Cycling in Carmel, Indiana from a Dutch perspective 

That's crazy that a random suburb that most people have never heard of is way more pedestrian and biking friendly than the larger city.

I am so happy that we were able to host you in Carmel and have you not only visit as a friend, but as an expert in assessing human-scale infrastructure design centered around active transportation. It's hard to believe that this exists, especially in the middle of Indiana, but I think we're doing very exciting things here in Carmel and this is why my wife and I relocated here over 3 years ago, simply to take advantage of the infrastructure and live a car-lite lifestyle, which is hard to do in the US. This video provides a nice glimpse into what we have to offer and I'm sure that in the coming years, things will only continue to get better as our leadership keeps up the initiative of progressive city design that, as you stated, does not need to be a partisan issue.

America has so much potential

As a dutchy, looking at the thumbnail I actually thought it was a new neighbourhood somewhere in the Netherlands. Until I read the Title. Honestly really cool!

as a republican who is also against car dependency and all for cycling and people friendly cities, this is one of my favorite videos! friendly streets/cities and cycling don't have to be political!

A quiet, people-centric city in a red state, I can only dream of something like that in Texas.

Great to see progress here in the U.S. There seems to be growing momentum towards making urban areas less car-centric

It was a pleasure seeing you! I am so glad that you got to come and enjoy this lovely city. With the right vision, even North America can be a walkable environment!

I'm actually quite happy to see North American cycling and walking infrastructure done properly, of course with some improvements needed. But the effort is absolutely substantial!. Indiana is definitely taking this effort at heart..

I was thrilled to run into you at the Carmel Library while you were visiting. Wonderful video and perspective on the area my family and I have chosen to call home. Thanks to you, your partner, and @AmericanFietser for spending a few minutes talking to my son and I. I hope you enjoyed your travels to Indiana!

I grew up in the neighboring suburb to Carmel (Fishers) and the arts district of Carmel was always a place I loved going with my friends, because when you need a cheap activity to do with your friends as a teenager, having a convenient place to get coffee, sit and chat, and go on a walking trail was luxury I didn't fully appreciate at the time. Your video was phenomenal, and I would just like to emphasize two points. One is that walkability and attractiveness in any part of America is heavily correlated with the wealth of that area. Carmel is one of the wealthiest places in Indiana, if not the entire US, and something I noticed as my neighboring suburb grew in both wealth and population was that our commercial areas and city center were developed very similarly to Carmel. So often a lot of less walkable/attractive suburbs just don't have tons of resources to put into that type of development or there's not political will among residents to raise the taxes to do that (Its even a fight in wealthy suburbs, trust me). The other thing I wanted to point out is I've mentioned commercial areas several times because if you live in most residential areas of these suburbs, biking/walking infrastructure is very limited or non-existent leaving most residents with still no other option than to drive (hence the necessity for large parking garages all over the commercial areas). Keep up the good work! Love to see videos like this!

Nice to see this. I discovered your channel a few years ago and it was life-changing. I'm learning Dutch and have spent nine weeks there on three visits the last two years. Going for two months this summer. Dreaming of moving there, actually. Ik ben nu een beetja tweetalig, danzij jou.

Great architecture too; the new building blocks look like the've always been there.

One of the few places in the US that doesn't look like actual garbage. One cannot help but notice the abundance of people out and about in your film shots, even though it's clearly not even summer there yet. It turns out that people like a nice built environment.

Well done Carmel! Well done to the mayor and everybody else involved who has been helping, in one way or another, this transformation. 🎉

Hopefully we made a good impression on you. We've lived here for almost 20 years and have seen significant (good) change in the Carmel/Westfield area. When we moved here, you had to stop along the Monon trail at each and every street- which is fun prohibative. And, the areas that Brandon features weren't even here then. Thanks for making the video and safe travels.

Wow, this city looks so extremely far ahead of the usual US or Canadian city - especially from the aspect of mixed use and density.

As a Realtor and local resident of the Carmel, Indiana area, it is truly a gift to call this place home. Thank you for taking the time to make this video, and visit our community. The feedback is wonderful to hear from your perspective. Was there a favorite restaurant you enjoyed?

Carmel looks terrific. Bravo.

Wow, as a European that lived in America for a year, this city looks like the fusion of a European and American city i always dreamed of. Hats off to them, amazing!

Wow, an investment of 'only' 23 million, and to get this in return? This is fantastic :) It really does look oddly familiar from a Dutch perspective and absolutely like something you'd want to visit. What a success!

