INDIANAPOLIS — Do you want to see more trails, better roads or improved access to public transportation here in Indianapolis? A new survey for Indianapolis residents could help, but only if it gets filled out.
"There's more need for transportation infrastructure than there are dollars," Sean Northup, Deputy Director of the Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization, exclaimed.
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So where should those dollars go?
"More bus routes would be great. More trails in general," Sydney, who lives in SoBro, said.
“Making it safer for all pedestrians as well, sidewalks, connection points, that sort of thing," Casey, a Glendale resident, said.
More trails, improved roadways and increased walkability: those are the things north side residents want to see in their community.
“I love walkability and cities where you can walk places," Sydney said. "And I’d love to be able to walk more places in the city for sure.”
“I would love to see more trails in Indy," Casey told us. "I think pedestrian-friendly transportation is one of the single biggest things that this city is missing.”
“If you’d like to have a trail close to your house, if you’d like to have that roadway reconstructed, we gotta know that you’re using it," Northup emphasized.
That's the goal of the Hoosier Travel Counts survey.
“The idea is to understand how people move around the region," Northup said. "Where they’re starting, where they’re ending, what mode of transportation they’re taking, how often they’re going, what times they’re going.”
“We have representation by age and income and race, and we are trying to get a representative sample of the population," Andy Swenson, Principal Planner for Data & Analytics at IMPO, explained.
The survey helps to determine how federal funding dollars will be used.
“The federal dollars can get used for road reconstructions, or trails, or bridge repair, bridge reconstruction, to buy buses, all kinds of infrastructure projects like that," Northup said.
Right now, IMPO said they have about a 73% response rate, but they need to get to 100% in order to get a fairly representative sample.
As they mail out 250,000 more surveys this week, they are urging people to get the survey done. One easy way to do so is to go online to Hoosiertravelcounts.com, go to the participate section and scroll to see the different ways you can take the survey.
IMPO emphasized that all participants will get compensated for their time.
“By having them buy in and participate, that means they get represented and everybody’s fairly represented," Swenson said.
“If we don’t know that folks are using a piece of infrastructure, then it’s gonna be underrepresented and it’s not going to show up as strongly when it’s time to allocate these limited dollars," Northup stated.
You can also go to this link to see if you were one of the households that received a survey in the past. If you did, they ask you to fill out the survey as soon as you can.
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Casey Zanowic is the In Your Community reporter for North Side Indy. She joined WRTV in July of 2025. Casey has a passion for storytelling and is ready to showcase impactful stories that make a difference in her community. Share your story ideas and important issues with Casey by emailing her at casey.zanowic@wrtv.com.
