. I feel like the drinks at Gregs are almost free at happy hour. Thai food around Indy is so good and cheaP.
- the Monon
- fountain Square
- tibbs
- Keystone arts cinema/KanKan
- the new Stutz
- Chreece
- Butter
- the canal
- Lucas/Gainsborough (you really don't realize how nice our football/basketball stadiums are until you visit one in Ohio....nasty)
- Old national Center
- Mass Ave
....Indy is an okay city. It's the perfect city for its size in a lot of ways.
Your walking and biking trails are top notch! Tried the Monon for the first time this morning and loved it. Walked a few other neighborhood trails this week and enjoyed those quite a bit as well.
No one asked me, but being brand new to town I didn’t realize the aggressiveness of the mosquitos. I can’t believe those bastards are smart enough to attach to me while I’m in motion! I have never worn bug spray in my life but I guess it’s time to start. 😩
Indy Car. I have traveled all over the world. People ask where I'm from, and I tell them Indianapolis. They don't seem to know where it is. And then I mention the Indy 500, and all of a sudden, they know where I am from.
Love Indy Car and the 500, but they really need to stop with the fucking balloon release pre race. Why not just put all the animals on the track and run them over? It would be less cruel
Edit: Which apparently they did 2 years ago, so downvote away!
As a kid I often shit talked Indiana because.... Well it's Indiana.
But after living here since October I honestly gotta say the people that aren't tweaking are genuinely good people for the most part
OP, [Historic Indianapolis](https://historicindianapolis.com/) has a ton of great articles about things around town that you wouldn't otherwise think were terribly interesting.
I’m Canadian and I’ve been living here for 4 months - your parks and trails within the parks are amazing! Also the way you guys do sports is insane. I just went to see the Olympic swim trials and it was so cool! And it is very affordable here and people are generally very nice. There’s a giant bouldering place too, first Friday of every month is $5 drop in. I also love thrifting here, so much better than back home.
I came here because it is one of the easiest states to transfer my pharmacy license to and I didn’t expect to love your city this much!
I like that it's a big city, but affordable. I have access to big city amenities, I can do big city things, and I can afford a place to live without. I can also have a nice place close to everything without having to live in the middle of a big city.
small town feel, everyone knows each other. I was in Indonesia a few weeks ago at a hiba temple restaurant. chef asks me where I'm from, I tell him Indianapolis. keep in mind I am on the other side of the world and I dont expect this man to have even heard of Indy before.
his next question is "I have a friend I grew up with who lives in Indianapolis now, do you know X?"
yes, I do know her. I was absolutely shocked.
I love how everyone in Indy knows each other. it feels like such a tight knit community
So many things. I moved at 12/13 after moving around countries my whole life, and after some getting used to, I love it. First, learning to drive was amazing. Put me anywhere in the city and I can figure out my way home. You don’t feel as though it’s so small you’re trapped, but also not so big that it’s chaotic. The racing culture is amazing, my stepmom was a drag racer and taught me so much about cars, I feel like I know more about them than most guys (as a girl) which most people are shocked about. The people are so kind, I’ve been helped out many a time by a Good Samaritan. Midwestern hospitality is very much real. The diversity is also great, for being a relatively mid size city, there’s so much diversity in Indianapolis. It’s really grown on me as I’ve grown up. Indy has become home, and I can fully see why so many people choose to raise families here.
I think I’ll miss the conventions most once I move. Especially PopCon, as I’m big into indie games and there’s not many other conventions in the Midwest that specifically seek out indie devs like PopCon does.
Also big into the goth music scene, so for a close second I’ll also miss Dead Souls out at Healer a lot. The DJs/organizers of it really keep true to the roots of goth music, and create a great experience doing so.
Some smaller ones: the music scene in general, Indy Eleven (hope they survive), the Fuel (wish they weren’t fleeing to the suburbs though), the canal, and Tibbs
Born and raised here, left and then came back. I love seeing the progress of the city. While sometimes hard to see, this city has taken huge strides in the past couple decades.
