Cincinnati vs Cleveland vs indianapolis vs louisville (Akron, Kent: real estate, crime)

[Cincinnati boy]

I from cincinnati and been living bere for 1 year. I lived in all citire for job relocation i Find all cities beautiful especialy cincinnati. I think indianapolis îs kinda consevative .i would like for you guta to compare all citie by

Transportation
Culture
Diversity
Education
Traffic
Climate
City scape
Crime
Population and economy

[ckzona]

Cincinnati 1st, Louisville 2nd

[smoking357]

Cincy, Louisville, photo for show.

[goyguy]

Cincy parks rule way over all the others'.
Loovull has a few cool attractions, but how many times do you watch baseball bats being made or look at Muhammad Ali artifacts before it starts to get old? There's also all of one "happening" street there, Bardstown Rd. "River City Transit" is pretty abysmal, not that Metro is any great shakes either.
Indy? Meridian St. The Soldiers & Sailors Monument. The Children's Museum. The Indy 500. The State Capitol. Wow.
Cleveland? The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. The Flats. A slow trolley to the airport and a handful of other areas. Wow.
Higher education in Cincinnati probably compares favorably to that of the other cities. The public schools are probably no worse, despite the language massacre in the OP's post (not hatin', just statin'.)
"Culture" is no contest. Who has the May Festival, TWO excellent art museums, a world-class symphony orchestra, Playhouse in the Park, opera and ballet companies, the Museum Center, AND a robust indie (not Indy) rock scene?
All of these cities have "diverse" populations, and none are especially well assimilated. The summers in any of them are no fun to swelter through while waiting for the next tornado watch. Every large city has "bad" and "good" sections, so to ask how each as a whole ranks as far as crime's concerned is a strange question to ask.
Mi dos centavos.

[restorationconsultant]

Having lived In Indy, Louisville and now Cincy, I think I can provide some comparisons.

Louisville tends to be a more 'classic' city. By that I mean the people tend to be well mannered and considerate, for the most part. It is a much more 'southern' city than any of the others. Architecturally its neck and neck with Cincinnati but I give Cincinnati a slight edge. Indianapolis has little historic arhitecture and its confined to mostly 12 historic Districts. Indy is a much newer city than Louisville or Cincinnati.

Cincinnati is far more conservative than Indy or Louisville. Indy does not erect large tacky Jesus statues by interstates.

In terms of cultural differences Indy probably has a more cultural diversity with a large Hispanic and African American populations. Indy also has a large gay community and their gay pride event has been held downtown for years (this years attendance was well over 50,000). Indy does not have much of an Applachian population as does Cincinnati and Louisville.

Indy is a major sports town and a major convention buisness and in terms of its downtown development is far ahead of Cincinnati and somewhat ahead of Louisville. Indy has a very vibrant downtown that is busy all the time and it has gained over 40000 people downtown in the last 6 years. Louisvillle has made major progress in this area. In this respect Cincinnati is a Decade behind Louisville and 15 years behind Indy in terms of a urban turnaround but I predict Cincinati will catch up which is why I chose to move from Indianapolis to Cincinnati. That, and there is so much historic architecture to restore here.

Real estate prices are higher in Louisville and Indy than in Cincinnati. People in Cincinnati seem slower to accept change, something somewhat true in Louisville as well.

Cleveland I have no clue about as I've never even been there.

[austiNati]

Lol, being this is a Cincy forum I'm pretty sure we'll get all the votes. I think Indianapolis is kind of the odd man out simply because it is built so differently than Cincy, Cleveland and Louisville. If you want to see a truely depressed urban core, check out Indy. That place is like my second home, I've visited over 100 times, and with the exception of downtown, I've not seen any change in their city center. Indy does however, have a nice chilled back atmosphere with more of a 'big town' feel than a city.

But to answer your questions...

Transportation:
Cleveland is far ahead of all the other cities due to the fact they have built out their rail transit. Cincy is finally in the process of building light rail (decades too late), and I've heard Indy is interested in doing so but they've not made any significant steps for making this a reality. All of the cities mentioned have bus service, but I'm only familiar with Cincy and Indy when it comes to that.
In Indianapolis, many roads don't have sidewalks and bus stops are usually in the grass or in front of some strip mall. The buses up there don't run as frequently. Cincy's metro bus routes look like scribble scrabble over the Cincy metro area, but the system is more effective in the actual city than in the suburbs.

Culture, Diversity:
Cleveland and Indianapolis are the more diverse of the cities mentioned. I feel Cleveland offers more 'culture' (in terms of cosmopolitan and urban environments) and that can be seen through ethnic neighborhoods such as Little Italy. Indianapolis has a large and growing hispanic population (many of which come directly from Chicago), as well as a large number of bi-racial families. Indy's culture is also HEAVILY sports influenced and they have become the amature sports capital of the Midwest, as well as hosting the legendary Indy 500.
Cincinnati's culture revolves heavily around German heritage, and not much else. There are also no ethnic neighborhoods left in Cincy (most were destroyed, or demographics changed the urban neighborhoods) The city does however, offer spectacular architecture that reminds people of what Cincy once was and struggles to be again. Looking at buildings in OTR and at Union Terminal, one can only be wow'd.

Education (post secondary):
Cincy - UC, Xavier, NKU, Cincy State, Mt. St. Joe and countless community colleges. Miami University of Oxford is also 45 mins. away

Louisville - University of Louisville has an excellent campus, strong basketball rivalry with Cincy, and an outstanding Health Sciences center.

Cleveland - Cleveland State, Case Western University (very good school), Kent State (45 mins outside Cleveland/Akron)

Indy - Butler (private institution and participated in the NCAA Final 4 this year), IUPUI, Marian Univ., Ball State of Indy and Ivy Tech.

Climate:

Cleveland - Warm 6 months, Cold 6 Months (with heavy snow on the eastside)

Cincy, Louisville - Warm 8 months, Cold 4 months (very humid in the summer, expect at least a full month of snow in the winter)

Indianapolis - Warm 7 months, Cold 5 months (moderate snow, humidity)

Crime:

All cities are nearly identical in crime statistics. Not the safest, but not the most dangerous either.

Population:

Cincy is the largest metro of the four cities with 2,200,000 people.

Cleveland - 2,050,000

Indy - 1,700,000

Louisville - 1,200,000


Economy:

Cleveland, Louisville - Healthcare and medical sciences

Cincy, Indy - Service based. Cincy is home to the most Fortune 500 companies of the places mentioned



Wow, that took a while to type. Sorry I couldnt get more in depth, and I dont have much knowledge on Louisville, but I hope this helped. If you have any other questions then hit me up.

[ckzona]

restorationconsultant. Im pretty sure Cincy has alot more development downtown than Indi.

[grmasterb]

Originally Posted by ckzona

restorationconsultant. Im pretty sure Cincy has alot more development downtown than Indi.

Not really. Certainly not residential development.

[grmasterb]

Originally Posted by Cincinnati boy

I think indianapolis îs kinda consevative.

Compared to Cincy? Really?

[unusualfire]

Wait Indy gained 40,000 residences in 6 years?? Impossible. They would have an Vancouver type skyline.