Pedestrian & Bicycle Crash Hotspots in Indianapolis

Indianapolis lost 85 people to traffic crashes in 2025, and pedestrians and cyclists made up more than 30 percent of them: 24 people on foot and 9 on bikes. That's down from the more than 120 deaths recorded during the pandemic-era peak in 2021, but people walking and biking keep making up a disproportionate share of who dies on the city's streets.¹

The city and the Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization (IMPO) don't just track those deaths citywide. They map where they cluster. An internal Vision Zero Task Force review found that about 5 percent of city streets, roughly 205 miles out of 8,400 total lane miles, account for nearly half of all fatal and incapacitating crashes in Indianapolis.² The IMPO runs a parallel, region-wide version of the same idea called the High Injury Network: 234 centerline miles, about 10 percent of the region's collector and arterial roads, built from crash data collected between 2016 and 2020.³ Layer the two together and the same names keep showing up.

The roads and intersections behind the numbers

East Washington Street is one of them. Eric Holt, who founded the advocacy group Safe Streets Indy, has called it "the worst street in Indianapolis across the spectrum from the West to the East side," for pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers alike.⁴

On the near southwest side, the intersection of Raymond Street and Harding Street has killed three cyclists since 2021. One was Dustin Craig, who was riding north in the left lane of Harding when he was struck from behind, thrown into the southbound lanes, and hit again by a second vehicle. A cyclist was killed one block over, at Raymond and Shelby Streets, in February 2025.⁵

Farther north, the 38th Street corridor turns up again and again in IMPD's own crash reports. A 42-year-old pedestrian was killed in a hit-and-run near 38th Street and Keystone Avenue.⁶ Months later, IMPD reported another pedestrian struck and killed near East 38th Street and North Shadeland Avenue.⁷ And at 86th Street, where the Monon Trail crosses, a cyclist was killed in 2021, one of several fatal crashes that pushed the corridor onto the city's watch list.²

The IMPO's 2023 Intersection Safety Study formalized this pattern, naming 19 high-crash locations across the Indianapolis metropolitan planning area, including five flagged specifically as high priority for pedestrians and cyclists. Each got a collision diagram, a field check, and a sit-down with local police and engineers before recommendations went out.⁸

Who gets hit, and when

Marion County's own pedestrian crash data, compiled from Indiana State Police reports by the public health group Health by Design, fills in detail that citywide totals miss. In 2021, the county logged 259 pedestrian crashes, 27 of them fatal, a 10.4 percent fatality rate. The year before was worse: 243 crashes, 38 deaths, a 15.6 percent fatality rate, the highest of the twelve years the report tracked.⁹

The pattern in that data holds up year over year. Eighty-four percent of pedestrian fatalities between 2010 and 2021 happened after dark. Seventy-one percent happened somewhere other than an intersection, meaning most of the county's deadliest pedestrian crashes happen mid-block, not at a crosswalk. Tuesday is the single most dangerous day (18 percent of crashes), and 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. is the most common window on most days of the week. October and November are the worst months. Two-thirds of drivers involved were simply going straight when they hit someone; 15 percent were turning left. The average pedestrian struck was 40 years old, and men made up 68 percent of those hit in 2021.⁹

Hit-and-runs are their own problem. Twenty percent of Marion County's 2021 pedestrian crashes involved a driver who fled the scene.⁹ By August 2024, a local tracking group called Indy Pedestrian Safety Crisis counted more than 100 pedestrians and cyclists struck by drivers in a single month, a 59 percent jump over August 2023. Seven people died that month (six pedestrians, one cyclist), and half of the year's fatalities to that point had been hit-and-runs.¹⁰

How Indianapolis compares

Smart Growth America's 2026 Dangerous by Design report ranks the Indianapolis metro area 47th out of the 101 largest U.S. metro areas for pedestrian danger, with an average annual fatality rate of 2.17 per 100,000 residents from 2020 through 2024. That's up from the 2015-2019 stretch: 231 deaths in the more recent five years against 170 in the one before it.¹¹ Marion County's own Pedestrian Danger Index, a related Smart Growth America metric that adjusts for how many people actually walk, came out to 145 in 2020, calculated from 38 deaths against a population of roughly 977,000 and an estimated 1.9 percent of workers who walk to their jobs.⁹

