I Choose Indy!

I have to be honest. Until I received the email from Doug Karr inviting me to post a contribution to the site, I never really spent significant time considering why I have chosen and continue to choose Indianapolis. Perhaps that is a testament to the city in itself. My calling this place home has almost been a foregone conclusion regardless of the opportunities that have been presented to me along the way.

It’s not that I haven’t seen other interesting places. I spent some time at Rose-Hulman in Terre Haute, for example. Seriously…it can be a very interesting city to live in. Okay, stop laughing out loud - it’s not very nice.

My point is that I’ve been to enough places to know that, while I certainly could survive somewhere else, I would always thrive here. As a systems integration consultant and then employee of the formerly Indianapolis-based Great Lakes Chemical Corporation, I traveled extensively. Most of my business-related jaunts took me to Europe, North America and Asia. As a technology specialist at Microsoft I was able to spend a lot of time on the West Coast as well as many other major cities in the U.S.

And, in what many family members have considered conclusive proof of my insanity, when it came time to decide where I wanted to go within Microsoft after 5 years at the company I decided I’d rather stay in Indianapolis than relocate to Chicago, Seattle, San Jose, Charlotte or Dallas. Instead, I chose to leave the company and join a smaller software developer in town where I can still leverage my talents, but do so in the city that has been my home for the last 12 years and the state that has been my home since I was born. So what exactly has kept me here? That’s rather simple - Family, Community, Accessibility and Value.

That’s right, I was born and raised in Indiana. I have lived here my entire life. You would be surprised at how many people are astonished by that fact. It seems odd to them that someone, after being placed here by happenstance, would choose to stay by their own free will. But because both my wife’s family and my family are here, we feel it’s important that we be here too. Our two sons deserve an opportunity to really know their grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. Not just visit them twice a year at Easter and Christmas. Placing such a high value on family is one of those quaint Midwestern qualities for which Indianapolis residents are known. It’s not just something I am guilty of but that most of the people I know are guilty of as well - a rather compelling argument for putting down roots here.

The last three qualities have been covered extensively by other posters. Despite that fact, I want to emphasize them again anyway:

Community is more than just casual politeness and Hoosier hospitality. It’s a general desire by everyone here to try to make this city a better place to live and work. In the technical community alone, there are over 10 different peer groups focused on educating IT professionals in the area and helping them build relationships with others. And others in different industries could undoubtedly point to a similar number of groups in their field actively focusing on their own worthwhile goals. And culturally, I would rank Indianapolis’s museums and attractions on par with cities twice its size. We have a great zoo, a wonderful children’s museum, interesting historical sites, excellent art galleries, a variety of music venues, etc. All of these attractions, along with the people we share the city with, add to the great sense of community here in Indianapolis.

There is nothing worse than sitting in traffic on I-294 in Chicago on a Friday afternoon trying desperately to hold back the road rage long enough to make it out of the city and start the weekend. And forget about navigating an automobile in downtown New York or Los Angeles on a daily basis. Indianapolis, though it’s still “big city”, doesn’t have these kinds of challenges. It is accessible to me and my family and we are able to get around easily to be able to enjoy its many pleasures. Even if traffic is horrific during the afternoon commute, it still takes me less than an hour to make it all the way across town to my home on the south-side. Though we could be doing much to improve mass transit, getting around town is not a hassle.

Lastly, there is value. Indianapolis is still one of the most reasonable cities to live in from a cost perspective. I continue to be amazed at how we compare to other areas and I’m happy that we can have the lifestyle we enjoy without working two jobs to make ends meet.

So, there you have it. Family, Community, Accessibility and Value. Four qualities that make Indianapolis a great place to live. And the main reasons, in spite of the allure of Terre Haute, why I’ve decided to stay.