I live here in Carmel. Have for a big chunk of my life growing up, and now with a family. And most of what he says in this video is generally true, but only when you look at a very narrow slice of Carmel. The vast majority of Carmel is a massive sprawling suburb, to the point were we are running out of land to build more huge homogenous housing projects on which is ABSOLUTELY car-centric. My kid has a friend on the other side of Carmel, and it takes a good 15 minutes in a car to drive to their house. And thats on a fairly high-speed stroad. The amount of car traffic zipping around everywhere in Carmel is crazy compared to when I was a kid. And the roundabouts, while maybe good for. some things, do tend to make a steady flow of traffic that doesn't want to stop for something as pesky as someone on a bike. Few of the streets are designed with any kind of bike lane. The Monon trail is great, back when I lived within reasonably easy access to it, but now I'm on the other side of town, and there is little in the way of east-west bike-only paths to get there. And there are no north-south trails like the Monon where I'm at. So its great if you live near it, but most of Carmel does not have easy access to it or an alternative in their part of town. Yes, they have revitalized a lot of older downtown Carmel, and there is a lot more higher density housing there, with a small amount being mixed use, but you still need a car if you want to go grocery shopping, as there is no mass-transit that will let you easily get to a store without needing your car. The pharmacies are even further away. The local movie theatre has a bike rack, but it's in a shopping plaza surrounded by VERY busy roads. I wouldn't want to bike there. And as they add more and more high-density housing, more people are on the roads to get to their jobs, to shop, to do things. The fancy part of the Monon trail is just a tiny fraction of the entirety. If I want to go visit it, I've got to get in my car, and deal with traffic, and parking because there certainly isn't any other transit option from where I live to this 'bike friendly' area. Getting to downtown Indianapolis via light rail would have been awesome, IF they hadn't converted the Monon to a bike only lane. If they had left the train line, and built the trail next to it, they could have put in some light rail AND had a cool bike path. Which would have been great for all the people that live in Carmel to access all the events in Indy without having to deal with a car. They have built and are building a number of parking garages because if you want to visit Carmel, you pretty much have to have a car, and there is precious little parking downtown with all the people trying to come here. Most of the housing is very expensive, so getting all the people we need to work at a lot of the service jobs we have, isn't easy, when they can't necessarily afford to live here. And there is no transit to help get people here. So this story is really misleading. Should have spent a little more time driving around all the bike-unfriendly areas, with ZERO high density, much less, mixed use housing. Forget mass-transit. Forget ditching your car. You're going to TOTALLY need your car. Unless you happen to live and work in a couple of the VERY few areas where getting around on a bike or your two legs is feasible. The rest of the city is NOT like this video.

From Colorado where some of this is just normal infrastructure, I am so impressed with Carmel! What a beautiful area! Great job

Wow, when I looked at the thumbnail I thought it was in the Netherlands or Denmark or Sweden at first. Then I saw that it was INDIANA. Some of the development happening there seems really nice and almost reminiscent of the places you'd show in your home country. Definitely should be a place I visit soon :)

Thanks for the video. Anne from Berlin.

This is so calming and comforting. Great little video

I think it's really cool that you went to Carmel. As someone that lives in the Netherlands I'm actually somewhat jealous of some of the things that Carmel has done. Because even though I love the bike infrastructure that we have in the Netherlands I do love some of things of American life, like in this video I really like the style of some of the homes shown, which in the Netherlands unless you have a lot of money isn't something you are likely to be able to have. So I think for most places that are still too focused on the car, Carmel is a great example to strive to, that way you get much of the safety, health benefits and better city planning of the Netherlands but still keep much of "American" life. If I could pick, I would honestly pick the Carmel way over the Dutch way, though obviously with some improvements in the Carmel way. Like for example, I don't know how good their public transport is. I would need bus and especially train connection to be as good as it is in the Netherlands.

Nice job Americano's! Notice that the electrical cables are almost everywhere burried under ground what makes a huge different to me. Keep up the good work!

I wonder whether the initial plans met fierce restitance. I suppose that the population of Carmel (shopowners included) was initially just as car centric as the population of any other American town. And, if so, how did the mayor overcome this resistance?

There are lots of nice rich suburbs in America. This is one of them. I'd love to see it be implemented in an affordable city.

i honestly believe the political divide in the US will be closed by a mutual love of human-first urban development

Anyone really shocked about how Indiana of all places got something like this, look up the distribution of salary or house costs for the suburb then you'll understand lol.

Fascinating sights. At some points it felt almost dutch, whitch I have never had before with US cities

As a dutch man, this city is on to something! There are so many benefits to this, people having a good time and hanging around, the place is not only surviving but thriving! You are making good progress USA ❤

Glad you made it to Carmel. I moved here in 2006 when we only had a handful of roundabouts and very limited bike paths. While the Monon gets a lot of the attention, it represents only 5.2 miles of the over 200 miles of trails. Every year more trails are being built and our ability to get to a variety of amenities is also growing. I hope you enjoyed your time here and thanks for sharing your thoughts on our city. Keep up the great work you do.

