For Cliff Carley, Sept. 11, 2001, is a date of great personal significance unrelated to tragic events. That’s the day the construction company owner bought a pair of Rocky Mountain elk and began raising the large deer on his northern Hamilton County property near Atlanta. Nearly five years later, Carley Elk Farm hosts Saturday tours for which visitors pay $5 to roam the rural acreage and help feed a herd that numbers about 50. On the way home, they can…
It looked like a photo shoot for GQ or Elle. Guests wore denim that probably won’t show up in American stores until next year, if even then. Other guests checking into the Conrad Indianapolis for the July 2 U.S. Grand Prix wore sparkling diamonds and designer apparel. They carried Coach handbags of all shapes and sizes, setting them on the concierge desk as they awaited delivery of their luggage. Without fail, Lynna Mills would peek around the bags and cordially…
Two bridges at opposite ends of the state are of concern to neighboring citizens and all Hoosiers. Both are historic steel-truss bridges. One spans the Wabash River connecting New Harmony (Posey County) with White County, Ill. The second spans the Gibson rail yard in Hammond (Lake County) and carries the traffic of busy Indianapolis Boulevard. Both bridges are in poor condition. The Indiana Department of Transportation has recommendations for both bridges. Local officials are opposed to the INDOT plans. Whose…
I’m not sensing a lot of enthusiasm for the state’s new tourism slogan, “Restart Your Engines.” Wait. What am I saying? What I sense is some outright hostility because the state paid $85,000 for this clunker, then was so tone deaf as to unveil it right after the income tax deadline, setting off a wave of “Your tax dollars at work” jokes in newspapers, blogs and coffee shops. So here we are in May, at the start of another tourist…
They thought they had a winner with The New Midwest. They even had the logo-a stylized “I”-all figured out. And a color palette. But then they hit a bump in the road. When Mark Miles became CEO of the Central Indiana Corporate Partnership in January, he joined the big group and said the slogan was a dud. At the least, he said, participants should run it by focus groups. They only had to run it by two before they realized…
Special events aren’t just fun and games-they’re big business, generating careers and economic activity that are anything but frivolous. Special event spending in Indianapolis is nearly $3 billion a year, according to Bob Shultz, public relations director for the Indiana Convention & Visitors Association. Annual spending for special events worldwide is $500 billion, according to research conducted by the Chicago-based International Special Events Society. In Money Magazine’s annual “Best Jobs in America” survey, meeting and convention planners were ranked in…
There is so much I do not understand about Indiana. After living here for 35 years, after visiting every county and traveling almost every mile of state highway, after making friends with thousands of Hoosiers, I am in the dark on so many issues. Here are three examples: Example 1: What do Mitch Daniels, Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, and Kathleen Blanco of Louisiana have in common? They are all governors who have massive approval deficits. According to Survey USA (and…
Billboards in southern Indiana used to tug spelunkers in four different directions. Come to Marengo Caves. Spend an afternoon at Bluespring Caverns. Visit Wyandotte Caves. Don a headlamp at Squire Boone Caverns. Two years ago, however, operators at the four attractions decided it might be a better use of cash to market the area as a single attraction. They pooled their advertising budgets and printed a brochure that listed all four destinations. They also created a passport that visitors could…
The long-discussed trail will loop through downtown and cost $35 million to $42 million. All the money will come from federal transportation dollars and private contributions. “The trail has been officially approved,” said Brian Payne, president of the Central Indiana Community Foundation, the project’s lead managing partner. “It’s definitely a project that’s going to happen now.” Tourism officials greeted the news with enthusiasm. It’s a “huge win for White River State Park as well as the city,” said Bob Whitt,…
Indiana Avenue looks for revival Cultural plan stresses retail, residential growth, and a possible extension Indiana Avenue’s glory days as a haven for black-owned businesses and vibrant nightclubs exists only in the history books. But a plan to revitalize the city’s newest cultural district could restore some of the luster. City leaders completed the blueprint for redevelopment early this year and now are in the early stages of executing a plan that organizers say could take 20 years to play…
