It is also ironic that anyone on here who has staunchly supported the maintenance of historic buildings/areas downtown would not understand why a historic neighborhood would have their own set of concerns. That said, this letter or any objections they pose will not be enough to impede progress. They will find their fears unfounded.

The need for power is vastly different than in the past when this was a vibrant community.

Based on what?

You think that back in the 50's before urban renewal people didn't have air conditioning? Yes, there are more electronics today but they are also made to be pretty darn energy efficient; we've also vastly increased insulation and window and door efficiency. Studies show that energy consumption per household has been trending DOWN for decades.

And there were about 3x the number of people living, working and going to church in that immediate area than there are today.


And even if you are correct, your issue should be with Saint Anthony. Have you protested their multiple expansions, especially since you claim it's the primary reason for the change in your neighborhood? Do you realize they have even bigger expansion plans on the horizon?

Like I said Okc needs more stronger neighborhoods and community watchdogs.

Totally agree. However, the concerns as presented can easily be perceived as simple NIMBYISM in the way that the simple notice was written.

Just had an interesting conversation with my boss after reading this thread.

She lives in HH and according to her a lot of people are concerned that this is section 8/low income housing. The connection comes from a story in the Gazette a few issues ago that this project recieved HUD funding. Of couse HUD is a huge government organization, so someone can be eligible for HUD funds for numerous reasons. However, most people see HUD and automatically think projects/section 8, etc.

At the meeting it needs to be made clear by the developer that this is in fact NOT a low income housing project, with rents that will be geard to professional, high earning people. Everything else (water usage, electricity) are all legit issues but should not derail this project.

This has NOTHING to do with the Section 8 program; it uses the same HUD financing used for the Sieber Hotel Apartments and I challenge anyone to say that's Section 8.

Yuppies are going to live here, not the poor... but you can tell how the richies do feel about the poor from their line of thinking. If you are scared of people different then you then move to the suburbs... that is why they came into existence - so rich, white people could get away from "others."

any person that thinks this is a sec 8 project clearly never reads the paper and doesn't have a clue ...



as for water pressure ... i live closer to this site than 95% of HH/mesta and have no Water issue ..

also have no problem with the historic neighborhood protecting their neighborhood but this project is not in their neighborhood

Here's the problem I have with any of the homeowners that want to protest on very vague grounds...

HH and MP property owners are the biggest beneficiaries of the hundreds of millions spent on street improvement and other amenities all within walking distance of their homes. The incredible improvements in 23rd street to the north and Midtown and downtown to the south are all directly due to this massive public investment. Accordingly, their home prices have gone up substantially as has their quality of life.

But now that others want to develop and move into the general area the drawbridge gets pulled up. Since they are already in and will not necessarily receive a benefit from this development (although that point in itself is arguable), now they want to stand in the way others moving in.


Well, hard cheese. If you don't like the idea of density and renters and retail and more businesses -- all across a busy street and not directly bordering your neighborhood anyway -- it's probably time to cash out your profit, move to Edmond and let others who long for a vibrant central city take your place.

Here's the problem I have with any of the homeowners that want to protest on very vague grounds...

HH and MP property owners are the biggest beneficiaries of the hundreds of millions spent on street improvement and other amenities all within walking distance of their homes. The incredible improvements in 23rd street to the north and Midtown and downtown to the south are all directly due to this massive public investment. Accordingly, their home prices have gone up substantially as has their quality of life.

But now that others want to develop and move into the general area the drawbridge gets pulled up. Since they are already in and will not necessarily receive a benefit from this development (although that point in itself is arguable), now they want to stand in the way others moving in.


Well, hard cheese. If you don't like the idea of density and renters and retail and more businesses -- all across a busy street and not directly bordering your neighborhood anyway -- it's probably time to cash out your profit, move to Edmond and let others who long for a vibrant central city take your place.

EXACTLY! Well put!