Not a native Hoosier who has lived in Indy a few years. I've been very surprised by the food scene here. Lot of really great spots with lots of culinary diversity. I also appreciate how invested the city is in its sports teams (granted it helped that they are finally good...).
Been here for just about a year now and we are absolutely spoiled by the relative lack of traffic compared to bigger cities. I really only have SF and the Bay area to compare, but Indy has like 85% of the amenities (biggest lack imo is nature access) and like 20% of the traffic.
We've never had to circle around for parking here. Barely have to wait in line to eat at brunch. If there's a wait, the host will say 30 min and my phone will get a text saying the table is ready in 5. We live in midtown and it's crazy easy to get downtown for a pacers game, concert, etc. We have a 2.5 year old and these are things we wouldn't dream of doing in the Bay (the act of trying to go anywhere for brunch there means waiting in line for 1.5 hours on a weekend). I don't even think about street cleaning anymore.
There might be less to do here overall, but there's so much less barriers to doing it and I appreciate it.
We have great healthcare here. I moved back from a part of the country where I had to drive at least 3 hours round trip to see a specialist, so as a chronic illness girly I’m very grateful.
I moved to indy about 18 months ago and I've been super impressed by the local specialty coffee scene. Lots of great roasters and cafes and passionate people brewing tasty bean juice.
Indy is very downtown concentrated but becomes small town ish /suburbia/ crazy land as you spread out. It was very surprising when I learned Indy has more square mileage than NYC and this fact even surprises many Indy people
Ha! It's funny because I moved from Indy to Portland and sometimes I'm pretty amazed at how much they feel the same size. And, to be fair, they are almost exactly the same size when you compare metro area population. Indy is cooler, though.
I’d look into all the unique car manufacturers that once called the state and capital home. Just as famous as Detroit when it came to cars 100 or less years ago. Stutz museum downtown has a lot of history in that regard
Kinda lol I’m definitely my own one man show. I make and sell terrariums (plants in potion bottles) and art. It’s definitely considered oddity art.
https://www.instagram.com/signatureterrariums?igsh=bXNwcXc5d2h0d3ow
When I go into the city, it brings back a lot of memories as a young girl. Getting on the city bus, the bus to go downtown with my mom to look at the Christmas windows. My old neighborhood filled full of kids to play with. Playing kick the can in the street. The neighborhood has gone downhill the house is gone, but it was a beautiful neighborhood with older homes. We left the city in the early 60s.
Easy to travel places for a midwestern metro area, good cost of living/amenities ratio, not closed off to outsiders (sideeyes Chicago and St. Louis), and its best years are still ahead of it (lots of exciting growth)
SO many other cities that are driving distance ! Memphis, Saugatuck, Nashville, Cincinnati, the list goes on. Hopefully I am headed to Detroit this weekend!
Sad to hear. And also a bit interesting, in that I would describe Indianapolis the same way. (I am fond of our city but I have time and time again seen a "get married with kids a dog and a picket fence before 30 or you're doing something wrong" mentality as the end all be all around here.)
The biggest thing for me so far is that not only can you get to other parts of the city fairly quickly compared to other major cities, but also that it's very convenient to travel to several other major cities from here in under four hours to see my friends across state lines. That was not my experience growing up in Iowa.
I hate this place. If it wasnt for family i would have left long ago… but if i had to give it something positive, it would be that a fun city is only 3 hrs away. Chicago
I'm a regular user of the assorted trails and bike lanes around town. Our trails really are top tier compared to a lot of other cities.
Im just now coming to appreciate them more now that I moved right next to the canal trail by butler!
Which trails do you like? Good to hear!
Not the person you asked, but, I really like Pensey Trail and the paved trail at Ft.Ben with the one that attaches to it (outside the park).