Recycling isn’t just good for the environment. It’s good for buildings, and ultimately for economic development. When the Disciples of Christ moved its international headquarters downtown from Irvington in 1995, it left behind a 121,000-square-foot structure built in 1910 that could easily have become a vacant eyesore in the east-side neighborhood. Instead, local developer Mansur Real Estate Services Inc. helped give it new life as Mission Apartments for seniors. That $6.5 million project might not have happened without the help…
Opportunity or threat? Indiana businesses brace for growing global competition Next month, President Bush will make his first official visit to India. To most of the American media, it’ll be just one more round of global terrorism discussions with a distant foreign nation, perhaps worthy of a brief. The Indian press knows better. Six weeks ahead of Bush’s trip, banner headlines about it ran in every newspaper. Al Hubbard knows better, too. Friends with Bush since their days at Harvard…
Two wall-size murals now welcome people to Massachusetts Avenue. An abstract sculpture that looks like an Alexander Calder tribute sits on a bridge in the Canal District. A towering blue and green obelisk marks the north end of Broad Ripple on College Avenue. The works aren’t part of an elaborate conspiracy by a renegade public artist. They’re the result of two years of careful planning by the city’s Cultural Development Commission. In 2003, the commission designated five areas of the…
The Omni Severin Hotel has confirmed it’s negotiating to buy the surface parking lot immediately east of the hotel, which it wants to redevelop into a parking garage capped by a 12,000-square-foot ballroom. Tourism officials love the idea, but some parking lot managers say it’s unnecessary. “We’re buying it for a reason,” said Chris Ratay, the hotel’s area director of sales and marketing. “This would allow us to have our own parking facility.” Today, the hotel’s valets run across the…
I drove north last week from the Caesar’s gambling facility in Harrison County. Instead of taking the usual roads, I twisted up the cliffside overlooking the Ohio River via Doolittle Road. Then I went through New Middleton to Corydon before I joined the state highway system. It was a delightful drive that I never would have known about from anything on the state’s tourism Web site. Yes, I can hear the usual lament: “Wait, we’re working on improving our materials….
He can do card tricks with the verve of a Brooklyn street hustler. He knows how to levitate. And for his biggest trick yet, he wants to transform White River State Park. It’s no short con. It doesn’t involve sleight of hand. Meet Bob from these increased attractions.” In addition to the Eiteljorg, the Indianapolis Zoo, White River Gardens, Indiana State Museum, Victory Field and NCAA Hall of Champions call the park home. At least one community activist, and one…
“It gives [Indianapolis] a big-league chef,” said John Mariani, food and travel correspondent for Esquire magazine, when asked about Wright’s arrival. “It’s about time a city like Indianapolis has a restaurant of this caliber.” Wright left the kitchen at the Windsor Court Hotel in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. He and his wife, Delia, an executive with a restaurantproducts distributor, chose Indianapolis partly because she has business contacts here. Jonathan is accustomed to pleasing an eclectic range of diners. He…
The dirt is still fresh from the Colts’ stadium ground breaking, but local hospitality professionals already are planning for the growth it will spur in their industry. Experts project as many as 25,000 additional jobs by 2010, when both the stadium and a 275,000-square-foot expansion of the Indiana Convention Center are scheduled to be complete. That tally counts jobs created in those facilities as well as in hotels, restaurants and other attractions. Officials expect 4,200 jobs to be added in…
Last month my wife, Jean, and I had the pleasure of joining another Indiana University Alumni Travelers voyage superbly planned by Alumni Travel Director Joan Curts and Gohagen Travel. In company with an agreeable and stimulating group of IU and Boston University alumni, we visited the Cotswolds in England, near where we had lived 27 years earlier when on sabbatical leave at Oxford. Tourism seems alive and well in the United Kingdom, but there is concern that current tourist volume…
What major, national, student-oriented not-for-profit organization with deep roots in Kansas City moved its headquarters to Indianapolis in the last decade and now has made commitments to bring a huge number of visitors to Indianapolis each year into the future? If you think the answer is the NCAA, you would be half right. The complete answer is that there are two such organizations: the NCAA and FFA. Both the NCAA and FFA brought economic benefits along with their headquarters. Through…