What is impressive is that the urban design looks very European/Dutch. And that is obviously the hand of the architects. Well done!

this is amazing that a city like this can be in the usa, only the street signs give a hint it is.

Thank you for visiting Indiana!!!!

Mark, you are a true promoter of cycling! Keep up the good work!

My wife and I lived in Indy for a few years. We always loved visiting Carmel! Has a lot going for it!

Let’s hope a lot more places get inspired by Carmel!

I hope other municipalities see and learn from this excellent presentation. Living in Burbank, CA, we could certainly benefit from this type of infrastructure. There are quite a few projects underway here, and some of them do include cycling infrastructure.

It's kind of wild how they put so much effort into their urbanism and road design, yet don't run a bus system in this pretty large city with more surrounding smaller towns. I was looking into the realities of moving here without a car and still looks decent if you don't mind biking long distances. It's 7-10 miles down the Monon Trail before you encounter a bus in the Indianapolis metro area. You can even bike 25 miles to downtown Indianapolis on the trail.

.....🤍💛🧡❤💜💙!!!! Hello!😉 Beautiful video, as usual, and beautiful report. This city is an advanced one, and many should take example on it. Have a great continuation and see you. 😉👍👍👍👌

Amazing video well done 👍 short and to the point

I've seen a lot of videos on the roundabouts in Carmel but this is the first I've seen on the other infrastructure. I'm impressed.

I heard about this city in the news regarding their roundabouts. I didn't know good multi-modal infrastructure was also available. I enjoyed the eclipse in a nearby town also near Indianapolis. I hope Carmel inspires more North American towns that it can be done - even if they are small in comparison to other big cities.

As a Dutch person I’m very happy to see an American city slowly turning in to a better city for its citizens! 😄

Great video. we have been to Carmel many times. Good (Dutch) friend and my in-laws live there. We have taken our fietsen on the Monon several times.

"Bravo!" to all those responsible for creating such a vibrant, attractive, memorable, and cycle-/pedestrian-friendly environment. What a joy! (Is this really in the US?!) I am watching from the Netherlands.

Such a surprise to see this in Indiana. Hope they keep it going.

It's great to see that Carmel is pioneering the urban/suburban redevelopment in the United States! Thankful to live here.

If you want more details check the blog (the link is in the description 📦). You'll find great stuff like the fact that at the first round about the population was at just 25,000people. The good development must have made a good impression on people who decided to move there. Again, my compliments to the mayor 💜

Gorgeous! Reading the history of Mayor Brainard is great, and seems the sort of leader we could use in more communities. Believes in using experts, good urban design, civil rights and diversity, and also believes in doing so in a way that you're not bankrupting future generations.

That mayor is doing an incredible job by transforming his city into a shining example. Props to him!

Absolutely inspiring

As an American Midwesterner it took me a few seconds to realize the shots weren't of somewhere in The Netherlands. Carmel is the best designed suburb in the US and possibly the most Dutch suburb in the United States also.

A great video. I like the part that highlights how the Monon has become the crystallization core for successful urban growth in generell. I was a real estate developer. The access to cycling infrastructure is such an important point that I now only doing cycling stuff … 🤓 Greatings to Mrs. and Mr. @AmericanFietser

I am amazed. This is in the USA but I’m getting strong Dutch vibes. Thanks for saying it does not have to be political. I think that’s exactly the tone we need.

Something to remember, Carmel is one of the nicest suburban Areas of Indianapolis, so many people who work in the city live up there. They have an abnormal amount of money to work with.

Interesting to see the Dutch "bakfiets" being adopted in Carmel as well. Also, Carmel is making it clear that the Dutch approach to traffic management and infrastructure CAN be applied in North America.

Awesome! I wish they would do something like that in our town. It would revitalize it.

Very cool. I live an hour away from Carmel and never knew anything about it before. Now I want to go check it out!

This popped up in my recommended and its always wild to see places I'm familiar with being discussed online, I am from a smaller city next to Carmel and Carmel's style of developments are starting to spread more around our sort of 4 city area here in Hamilton County, having grown up here my whole life the change has been incredible to see.

i am glad you enjoyed our small but special city!

Lived in Carmel last year Indiana native here, rented an apartment with a buddy of mine and loved it there

HaHaHa-at 0:21-0:27, you can see our bike trio that came to Carmel to watch the eclipse! If you're interested, watch our ride along the Michigan Lake trail in Chicago. As for coming to Indiana from the Netherlands to bike, we recently traveled with our bikes to Japan from the US, so you can try this as well.

The videos here date back from months to years ago. A lot more has changed and improved since then!

This is wonderful!

Goed zo. Nu de rest van America nog. Goed voor jullie gezondheid. 👍

If I were a film or television studio, I would absolutely film there.

