Downtown Indianapolis is a neighborhood area in and the central business district of Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. Downtown is bordered by Interstate 65, Interstate 70, and the White River, and is situated near the geographic center of Marion County. Downtown emerged from the original 1821 town plat for Indianapolis—often referred to as the Mile Square—to encompass a broader geographic area of the central city, containing several smaller historic neighborhoods.
Downtown Indianapolis is the cultural, economic, and political center of the Indianapolis metropolitan area. Downtown anchors the city's burgeoning leisure and hospitality sector, home to nearly 8,000 hotel rooms and the city's major sports and convention facilities. Most of the city's monuments and memorials, performing arts venues, and museums are located downtown, as well as numerous parks, historic sites, and districts. Since 1825, the respective seats of municipal and state governments have operated from downtown Indianapolis.
Location and boundaries
When Indianapolis was founded in 1820, the new capital city was planned to occupy an area of near the confluence of Fall Creek and the White River, close to the geographic center of Marion County. The plat included eastern and western "anchors": the Indiana Statehouse (west), and the Indianapolis City Market and Marion County Courthouse (site of today's City-County Building), respectively. As the population increased and the city matured, the original plat continued to densify, developing into the region's central business district.
The city's historical core and contemporary central business district is sometimes referred to as the Mile Square. However, the downtown Indianapolis "neighborhood area" defines a broader geography of about , incorporating the area bounded by 16th Street and Interstate 65 (north), Interstate 70 (south), Interstate 65/70 (east), and the White River (west). Downtown is generally bisected into four quadrants, divided by Meridian Street (north to south) and Washington Street (east to west).
Pogue's Run, a small creek, was channeled into a tunnel beneath downtown in the 1910s. It enters a culvert near New York and Dickson streets east of downtown, emptying into the White River near Kentucky and McCarty streets on downtown's southwest side.
Neighborhoods and districts
Downtown Indianapolis contains 34 extant apartment buildings that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places in the Apartments and Flats of Downtown Indianapolis Thematic Resources.
Officially designated cultural districts are identified with a "†" symbol:
Bottleworks District Canal and White River State Park† Chatham–Arch Cole-Noble District Flanner House Homes Fletcher Place† Holy Rosary–Danish Church Historic District Indiana Avenue† Indiana World War Memorial Historic District Lockefield Gardens Lockerbie Square Historic District Market East† Mass Ave Cultural Arts District† Old Southside Ransom Place Historic District St. Joseph Neighborhood Historic District Washington Street–Monument Circle Historic District Wholesale District†
History
19th century
Downtown Indianapolis dates to the city's founding as the state of Indiana's new capital in 1820 near the east bank of the White River. The state legislature appointed Alexander Ralston and Elias Pym Fordham to survey and design a town plan for Indianapolis, which was platted in 1821.Hyman, p. 10, and Ralston's original plan for Indianapolis called for a town of bounded by North, East, South, and West streets (although they were not named at that time), with Governor's Circle, a large circular commons, at the center of town.
Ralston's grid pattern with wide roads and public squares extended outward from the four blocks adjacent to the Circle, and also included four diagonal streets, later renamed as avenues.Massachusetts Street points diagonally to the northeast, Virginia Street to the southeast, Kentucky Street to the southwest, and Indiana Street to the northwest, beyond the Circle. See Browne, pp. 11, 16. Public squares were reserved for government and community use, but not all of these squares were used for this intended purpose.A revised town plat from 1831 indicated public squares were set aside for a state university (square 25) and a state hospital (square 22). See Hale, p. 10, and Hyman, p. 10. Ralston altered the grid pattern in the southeast quadrant to accommodate the flow of Pogue's Run, but a plat created in 1831 changed his original design and established a standard grid there as well.Hale, p. 79.
Ralston's basic street plan is still evident in present-day Downtown Indianapolis. Streets in the original plat were named after states that were part of the United States when Indianapolis was initially planned, with the addition of Michigan, which was a U.S. territory at that time. Tennessee and Mississippi Streets were renamed Capitol and Senate Avenues in 1895 after several state government buildings were built west of the Circle near the Indiana Statehouse. There are a few other exceptions to the early street names. The National Road, which eventually bisected Indiana, passed through Indianapolis along Washington Street, a east–west street, more recently converted into a one-way westbound street west of New Jersey Street, located one block south of the Circle. The city's address numbering system begins at the intersection of Washington and Meridian streets. Meridian and Market Streets intersect the Circle. Few street improvements were made in the 1820s and 1830s; sidewalks did not appear until 1839 or 1840.Brown, p. 25, and Browne, pp. 9–10, 17.