I think you guys are being a little hard on these homeowners. It would be a pretty good guess that little to none of them have ever been on or heard of OKCtalk. THerefore they probably have zero clue about what kind of development it is. Then they get flyers asking them to voice thier concerns over an apartment project. Therefore by being asked what their concerns are lead to them be concerned about what is being built.

Once they realize the quality of it is, like the above poster said, I think they will change their tune. I would be happy if they built this by my place in Edgemere. But these homeowners need to realize when an area becomes desireable, then people are going to come. Happens everywhere.

and a side note. I grew up in edmond, and lived there for 4 years after college. I recently moved to Edgemere Park. Love both places. It is what it is. Good schools and a good place to raise a family. Not for everyone. No one is asking you to move there. There are smug people everywhere. Nichols Hills. Mesta Park. Norman. Yukon. Moore. Great. You don't like the suburbs, we get it. Get over it. You sound like babies.

Here is the notice sent out to Mesta Park residents.

Sounds like someone needs an education in how new urbanism development INCREASES property values. Plus, when these very same Mesta Park residents get too old to take care of a house they can move into the Edge (or other nearby apartments) and still have access to the same entertainment/retail/dining options and keep the same circle of friends. New Urbanism allows people to live in the same neighborhood as their income and living situation changes. And the very people that buy their house in the future might be the same people that move into the Edge first.

Time Line:
2014 - Move into Edge
2015 - meet girl
2018 - get married
2019 - buy Mesta Park house and raise family
2030 - buy Heritage Hills house
2045 - move back to Edge

Live 45 years in the same neighborhood - priceless.

Yuppies are going to live here, not the poor... but you can tell how the richies do feel about the poor from their line of thinking. If you are scared of people different then you then move to the suburbs... that is why they came into existence - so rich, white people could get away from "others."


They need to build some Bedford-Stuyvestant-style high-rise tenements and import eternally-unemployed residents from Brooklyn to move to Oklahoma. Then we would have a truly diverse city. And lots and lots and lots more crime and squalor. And it would bring growth. Lots of it. Quickly.

With none of the electrical requirements of Today. St Anthony is a huge power consumer and using more all the time with new science equipment. Heritage Hill's 14th street and south of Classen Drive are all on the St. Anthony grid. The need for power is vastly different than in the past when this was a vibrant community.
Honestly, I imagine a development of 100 would compromise the current grid.

I suspect St. Anthony makes their own electricity from steam but I could be wrong on that. Most hospitals don't rely on the regular grid.

With all due respect to some posters on here I think it needs to be clarified that this is SOME not all of the homeowers in Heritage Hills. If some have opposition to this project due to the section 8 rumor then I would imagine then a lot of those people would be on board with this once that is cleared up.

In regards to the water/electric issue, I can say that as a resident of Midtown we had some water outages, although this was probably due to the drought stricken soil shifting old water lines. We have also had two brownouts in the past year. But its not like this is something that can't be fixed.

It seems theres a lot of misinforamtion flying around. One person reading the Gazette, then suddenly everyone's going around clucking that they're building projects in their backyard.


They need to build some Bedford-Stuyvestant-style high-rise tenements and import eternally-unemployed residents from Brooklyn to move to Oklahoma. Then we would have a truly diverse city. And lots and lots and lots more crime and squalor. And it would bring growth. Lots of it. Quickly.

I was just in Bed-Stuy this October and its rapidly gentrifying into a prosperous hood full of high earning black professionals. Thanks for playing, though.

Let's not use extremes as the basis for brushing aside the crux of this discussion. No one is accusing all the homeowners as being evil any more than all people in favor of this project "don't like the suburbs".

However, there are SOME homeowners not only against this project but circulating a flyer that reads "If you oppose this development, or oppose it in it's current fashion, please attend the Downtown Design Review Committee meeting." This is not coming from a place of understanding but out-right opposition.

There is also a homeowner on this thread making claims about electricity and water without presenting any facts.


