Describe Your Small City (Indianapolis, Fort Wayne: crime, consignment, home)

[Firebird64]

As a teenager who has lived in a small city in Indiana for most of my life (Crawfordsville), I’d like people from other small cities to describe their city and what it’s like to live there.

Try to describe your city based on these categories:
- Restaurants
- Shopping
- Entertainment/Things to Do
- Education
- Crime (Is your small city safe?)
- Nearest larger cities

Add more categories if you need.

[Firebird64]

Crawfordsville (Pop: around 16,174)

Restaurants:
- Fast Food places include McDonalds, Wendy’s, Taco Bell, Burger King, Culver’s, Domino’s, and a few more. A Starbucks currently being built now.

- Sit Down Places include chains like Applebees, Cracker Barrel, Pizza Hut, Wings Etc, Buffalo Wild Wings, and Arni’s (Indiana chain restaurant)

- Non chain places include El Charro, Little Mexico, and Mi Corcel (Mexican), Brother’s Pizza (Pizza), Creekside Lodge, Allen’s Country Kitchen, and Barefoot Burger (American)

Shopping:
- Walmart, Kroger, County Market, and Big R are the main stores in town. There are also a few clothing and sporting goods stores. GameStop as well and there are more stores but those are the main ones.

Entertainment/Things To Do:
- An AMC movie theater to watch movies
- A park called Milligan Park and a public swimming pool
- South of Crawfordsville are Lake Holiday and Lake Waveland
- Shades State Park and Turkey Run State Park are not too far away if you like walking trails.
- Attend Wabash College sporting events

Education:
- 3 School corporations: Crawfordsville, North Montgomery, and South Montgomery. All the school corporations have only one high school. All of the high schools have 500-600 students each so combined they would have about 1500-1800 students if they all merged into one high school.

- Wabash College is a NCAA Division III all male college with about 800 students.

Crime:
- Not much major crime in Crawfordsville. The majority of arrests come from people using drugs.

Nearest Larger Cities:
-Lafayette is about 45 min drive north of Crawfordsville. Most people in Crawfordsville will go to Lafayette if they want to eat or shop at places Crawfordsville doesn’t have. They might also go to work there.

-Indianapolis is about an hour drive east of Crawfordsville. People in Crawfordsville will come to Indy for the same reason as Lafayette. They might also go for sporting events or to walk around downtown.

-Champaign, Illinois is about an hour and a half drive west of Crawfordsville. It is not very common for people in Crawfordsville to go there, but it is still not too far.

[ischyros]

Goshen (pop. approx. 32,000). I don't live there anymore but grew up there and visit quite often.

Restaurants:
Fast Food: The Usual. 2 McDonalds, 3 Burger Kings, 2 Wendys, Culvers, 3 Taco Bells, 2 Dairy Queens, KFC, Penguin Point, Arbys, Jimmy Jones, Panera Bread

Sit Down: Chains like Chilis, Buffalo Wild Wings, Ponderosa, Applebees, IHOP

Local Places: Hacienda Mexican Restaurant, Dandinos, Goshen Brewing Company, Electric Brew, Lux Cafe, South Side Soda Shop, Olympia Candy Kitchen, Trolley Cafe, Hoppers, several Mexican restaurants and others I haven't tried yet.

Shopping:
Chains: 2 Wal-Marts, Meijer, Kohls, Target, Lowes, Menards, Staples, Game Stop, AutoZone, Michaels, Pier 1 Imports

Local: Home Again Consignment, Goshen Antique Mall, Balloon Express, TG Music, Maple City Hobbies, Better World Books, Sorg Jewelers, several places in the Old Bag Factory, more places downtown than these listed

Entertainment/Things To Do:
14-screen locally owned movie theater (Linway Cinema), small arthouse theater (Goshen Art House), the Historic Goshen Theater (screens older movies occasionally, being renovated for performing arts), Goshen Historical Museum, public library, Maple City Bowl (bowling alley), public swimming pool, a couple large city parks and a large county park, Millrace Canal Trail, Winona Railway Trail, Pumpkinvine Nature Trail, Elkhart County 4-H Fair for a week in the summer (2nd largest county fair in the country)

Education:
Goshen Community Schools, good schools that cover the city limits, some neighborhoods on the northwest side go to Concord Schools in Elkhart. 1 private high school, Bethany Christian High School. Rural areas south and east go to Fairfield Schools.


Goshen College: A small, private liberal arts school

Crime:
Pretty minor anywhere in the city

Nearest Large Cities:
Elkhart (pop. 51,000) butts right up against the city limits of Goshen.
Mishawaka/South Bend are about 30 minutes away.
Fort Wayne a little over an hour.
Chicago about 2 hours away.
Indianapolis about 3 hours away.