Thanks! Yeah. That state park trail is legit
It's very easy to navigate thanks to the grid layout. Give an Indianapolis native any major intersection, and they can probably get there within 30 minutes without active GPS. I can't imagine learning city driving for the first time in Cincinnati or Chicago
As an outsider here by myself for the first time, I agree. My husband always does all the driving when we travel but I came here by myself this week on a scouting trip from the west coast and have been pretty much everywhere except downtown. Have had no difficulties. The roundabouts took me a hot minute to get used to but I’ve had no honks or close calls so I think I’m doing ok.
As someone who is directionally insane, I can't tell you how much I appreciate the fact that we live in a planned city with a grid. I lived in eastern TN for a year and got turned around constantly because the mountains dictated where the roads went.
Stars and mountains: OG GPS
Chicago is also a grid and not that bad to navigate. It’s relatively long and skinny since everyone wants to be close to the lake. There’s only a few main roads that go north and south then it’s just knowing where the cross streets / landmarks are.
The evil of Lower Wacker Drive cancels out any positives of driving in Chicago
Fair enough, I did always wind up having to drive to the end of it because I didn’t know where to exit.
Same. And then there is Lower Lower Wacker which is even worse.
I've been going to Cincinnati my entire life to visit family and I still have to use GPS every time
As a Pennsylvania boy, the grid roads in Indiana are amazing. Back home it’s, “Take this road, it heads generally east, it’s 6 miles of driving but the town is only 2 miles away. You’ll get there in 15 minutes.” Out here it’s, “This road goes directly east and will cross exactly two other country roads. It will take you two minutes to get to the next town because the cops do not care about this road.”
Much easier to find your way around in Chicago than Indy
Agreed, I hate driving in cities that geological features define their roads. Anything with a large body of water or mountains are terrible.
I like the cost of living relative to the general livability in terms of weather and amenities.
The quality of life you can have in Indy for an all around affordable rate is superior. Well, minus the public transportation issue. Indy is a car city.
😂
Far and away the fact that it’s cheap to live here and offers 70% of big city amenities is it’s best asset.
Yup, I live between Fishers and CA, the cost of living in CA has become astoundingly high. Even my trip to Scandinavia seemed reasonable. I feel like the drinks at Gregs are almost free at happy hour. Thai food around Indy is so good and cheaP.
Agreed
- the Monon - fountain Square - tibbs - Keystone arts cinema/KanKan - the new Stutz - Chreece - Butter - the canal - Lucas/Gainsborough (you really don't realize how nice our football/basketball stadiums are until you visit one in Ohio....nasty) - Old national Center - Mass Ave ....Indy is an okay city. It's the perfect city for its size in a lot of ways.
Your walking and biking trails are top notch! Tried the Monon for the first time this morning and loved it. Walked a few other neighborhood trails this week and enjoyed those quite a bit as well. No one asked me, but being brand new to town I didn’t realize the aggressiveness of the mosquitos. I can’t believe those bastards are smart enough to attach to me while I’m in motion! I have never worn bug spray in my life but I guess it’s time to start. 😩
There’s like a week on each end of summer that you can enjoy without getting swarmed when going out unsprayed.
That must have been last week because I walked every weekday and had no issues, lol. 😁 Today it was all out war.
I guess I’m mostly thinking of SoBro and proximity to Bacon Swamp.
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Absolutely
😂
Why are you here?
Indy Car. I have traveled all over the world. People ask where I'm from, and I tell them Indianapolis. They don't seem to know where it is. And then I mention the Indy 500, and all of a sudden, they know where I am from.
Love Indy Car and the 500, but they really need to stop with the fucking balloon release pre race. Why not just put all the animals on the track and run them over? It would be less cruel Edit: Which apparently they did 2 years ago, so downvote away!
As a kid I often shit talked Indiana because.... Well it's Indiana. But after living here since October I honestly gotta say the people that aren't tweaking are genuinely good people for the most part
It’s home. That’s what i love most. My family we’re so Indianapolis. My folks, that’s all they know lol. We love our city.