Amazing! The only thing that bugs me as someone coming from central europe are the manicured lawns. Less deep green empty lawns with grass, more bushes and flowers like we have here. Natural grass is the way to go!

If only the rest of the US would follow this example, rather than the opposite. That would send a great signal to the rest of the world even, where car centricism prevails.

Very cool!

I would honestly consider moving there.

I cycle commuted to there for work in the 1980's from Indianapolis when Rangeline Road was a pencil thin 50mph in a 40mph speed limit gamble. Keystone and Meridian were also heart pounding gauntlets of horns, cuss words, debris filled fractured shoulders and getting passed by cars within inches. Now I have been known to drive my bicycle to there just to ride around in Southern Hamilton County.

Nice video. I wonder, when you were in the US did you get a chance to visit any other cities to look at bike infrastructure there? I hope you have a chance to visit Washington DC one day. It's not Dutch-standard, but there has been quite a lot of progress in the last 5 years on getting bike lanes (especially protected lanes) installed in much of the core of the city. The city has a generously cheap and widespread bike share program called CaBi. You can take bikes on the metrorail system. There are many trails like the MBT, Capital Crescent, and Anacostia Trail to get you further out into the city and surrounding areas, and many have bike amenities, local restaurants, residences and such nearby. It's not perfect- we are fighting hard to get bike lanes put on some major roads that really need it. But I'd say DC is the most comfortable major US city to bike in.

We need this up north in Indiana

Interesting video-title! *Initially* I understood it as viewing the USA's state of Indiana from a Dutch perspective via bicycling in a town called Carmel (that is located in the USA's state of California, so far as *I* knew). A few re-reads were required for the USA-er's penchant for writing "town *,* state" to come to the surface, thus giving the sentence a totally different meaning. Oh well... US-English is NOT like UK-English... Anyway, for me a very significant difference between the Dutch view of traffic versus that of many other countries is the wide-openness of pathways for bicycles & pedestrians versus the restrictively-designed pathways for cars (literal & visual narrowing by trees right-beside the asphalt). In areas where people abound, the car is in NO way the "king", but a GUEST.

jan gehl and jeff speck?? damn I had no idea all the urban titans were involved in this. love mr fietser too

I live in the same county but a different town. Because there are a lot of roundabouts in this part of Indiana, my father took me here when i was learning to drive as i requested to get some more experience while driving. When going through town i thought it looked rather walkable.

Woah that looks worthy of the Dutch!

Roundabout driving rule is simple: Give way to cars driving from your left

0:24 is literally me and my folks lmao We came to visit friends for the eclipse

Carmel is the new Milton Keynes. The UK city (which officially attained that status in 2022) with almost no traffic lights. I live near Keynes to the point I practiced roundabouts there for my driving.

I'd love to visit Carmel some day, it seems like a fascinating city. It's just a shame that for all the incredible progress they've made on the pedestrian and cycling fronts, they still have no public transit whatsoever except for a dial-a-ride that must be reserved 24hrs in advance.

Brillant!! Well done Carmel Indiana.. 👏😀

Important considerations: In 2023, Carmel was the most expensive city to live in in Indiana. The median family income in 2021 was just under $120,000. "In 2021, the median property value in Carmel, IN was $372,100, and the homeownership rate was 75.3%. Most people in Carmel, IN drove alone to work, and the average commute time was 25 minutes. The average car ownership in Carmel, IN was 2 cars per household." The percent black population in 2021 was 2.7% of the total.

I wish the rest of the us was like this

hopefully Carmel goes viral and everyone start moving there. The first american Paris

I liked Carmel as a place when visiting a friend there, but actually getting to/from there without a car, especially from Indianapolis, was nigh on impossible. It still felt very car centric as a result

So pretty and so pleasant! Carmel did the right thing.

Should be called Bikemel.

Have you seen cycling infrastructure in Ljubljana and Slovenia? It looks as if the whole country has loads of protected intersections and protected lanes. Could you possibly do a video on the cycling infrastructure there someday?

This makes my heart sing :) this doesn’t have to be a partisan issue!

I live pretty close to the monon trail, it's really nice!

Pretty little town!

The things you can do with vision and hard work.

Good to see progressive developments in Carmel, IN. I stayed at the Residence INN in Carmel for over six months in the mid-1990s as a contractor to a Fortune 500 company there. Two things I found unappealing about the place then. First, the population was monochrome, and quite parochial. Having come from the West, it was not always comfortable. Second, I had to drive everywhere. I am a walker, and I love cities that are designed to be conducive to walking. Carmel had no sidewalks. This is a pleasant change, and it can only be good for the health of the people, who were on the average overweight or obese.

It'd be interesting to see you cycle (or rather, attempt it) in Athens, Greece. Actually, from Greece, you should visit the city of Karditsa, it's a city in which almost everyone cycles to go around everywhere.