If there is a specific concern, get educated, quantify it and use facts... Not vague and random scare tactics meant to inflame dissent at the END of a process that has spanned over five years.

Otherwise, this just all comes off as thinly veiled elitism.

Keep in mind, in OKC apartments have had a negative connotation and that is what most people think of. There are few high quality apartment complexes anywhere around here. Most of the apartment complexes in the city have gone through a series of owners, many of which use them as a cash source and often let them gradually deteriorate until they have to be replaced. In OKC apartment building has almost meant disposable. This development SHOULD be different, but the fear of it not being will indeed drive some fear. I don't know that it is elitism as much as a level of ignorance and fear.

I do find that it is easy to play the division card on this board. Rich vs. poor. Young vs old. City center dweller vs. suburbanite. Manager vs. worker. Many of us are ignorant of what other people's true issues are and quickly are judgmental. We need to just cut some of the rhetoric sometimes.

The fact is that a few (we have no idea of whether it is one person of more) may have some sort of grudge against the developer, may indeed be elitist, may just be ignorant, or may have some true concerns. This one or more persons do not reflect the feeling of the neighborhood. I believe most are in favor of a quality development coming to the area and are friendly to the idea. This may very well be a tempest in a teapot. I have a very hard time believing this will not go through and very close to what was proposed.

And, I have a hard time believing the HH residents are too paranoid about poorer neighborhoods nearby or they wouldn't have moved there in the first place. It isn't exactly surrounded by Newport Beach.

I suspect St. Anthony makes their own electricity from steam but I could be wrong on that. Most hospitals don't rely on the regular grid.

Where are you pulling that from, most hospitals use the grid and have a process for getting to backup generators, some with uninterrupted sources like flywheels as an intermediate source for that kind of power draw but that generally only covers critical systems.

I suspect St. Anthony makes their own electricity from steam but I could be wrong on that. Most hospitals don't rely on the regular grid.

So where does the steam come from? Steam is generated from other power sources unless it it a deep geothermal natural steam source.

He is referring to steam being used as a heat source on large campuses but no its not an energy source. As for apartments becoming deteriorated, that has to do with alternative land being cheap to develop. Because the underlying land should retain its value, the apartments should be well maintained, as they are in other valuable and convenient places.

He is referring to steam being used as a heat source on large campuses but no its not an energy source. As for apartments becoming deteriorated, that has to do with alternative land being cheap to develop. Because the underlying land should retain its value, the apartments should be well maintained, as they are in other valuable and convenient places.

I am not necessarily disagreeing, but it is often due to the owner and calculation of cash flow, depreciation, maintenance costs, renter demand, etc. If the rest of downtown keeps progressing, the underlying land will increase in value regardless. At some point, when the land is valuable but the building has been fully depreciated and the maintenance costs increase (as happens as buildings age), owners many times decide that the cost of refurbishing is too great. As long as demand stays high then it won't happen.

All I know is Jacksonville has four major hospitals and all four have their own physical plants. St Anthony's has one also at the corner of Lee and 9th. You can see the four cooling towers on Google Earth which are not visable from the street. Of course, these might be for some serious back-up generators though (hence the - I might be wrong). They burn natural gas to boil water that produces steam which turns a turbine that makes electricity.

But if they don't produce their own, I stand corrected.

You're right. I didn't know how they generated the electricity or if it had anything to do with the boilers in their buildings. But if natural gas is used, brown outs shouldn't affect them either way.

You're right. I didn't know how they generated the electricity or if it had anything to do with the boilers in their buildings. But if natural gas is used, brown outs shouldn't affect them either way.

Typically, there is a brief time between when the power goes out and a diesel generator kicks in. Not a big deal in an office building. It might make the lights flicker and a desktop computer might re-boot. I don't imagine a hospital would want equipment to flicker or re-boot. I have seen in some hospitals where they have differnent colored outlets indicating the orgin of the power. Critical equipments goes in one color and non-critical in another. So they might not produce enough to power the whole place, but they produce enough to power mission critical equipment. But like I said SA might not do this.