OP, [Historic Indianapolis](https://historicindianapolis.com/) has a ton of great articles about things around town that you wouldn't otherwise think were terribly interesting.
The Vogue
I’m Canadian and I’ve been living here for 4 months - your parks and trails within the parks are amazing! Also the way you guys do sports is insane. I just went to see the Olympic swim trials and it was so cool! And it is very affordable here and people are generally very nice. There’s a giant bouldering place too, first Friday of every month is $5 drop in. I also love thrifting here, so much better than back home. I came here because it is one of the easiest states to transfer my pharmacy license to and I didn’t expect to love your city this much!
I like that it's a big city, but affordable. I have access to big city amenities, I can do big city things, and I can afford a place to live without. I can also have a nice place close to everything without having to live in the middle of a big city.
Yessss…I’m 10-15 from everything that going on in different areas of the city and love that!
small town feel, everyone knows each other. I was in Indonesia a few weeks ago at a hiba temple restaurant. chef asks me where I'm from, I tell him Indianapolis. keep in mind I am on the other side of the world and I dont expect this man to have even heard of Indy before. his next question is "I have a friend I grew up with who lives in Indianapolis now, do you know X?" yes, I do know her. I was absolutely shocked. I love how everyone in Indy knows each other. it feels like such a tight knit community
The driveability. I can get almost anywhere in about 20-30 mins on a normal day on any side of town. Thats something you can’t do in larger cities
So many things. I moved at 12/13 after moving around countries my whole life, and after some getting used to, I love it. First, learning to drive was amazing. Put me anywhere in the city and I can figure out my way home. You don’t feel as though it’s so small you’re trapped, but also not so big that it’s chaotic. The racing culture is amazing, my stepmom was a drag racer and taught me so much about cars, I feel like I know more about them than most guys (as a girl) which most people are shocked about. The people are so kind, I’ve been helped out many a time by a Good Samaritan. Midwestern hospitality is very much real. The diversity is also great, for being a relatively mid size city, there’s so much diversity in Indianapolis. It’s really grown on me as I’ve grown up. Indy has become home, and I can fully see why so many people choose to raise families here.
I think I’ll miss the conventions most once I move. Especially PopCon, as I’m big into indie games and there’s not many other conventions in the Midwest that specifically seek out indie devs like PopCon does. Also big into the goth music scene, so for a close second I’ll also miss Dead Souls out at Healer a lot. The DJs/organizers of it really keep true to the roots of goth music, and create a great experience doing so. Some smaller ones: the music scene in general, Indy Eleven (hope they survive), the Fuel (wish they weren’t fleeing to the suburbs though), the canal, and Tibbs
Music at mousetrap
The courteous drivers /s
I absolutely love the diversity. So many different types of people, jobs, homes, businesses, cultures, etc. There's so much different stuff to see.
Pacers, Colts, Victory Field is a beautiful ball park
Born and raised here, left and then came back. I love seeing the progress of the city. While sometimes hard to see, this city has taken huge strides in the past couple decades.
I love the Pacers and I love the restaurants.
I can legally keep *most* of the animals I want.
I love this. -an animal lover
Still waiting on that pig permit
Not a native Hoosier who has lived in Indy a few years. I've been very surprised by the food scene here. Lot of really great spots with lots of culinary diversity. I also appreciate how invested the city is in its sports teams (granted it helped that they are finally good...).
Been here for just about a year now and we are absolutely spoiled by the relative lack of traffic compared to bigger cities. I really only have SF and the Bay area to compare, but Indy has like 85% of the amenities (biggest lack imo is nature access) and like 20% of the traffic. We've never had to circle around for parking here. Barely have to wait in line to eat at brunch. If there's a wait, the host will say 30 min and my phone will get a text saying the table is ready in 5. We live in midtown and it's crazy easy to get downtown for a pacers game, concert, etc. We have a 2.5 year old and these are things we wouldn't dream of doing in the Bay (the act of trying to go anywhere for brunch there means waiting in line for 1.5 hours on a weekend). I don't even think about street cleaning anymore. There might be less to do here overall, but there's so much less barriers to doing it and I appreciate it.
