It is often easy to get caught up in big ideas and big money. City, state, and nation-wide investments are all needed to really make an impact. However, recently there have been a few new smaller items that can also improve life for city residents.
The first is this little bus stop bench outside the Riley Towers at Alabama and North Street. Â This bench obviously requires little space, perfect for potentially cluttered city corners:
Second, the Bike Hub at the City Market has installed a bike repair station. Â Accessible 24 hours a day, users are free to fix any issues that they might have with their bikes:
Finally, this blog has talked about this program before, but People for Urban Progress just installed a good amount of new PUP stops. I saw numbers 14 and 19 yesterday while riding Indygo, and they are listed on this map as “future” stops.
I believe that this one (donated by The Libertine) at Market and Delaware is number 24, also listed on the map as “future”:
These little investments may not look like a lot, but they line up well with a point that was made in one of my favorite blog posts of the year, which I read on Rust Wire. Doing lots of little things can add up quickly, and be more reliable than working on the big things. Indianapolis has done some big things very well and we are fortunate in that. But I believe it is also important to focus on the smaller things where citizens and neighborhood groups can have more of an impact.
While out of the range for most people, you can donate a PUP stop through Indygo’s website for $1700. Not too big of a chunk for many corporations.
I would add that a bike repair station is now outside of the library in Fountain Square as well
Cool, thanks for the news.