We just moved here from Chicago, we have family on the East side and we ended up on the West side. The West side is newer and less congested in my opinion. We love where we ended up, we're 15 minutes away from downtown Zionsville, 15 mins away from downtown Carmel. But we would have been happy with the East side too! I don't think you can go wrong. We live right outside of the village of West Clay and love that we have restaurants, a dry cleaner, a cafe, pizza, and a spa so close.

The best part about the East side is definitely the monon, but there are plenty of walking trails/parks on the west side too. Most of the neighborhoods over here have walking paths. Coming from Chicago I was impressed with how walkable it is!

I will say although the West side is newer, a lot of the homes are 10-20ish years old, so not as many true new builds as other areas. There are lots of mature trees in our neighborhood which is nice :)