Columbus vs Indianapolis

[Tenzo]

Originally Posted by jmargaret

I don't understand the propensity (of some posters) to cite the # of LGBT residents as the benchmark for "progressiveness" or "open-mindedness" or "high housing values". .

It seems to be the new 'some of my best friends are black'.

"Look how open minded I am, we have a LGBT person in our neighborhood and no one has burned a cross on their yard yet!" But as someone else has posted; it's best if they stick to their own groups.

[MissingIndiana]

Overall, I think the two towns are pretty similar: very close on the metro and city populations, similar distribution of wealth in similar parts of town, very similar in the landscape. As for education, Columbus does have OSU but I think that Indy's close proximity to both IU and Purdue allow it to compete for this category. To make distinctions, I would give the following as advantages for each.

Indy:
-MUCH better downtown. Some years back, Indy made it a point to invest in downtown and that has resulted in a lot of great facilities including museums, sports, restaurants, shopping, etc. Columbus has begun to develop the Arena district area, but has a long way to go IF they choose to try to catch up to Indy in this respect. And they may not, Columbus has other neighborhoods that kind of serve this purpose.
-More nationally recognized, partially thanks to the 500, Colts, and Pacers
-About 3 hours closer to Chicago if you're into that sort of thing

Columbus:
-The highway system is set up much better for access around the city and the speed limits are 65 through most of town.
-MUCH better neighborhoods that are CLOSE to downtown (ie Bexley, Grandview, short north, german village, Upper Arlington). Unfortunately you have to get a good ways out of downtown in Indy before you get to these types of places (ie Meridian-Kessler and points futher north). They are there though, with some beautiful/historic homes to boot
-Metro Parks. I think Columbus has one of the best Metro Parks systems in the country. There are so many of them and the ones I have visited are beautiful(ie Inniswood, Highbanks, Blendon Woods, Darby). Indy has Eagle Creek in town and Brown County not far away, but I have to give this one to Columbus.

As a side note, I've noticed some comments on some of these threads that are, to say the least, fairly asinine, biased, and misleading. This is just a friendly reminder to those who are here truly looking for information to make a decision, that it may be best to look at the concrete aspects of the cities discussed first and then visit these areas before making your decisions about the people or belief systems there. Although fairly conservative, both Indy and Columbus are good sized cities. All types of attitudes/beliefs can be found and I have found that either city has sufficient options available to make of it what you wish.

[bgo]

MissingIndiana: good points. Like most of Columbus, most of the people on this post are just a few years out of college and thus have not experienced life. This explains the types of comments on the posts. It is ridiculous to think that anyone could get a reasonable compare/contrast analysis from them, so I would also agree that anyone reading these posts just read them for entertainment value, and not true information seeking reasons.

There's even one person, at least, who writes on this post for a LIVING. And it's so obvious. An inexpensive way to "promote" Columbus, I suppose.

[streetcreed]

-MUCH better neighborhoods that are CLOSE to downtown (ie Bexley, Grandview, short north, german village, Upper Arlington). Unfortunately you have to get a good ways out of downtown in Indy before you get to these types of places (ie Meridian-Kessler and points futher north). They are there though, with some beautiful/historic homes to boot

GOOD POINT!

Columbus is one of the few big midwestern cities with urban, clean, safe, neighborhoods (with local retail strips of restraurants/shops/galleries) right next to its downtown.

In say Indianapolis you have to drive further out of the central city to see such a thing.

Cleveland has nearly no fully gentrified urban neighborhoods in the city limits. Ask a Cleveland citizen "where they great urban neighborhoods are with retail?" They will list off great urban neighborhoods like Lakewood or Cleveland Heights, etc. but all of these are not in the city limits.

Columbus is a gem in terms of its center city neighborhoods. Columbus is a not a city you judge on its downtown but its urban/liveable neighborhoods.

[14thandYou]

Originally Posted by Tenzo

Columbus is downright xenophobic

I live in one of the most progressive cities in the country (DC), and I've met more than my share of close-minded xenophobes here. Columbus is a midwestern city, so you are going to see more of that behavior than you will in the coastal cities. But in terms of its size and geographic location, Columbus is generally a more open-minded and progressive city than most. Particularly in comparison to cities like Indianapolis, Cincinnati, St. Louis, etc.

[sauerkraut145]

I'm a runner and the jogging trails of Columbus are better than Indy's. The Indy Monon bike/jog Trail has too many street crosings and finding good safe parking is hard to do. Columbus has the Olentangy bike/jog trail and the Heritage trail in Hilliard, Ohio to name a few. Plus, many metro parks have jogging trails too such as Sharon Woods has a 4-mile loop trail, a real nice place to run. The city of Omaha, NE has a huge network of jogging trails a runner's heaven. www.omahatrails.com