In the last half of the 19th century, when the city's population soared from 8,091 in 1850 to 169,164 in 1900, urban development expanded in all directions as Indianapolis experienced a building boom and transitioned from an agricultural community to an industrial center.Bodenhamer and Barrows, eds., pp. 1481, 1486; Brown, p. 16; and Some of the city's most iconic structures were built during this period, including several that have survived to the present day in Downtown: the Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument (1888, dedicated 1902), the Indiana Statehouse (1888), Union Station (1888), and the Das Deutsche Haus (1898), among others.Major structures constructed during this era that have been demolished include Tomlinson Hall (1883–86), a civic auditorium at Delaware and Market Street, and English's Opera House and Hotel (1880; 1884, 1896) on Monument Circle, among others. See Bodenhamer and Barrows, eds., pp. 546–47; 1336–37.
20th century Following World War II, expansion of the American middle class, suburbanization, and declining manufacturing employment greatly impacted Downtown Indianapolis, similar to most U.S. central business districts at this time. Urban renewal projects of this era hastened the central business district's decline, particularly the clearance of working-class neighborhoods. The neighborhoods surrounding Indiana Avenue, the center of the city's African American community, were particularly impacted. The establishment of the Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) campus in 1969 and the construction of Interstate 65 and Interstate 70 in the 1960s and 1970s resulted in large-scale displacement of African Americans.
The loss of population and activity Downtown prompted civic leaders to plan for economic development and revitalization of the area. Among the first projects was the opening of Market Square Arena, which served as home to the Indiana Pacers and host to numerous concerts and other sporting events. The success of Market Square Arena helped persuade decision-makers to make Downtown the center of an aggressive sports tourism strategy. Throughout the 1980s, $122 million in public and private funding built several athletic facilities Downtown, including the Indianapolis Tennis Center, Indiana University Natatorium, Carroll Track and Soccer Stadium, and the Hoosier Dome. The latter project helped secure the 1984 relocation of the Baltimore Colts, the 1987 Pan American Games, and scores of subsequent athletic events of national and international interest.
Modern skyscraper construction catapulted Downtown office and commercial space in the 1980s. A building boom, lasting from 1982 to 1990, saw the construction of six of the city's ten tallest buildings. These included OneAmerica Tower (1982), Fifth Third Bank Tower (1983), Capital Center South Tower (1987), BMO Plaza (1988), Market Tower (1988), 300 North Meridian (1989), and the tallest, Salesforce Tower (1990).
The non-profit Downtown Indy, Inc. was established in 1993 to help promote economic development, beautification, and program events. Reinvestment continued through the 1990s, with the continued buildout of White River State Park museums and attractions, development of the Canal Walk, Circle Centre Mall (1995), Victory Field (1996), and Gainbridge Fieldhouse (1999).
21st century The city's successful sports tourism campaign provided local leadership with a template for increasing Downtown's capacity to host conventions and trade shows. Two of the city's tallest buildings to be completed in the 21st century, Conrad Indianapolis (2006) and the JW Marriott Indianapolis (2011), are hotels. Following the opening of Lucas Oil Stadium in 2008, the Indiana Convention Center completed its largest expansion in 2011.
In the 2010s, Downtown experienced increased demand for housing. Numerous mixed-use and apartment buildings were developed during this time. According to Downtown Indy, Inc., the number of apartment units Downtown increased 61 percent from 2011 to 2015, with more than 50 percent of new development occurring inside the Mile Square. In 2010, the population of Downtown was 14,664; by 2020, the population had increased to 22,412.
Economy
Downtown is the densest employment cluster in the state of Indiana. According to Downtown Indy, Inc., in 2021, there were about 154,500 workers. According to Colliers International, the central business district commercial office market contained of office space, with a direct vacancy rate of 16.9 percent in 2017.
Downtown Indianapolis is home to two of the city's three Fortune 500 companies: health insurance company Elevance Health and pharmaceutical company Lilly. Other prominent downtown employers include AES Indiana, Cummins, Rolls-Royce, Indiana University, IU Health, Angi, Barnes & Thornburg, Emmis Corporation, the Indianapolis Star, OneAmerica Financial Partners, the National Collegiate Athletic Association, Simon Property Group, and Salesforce.
Government
As the location for several local, state, and federal government agencies and buildings, downtown Indianapolis is home to a large concentration of white-collar workers with roles in public policy, law, advocacy, and public relations.
Located on Market Street, the City-County Building serves as the seat of the consolidated government of Indianapolis and Marion County. The office building houses the executive and legislative branches of local government as well as numerous municipal departments. The John Morton-Finney Center for Educational Services at Walnut and Delaware streets houses the administrative headquarters for Indianapolis Public Schools.
The Indiana Statehouse, located at the west end of Market Street, houses the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of Indiana's state government, including the offices of the governor and lieutenant governor of Indiana, the Indiana General Assembly, and the Indiana Supreme Court. Administrative offices for several state agencies are located in neighboring buildings, mainly the north and south buildings of the Indiana Government Center.