Statewide, pedestrian crashes hit a five-year high of 2,186 in 2023 even as fatalities dipped slightly to 98, down from 111 the year before, according to Indiana Crash Facts, produced annually by the Indiana University Public Policy Institute for the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute.¹² Indiana's pedestrian deaths still rose roughly 26 percent in the first half of 2024 compared with the same period in 2023, even as the country's fell. The Governors Highway Safety Association counted 3,304 pedestrian deaths nationwide in that same window, 88 fewer than a year earlier.¹³

What's being done

The Indianapolis City-County Council passed its Vision Zero ordinance in 2024, setting a goal of eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries by 2035. The task force held its first meeting in October 2024 and adopted its formal action plan in December 2025, after missing an original July 2025 deadline.² The IMPO's regional Safety Action Plan carries a parallel target: cutting serious and fatal crashes 35 percent by 2040.¹⁴ In 2023 alone, the city put $31 million toward pedestrian infrastructure, adding 8.5 miles of bike lanes, 531 new crosswalks, 55 new signalized intersections, and 20.5 miles of trails.⁵

If you or someone you know gets hit

Get medical care first, even if you feel fine. Adrenaline can mask real injuries for hours after a crash. Ask the responding IMPD officer for the crash report number before you leave the scene, and if you're able, get the plate number, vehicle description, and direction of travel for any driver who takes off. Given how often that happens here, that information matters.

An attorney who handles these cases regularly can help sort out liability and how Indiana's insurance and comparative-fault rules apply to your specific crash. You can find one through our legal directory.

This is general information, not legal advice.

Sources

1. WTHR, Indianapolis releases first Vision Zero report as traffic deaths decline from pandemic peak, https://www.wthr.com/article/news/local/indianapolis-releases-first-vision-zero-report-traffic-deaths-decline-from-pandemic-peak-cyclists-pedestrians/531-e6689ee1-72ef-4d2a-805d-b8d2e0e384f3

2. Mirror Indy, Vision Zero is possible in Indianapolis, advocates say, https://mirrorindy.org/vision-zero-2025-indianapolis-pedestrian-safety-action-plan/

3. Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization, Safety and the IMPO, https://www.indympo.org/resources/safety

4. WRTV, Vision Zero falling behind on keeping people safe, safety advocate says, https://www.wrtv.com/news/local-news/vision-zero-falling-behind-on-keeping-people-safe-safety-advocate-says

5. WRTV, Records show cyclist killed at Raymond and Harding is the 3rd since 2021, https://www.wrtv.com/news/local-news/records-show-cyclist-killed-at-raymond-and-harding-is-the-3rd-since-2021

6. WTHR, 42-year-old pedestrian killed in hit-and-run crash along 38th Street near Keystone Avenue, https://www.wthr.com/article/news/crime/person-killed-hit-and-run-crash-indianapolis-northeast-side/531-2a823b12-7a46-4d69-892f-ebf1fa57dc83

7. WTHR, IMPD: Pedestrian killed in crash near East 38th Street and North Shadeland Avenue, https://www.wthr.com/article/news/local/impd-pedestrian-struck-killed-near-east-38th-street-north-shadeland-avenue/531-e48de4c1-2a63-4230-a0d0-8e28aa614fed

8. Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization, Intersection Safety Studies, https://indympo.gov/plans-initiatives/safety-studies/

9. Health by Design, Marion County Pedestrian Crash Data Report - 2022, https://healthbydesignonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/Marion-County-Pedestrian-Crash-Data-Report.pdf

10. Mirror Indy, Indianapolis drivers hit 100+ cyclists and pedestrians last month, https://mirrorindy.org/indianapolis-traffic-fatalities-cyclists-pedestrians-killed-vision-zero-plan/

11. Smart Growth America, Dangerous by Design: Rankings, https://www.smartgrowthamerica.org/signature-reports/dangerous-by-design/rankings/

12. Indiana Criminal Justice Institute and Indiana University Public Policy Institute, Indiana Crash Facts 2023, https://www.in.gov/cji/research/files/2023-Crash-Facts-with-Officer-Report.pdf

13. Governors Highway Safety Association, Pedestrian Traffic Fatalities by State: 2024 Preliminary Data, https://www.ghsa.org/resource-hub/pedestrian-traffic-fatalities-january-june-2024

14. Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization, Annual Safety Report, https://indympo.gov/plans-initiatives/annual-safety-report/