This is the fourth in a series of stories by Kimmel, who's given up her car and is relying primarily on public transit.

First off, way to go, Indy! I love reading all of the great feedback we are getting as a Super Bowl host city.

Everyone seems really impressed — the Hoosier hospitality, the art and street performers and the walkability and compactness of our downtown area.

I rode the shuttle bus for the first time on Saturday night. As if riding from Mass Ave to Fountain Square in a circle around the city wasn’t different enough, the noise and energy on the bus was almost foreign. All that could be heard was chanting for the Giants and other conversation typical of the time of night and the situation.

I wasn’t surprised to see that the bus was full of loud and not-hardly-sober people. I talked to a few, but unfortunately most everyone I talked with was from out of town trying to make their way back to their hotels and had just happened upon the shuttle for the first time all weekend. Most everyone else was walking.

Since moving downtown a couple of months ago, it has become clear that walking is actually the easiest option for me, as well. I can’t blame anyone for feeling that way, especially during the Super Bowl. Personally, when I needed to make it to work on time or across the city on time, and didn’t want to deal with the hassle of the traffic and the closed streets, it was easiest to just walk the extra fifteen minutes.

Walking around Indianapolis the weekend of the Super Bowl made me realize that the city is very walkable. Of course, after reading the reviews, it is clear that I’m not the only one who feels that way.

I work part time at a brewery where several out-of-towners visited. I talked to a lot of them and was able to get some firsthand feedback on their time in Indianapolis. I got to play tour guide a little bit, too, suggesting places to eat, drink and spend their free hours. I suggested the buses and shuttles to everyone I talked to.

I told a couple of guys from New Jersey about the shuttle, about how it would take them to Mass Ave and they could get off and choose from a number of cool bars for lunch.

“How far is that?”

I told them it would be probably a five-minute ride on the shuttle. Their response was laughter.

“Why would we wait twenty minutes for a shuttle when we can walk there in less time?”

The overall feeling I got from our visitors was it was crazy to think they needed to take a shuttle only a few blocks away because surely we all must just walk everywhere.

I previously wrote about how I believed that the biggest complaint we would hear after everyone was gone was going to be our public transit system. I never really thought about how compact and walkable our downtown area is for people who would be staying right downtown. In fact, I only heard about two or three complaints about the transit system overall.

I’m an avid supporter of a mass public transit system, but I will continue to take as much advantage as I can of the nationwide realization that it’s easiest to navigate downtown Indianapolis by foot.

• Brandon Knapp

This is the third in a series of stories by Kimmel, who's given up her car and is relying primarily on public transit.

Many of you probably know that the transit legislation essentially died at the Statehouse last week. In a House Committee, the proposed bill failed to pass with an 11-10 vote. But what you may not know is that while the Committee was voting, IndyGo was working to increase ridership to levels this city hasn’t seen in years and to keep up with the demand for public transit during these couple of weeks of the Super Bowl.

So far, so good. Call it the calm before the storm, but with weekend one of the Super Bowl festivities under our belt, things seem to be running fairly smoothly. The buses have been packed with locals coming from the suburbs to experience the festivities and I haven't heard too many complaints about people being later than usual to their jobs.

My bus rides this week have been a mix of two types of people. During the week, on my way to work, I ride with people just trying to get to work who, at 8:30 in the morning, are not very affected by the Super Bowl visitors. These are the same faces I see and have become familiar with in the last few weeks and things seem pretty normal.

In the evenings and on the weekend, however, I ride buses full of people who look scared to death to be riding. They seem highly confused and it’s obvious who’s riding for the first time.

I have to chuckle at their faces and actions because I know that was me just a month ago not being able to find a seat and realizing I have to stand, trying to figure out where to hold on, not wanting to touch other people or invade their space.

One thing has been consistent this week though: The energy of the city has brought more conversation amongst the riders. I myself have been joining the conversation. I’ve met Sara, the woman who used to drive a bus herself several years ago and, though she is a huge Colts fan, is glad she doesn’t have to drive during the Super Bowl.

I’ve met Holly who had never stepped foot on a bus and was excited to see her friend’s band play in the Super Bowl Village. And I’ve met a guy they call Floyd, who carries around a metal bar to keep off the Pit Bulls who live in the neighborhood close to his job that he commutes an hour to — daily.

I've met people from all walks of life riding the bus for all different reasons and, whatever their reason, every person I’ve talked to has excitement and pride for their city.

Every rider has a story and so does Indianapolis.

If we can pull off this next weekend and bring light — whether negative or positive — to the sad state of our system, to the capability and to the need, Sara, Holly, Floyd, me and you will be able to enjoy the city as it should be and the transit bill will keep moving forward in legislation so that hopefully we can have this kind of ridership well beyond the Super Bowl.

• Brandon Knapp

I don’t care about the Super Bowl. There, I said it. I watched it once because the team I sometimes root for was playing, but still, the white noise of the game on TV will never cease to put me to sleep.

This year is obviously different. This year I am one of many Hoosiers involved in the hoopla and working to make it a good experience for visitors. My excitement comes from the remarkable things that the game has done and will do for Indianapolis: the food trucks, the street improvements, the Near Eastside Legacy Project, the TURF arts pavilion and the 46 for XLVI mural project, to name a few.

I am also concerned about a few things.

I am concerned that the people with whom I ride cannot stop their lives for the city to host the Super Bowl. That adding different routes and detours and people to the already significant problems of the public transit system is only going to make the commute to work more difficult for the people who need it the most.

It will certainly be confusing, inconvenient and chaotic and will probably leave people waiting unnecessarily long in cold weather.

I’ve also heard concerns that the visitors in town who do care about the game will no doubt be shocked at the state of our transit system…especially coming from such transit-reliant cities as Boston and New York.

It is disconcerting to think that a lot of opinions of our otherwise great city might be based on negative transit experiences.

However, I’m hopeful. I believe that the first weekend of February will be a good glimpse into what the public transit system could ultimately look like for our city with extra buses, circulator buses, full buses and free buses.

I know it will be another struggle to add to the daily lives of the people who rely so heavily on public transit, but, in my opinion, IndyGo has done a significant thing to offer free rides from Feb. 2-5 even for the regular routes — and to add the extra buses, shuttles and routes to ease the pain even a little bit.

The free rides are funded through a Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement grant to acknowledge and thank current riders for putting up with the hassle of the last few months and to attract new riders who otherwise might not utilize the system.

It is equally as exciting to think that people who don’t live in the heart of downtown will choose to ride the bus rather than pay to park and will be forced to step onto a bus for the first time.

I know there will be some bumps and problems and complaints about the transit system, but there already are and hopefully it’s clear that things are being done to improve them. I will try to be optimistic that the kinks have been worked out for the dependent riders and will remain confident that the first weekend of February will be yet another turning point for Indianapolis public transit.

And this year, I am hoping that instead of sleeping to the sounds of the Super Bowl, I will be traveling with ease through this city — to work, to the NFL village, to the parties and to experience all the other great things Indianapolis has in store for us.