Why I Support Neighborhood Infill Development
Posted by Kevin Kastner in Neighborhoods, New Development on Apr 28th, 2017 | 3 comments
Urban blogs are used to defending their points of views from a more car-centric culture that prevails in many places in the US, and especially here in Indianapolis. But there is one major place where urban blogs receive a bit of pushback from those on the left side of the spectrum: Neighborhood infill, especially multi-story structures. There is an overriding fear that these larger projects will kill the culture of the neighborhood, or make it too expensive. And those are very legitimate concerns. This post intends to lay out my reasons for supporting most of these developments, or at least making them...
Closing Time for Chatham Park? Yet Another (Probably Final) Hearing for the High-Quality Infill Development
Posted by Eric McAfee in Neighborhoods, New Development on Apr 27th, 2017 | 15 comments
I’ve covered the evolution of the Chatham Park proposal multiple times on this blog, so it might seem like overkill to feature it yet again. But it isn’t.
Why not? Because it hasn’t gone away. After multiple presentations before the Indianapolis Historic Preservation Commission (IHPC), it remains in an ambiguous state, neither approved nor disapproved. The IBJ covers the latest attempt thoroughly.  And, after the early-April meeting, it remains tabled, awaiting further changes until it meets the IHPC’s standards. In the meantime, we all get to look at the withering old...
East Side Bike Ride Photo Review
Posted by Kevin Kastner in Bicycling, Neighborhoods on Apr 25th, 2017 | 1 comment
I hope that everyone who was able to attend our East Side Bike Ride enjoyed the trip. I had a great time meeting others who were interested in this topic. Here are some photos from the trip:
Meeting in front of the 100 + year old Ford plant to discuss future plans:
Joe Smoker from NEARÂ joined us to help inform on housing construction and neighborhood redevelopment:
Enjoying the view from Highland Park:
Thanks to Centerpoint Brewing for hosting the group at the end:
Thanks again to all who came to this event. I hope to do this type of gathering again in the...
Strong Indy Meetup this Thursday
Posted by Jim Hodapp in Announcements on Apr 17th, 2017 | 2 comments
Strong Indy, our local chapter of Strong Towns applied to our beloved city of Indianapolis, is having a very special monthly meeting this week on Thursday, April 20th. It’s being hosted by Big Car at the Tube Factory artspace in Garfield Park.
We have the honor of having Cara Courage speak to us about her research in placemaking and her new book which includes a section about the efforts of Big Car in Garfield Park. She’s here in Indy to give a TEDx talk and is visiting from the UK. Find out more at her website:Â http://www.caracourage.net/
Other topics we’ll be covering...
Urban Indy Turns 10: A Look Back, a Look Ahead
Posted by Kevin Kastner in Historical Posts, New Development on Apr 11th, 2017 | 8 comments
This website was born ten years ago on this date. When this blog first started, I was using actual film in an actual camera and scanning the photos. I took these particular photos to be developed at Cord Camera, which is now a fried chicken restaurant on Mass Avenue. I didn’t have a smart phone or a social media account, with the exception of MySpace.
Urban Indy continued on as a solo project for a few years, then in 2010 I had some meetings with other bloggers to try to restart Urban Indy as a collaboration. We had a few really solid years, and some of this blogs best posts are from that era....