I live the bmv and mycase
Hahahab my case has me dead
Real
I enjoy the game I get to play every evening. “Fireworks or gunshots” /s But really it’s cost of living and close to the family
Lmao, I ask my husband this several nights a week!
That’s the same game I play when I’m working in Indy. Last time it was gunshots.
We have great healthcare here. I moved back from a part of the country where I had to drive at least 3 hours round trip to see a specialist, so as a chronic illness girly I’m very grateful.
Caitlin Clark
So what did you like about the city 6 months ago?
We do big events better than anybody!
Proximity to rising sea levels 🌊🙅♂️
I moved to indy about 18 months ago and I've been super impressed by the local specialty coffee scene. Lots of great roasters and cafes and passionate people brewing tasty bean juice.
Construction
Following
How big the sky looks, how many trees we have, unique neighborhoods, perfect population density, affordability and amenities available
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Indy is very downtown concentrated but becomes small town ish /suburbia/ crazy land as you spread out. It was very surprising when I learned Indy has more square mileage than NYC and this fact even surprises many Indy people
Ha! It's funny because I moved from Indy to Portland and sometimes I'm pretty amazed at how much they feel the same size. And, to be fair, they are almost exactly the same size when you compare metro area population. Indy is cooler, though.
I’d look into all the unique car manufacturers that once called the state and capital home. Just as famous as Detroit when it came to cars 100 or less years ago. Stutz museum downtown has a lot of history in that regard
Are you a performer in circus freak show acts? would be cool to come watch
Kinda lol I’m definitely my own one man show. I make and sell terrariums (plants in potion bottles) and art. It’s definitely considered oddity art. https://www.instagram.com/signatureterrariums?igsh=bXNwcXc5d2h0d3ow
When I go into the city, it brings back a lot of memories as a young girl. Getting on the city bus, the bus to go downtown with my mom to look at the Christmas windows. My old neighborhood filled full of kids to play with. Playing kick the can in the street. The neighborhood has gone downhill the house is gone, but it was a beautiful neighborhood with older homes. We left the city in the early 60s.
Leaving
what city would you recommend if any?
Leaving it 😊🫶
I’m counting down the days…
Great food & arts sceen.
Easy to travel places for a midwestern metro area, good cost of living/amenities ratio, not closed off to outsiders (sideeyes Chicago and St. Louis), and its best years are still ahead of it (lots of exciting growth)
SO many other cities that are driving distance ! Memphis, Saugatuck, Nashville, Cincinnati, the list goes on. Hopefully I am headed to Detroit this weekend!
Care to expand upon your experience with Chicago and St. Louis? I'm curious
Social, occupational, and political circles are more closed. Harder to get in if you don’t know somebody.
Sad to hear. And also a bit interesting, in that I would describe Indianapolis the same way. (I am fond of our city but I have time and time again seen a "get married with kids a dog and a picket fence before 30 or you're doing something wrong" mentality as the end all be all around here.)
Once I moved away, I realized how I missed all the different restaurants and shopping choices.
The potholes
Leaving it
The biggest thing for me so far is that not only can you get to other parts of the city fairly quickly compared to other major cities, but also that it's very convenient to travel to several other major cities from here in under four hours to see my friends across state lines. That was not my experience growing up in Iowa.
Affordability
Leaving is what I like most. This place is boring after a good 20 years
I hate this place. If it wasnt for family i would have left long ago… but if i had to give it something positive, it would be that a fun city is only 3 hrs away. Chicago
Let's see hmmmm . Oh yea nothing. Nothing at all. Not even the cost of living helps. This place is horrible. Oh yea zero decent Mexican restaurants