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This is wasted money until we create a 10+ year strategic plan to compete with Nashville or Greenville or even Cincinnati and Louisville.
Just random money being set on fire with no plan for activation long term.
I’d argue there is a plan – we are a convention and sports event city, and our downtown investments and building projects are pointed towards that.
But I think you bring up a good point – Indianapolis is a large city in terms of square miles without the tax base to make a large impact. Throw in a Legislature who would never have allowed projects like the Hoosier Dome again … and what we got is what we got.
Good Lord Indy already beasts those cities, and many others, in competition for convention business.
There IS a long-term plan. It involves maximization of convention center space, combined with required hotel space.
This is far from “random money.”
Being a convention city does literally nothing for the quality of life nor does it activate our downtown.
We have zero people downtown on a Saturday morning.
You take your family downtown on the weekend and show them the tourist investments we made?
Greenville? Seriously?! 😁
Greenville, SC. It’s a top 10 place for Indianapolis residents to retire to apparently.
And Canadians in general.
Place is a utopia
I believe long-term focus should go to a significant Performing Arts Center with an adjacent music-themed area restaurants such as exists in Nashville….sort of “Nashville North”. Indy has deep roots in jazz. So, with focus on Jazz, blues, rock and country, it would go a long way to making Indy a destination beyond just conventions. Of course, the crime and vagrancy problems have to be addressed and I don’t see that happening as long as Democrats control the Mayor’s office and the Marion Co. Prosecutor’s office.
It’s been an issue since lugar moved us to UniGov.
It’s not a political party issue – it’s having 55% of the tax base we need to support this massive foot print of a city.
I agree Hogsett isn’t the answer but until we hire a real city planner that can get us into a strategic plan that brings the Fortune 500 firms into the mix and investment we’re just pretending to have a plan at this point.
Nashville development should definitely NOT be the model Indy follows. Nashville infrastructure is a thing of nightmares.
The city has real city planners on staff already, and has had several particularly talented one on Staff over the years. Every administration chooses to hamstring them or hand out contracts to consultants for substandard work.
Murray that’s no excuse.
We’ve wasted 20 years now and have a bunch of half asses projects to show for it.
Both Republican and Democrat mayors are to blame. It’s a disgrace
It’s not an excuse, but it’s the reason. Also, staff planners can’t execute in a vacuum. They need sign off from their Mayor appointed director.
This all appears as icing on the new city owned hotel project. Hogsett is hoping it’s his lasting legacy, all at the ridiculous expense of the taxes that could and should be used where really needed. Can’t wait for the tax steal for the MLS stadium, if it even happens.
Rebuilding the 12 year old Georgia Street to fit another design firm’s dream is another joke on us all!
Interest rates are already falling, and that hotel will be able to be off-loaded to a private developer at more-favorable mortgage rates.