The Unvarnished Truth About Indianapolis
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1/15/2018
I have this general rule about cities and it goes like this. People in truly great cities don't care what outsiders think of them. This is true of New York, Boston, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Austin, Minneapolis, and a whole host of other places. People in poseur cities, on the other hand, obsess over it. Dallas and Denver come to mind...and Indianapolis. Especially Indianapolis.
By any reasonable measure, Indianapolis is a hot mess. Horrible violent crime. A huge drug problem. Large scale abandonment across a wide swath of the city. Infrastructure is crumbling. Clueless public officials who prey on clueless residents are the root cause. Lots of stuff gets built...they think it impresses others. Nothing gets maintained. If you're in for the weekend from somewhere else, downtown might appear prosperous but the longer you stay the more you realize it's all a facade with nothing behind it. Circle Center Mall? Failing. NCAA headquarters? Corporate welfare...they pay no rent. The fancy hotels? The stadiums? Take a close look. Most need maintenance already. Nothing stays nice in Indy for very long.
What's sad about this is that Indianapolis could actually be a pretty nice city if people here focused on the little things that all truly great cities do but they won't... They won't invest in the neighborhoods. They don't seem to understand that you can't have a strong core if the surrounding neighborhoods are dead and abandoned. They won't fix the roads or the sewers (downtown literally stinks). That's the heavy lifting great cities do. Indy is looking for the quick fix, like a new soccer stadium that old timers now will never be maintained.
So if you want to come here, please do, but come with your eyes wide open. Don't believe the Chamber of Commerce and tourism nonsense. There are a huge number of insecure millennial boosters who have never been anywhere that pump this city to no end. Thinking adults? They live in HamCo and only come in when necessary. That's the reality. Come and see for yourself. Keep your eyes wide open. It's obvious.
Maggie | Duluth, MN