Anyway, there is no evidence that St. Anthony power consumption or that of this proposed project will inhibit the MP/HH neighborhoods.

Or at least there has been no evidence presented here and I can't find anything like that elsewhere.

Anyway, there is no evidence that St. Anthony power consumption or that of this proposed project will inhibit the MP/HH neighborhoods.

Or at least there has been no evidence presented here and I can't find anything like that elsewhere.

Tru Dat. That is a "run an excuse up the flag pole and see who salutes" deal.

Or run 25 excuses up a flagpole to try and rile up the neighborhood in order to cause a needless obstruction.

All I know is Jacksonville has four major hospitals and all four have their own physical plants. St Anthony's has one also at the corner of Lee and 9th. You can see the four cooling towers on Google Earth which are not visable from the street. Of course, these might be for some serious back-up generators though (hence the - I might be wrong). They burn natural gas to boil water that produces steam which turns a turbine that makes electricity.

But if they don't produce their own, I stand corrected.

Cooling towers can be from HVAC system. Most are.

The irony of all those opposing too much density or that there isn't proper infrastructure is that the old Mercy Hospital that occupied that property until the 70's was almost exactly as dense as what is now proposed.

5-stories, multi-level parking garage and 225 beds:

http://www.okctalk.com/images/pete/oldmercy1.jpg

http://www.okctalk.com/images/pete/oldmercy2.jpg

Yes Steve, the neighborhood knows that now. But he could not speak for the neighborhood without going back to the board. Which he didn't.

Is it not embarrassing for such a highly-organized neighborhood to be so deeply misinformed about such a momentous development project on its own boundary??

embarrassing for who?

and again this could be a small group and is not representative of an entire neighborhood.

Well, after reading the proposal on the Downtown Design Review Committee agenda (which was made public today), I think that everyone's doubts about the quality of the Edge should be greatly mitigated, including those in Heritage Hills. It has a 4 page long design statement talking about the care that was put into the project to integrate it into the surrounding neighborhood and the respect given to its interaction with Heritage Hills. Also a plus is that it says real stucco will be used, not EIFS, along with brick. If the included real life pictures of similar buildings are what we can expect, I think this has a real chance to be even nicer than LEVEL.

I don't know how long this will last (I tried right clicking and doing save link): http://www.okc.gov/planning/planning_library/drc/11-00068.pdf

Some people would vote against tomorrow if they thought it would be different than today.

The Magna Wall stucco is apparently a fiber type or backed stucco. Is this like a fiberglass? Basically looks like a different type of spread on surface. Just because it says stucco that doesn't define it as high quality. How is it much different than Eifs or what is being applied at Level?

Here in Seattle (ya I know, not the same city) I am seeing buildings going up all over with real brick facades.

Oklahoma is in the brick belt. We even have a whole part of downtown called Bricktown. You would think brick would be the prefered building material for everything.

Or at least the stucco would be over brick for a more solid face. That is now being done residentially in OKC.

Well, I have to say, if I lived nearby I probably want to attend just to protest the use of brick veneers. I know it is cheaper, but it never looks good after much time.

Please enlighten me, seriously, what about just being a veneer makes brick not age as well as compared to a solid brick structure? Just the possibility of moisture seeping behind?

I thought that said stucco veneer the first time I read his comment

Technically most "brick walls" are brick veneer cavity walls, meaning the brick is a veneer finish over a structural component. In most residential this is a wood stud wall, in commercial it could be a metal stud wall or CMU block. There aren't too many structural brick walls being built anymore. The only thing that I can think sid is referring to is what some of us call "sticky brick", it is usually a 1/4" to 3/8" slice of brick held in place to a backing surface with mortar. Cultured stone is similar but tends to be thicker.

See, I've never seen "brick sheets". I thought you meant solid structure vs. an outer layer. Sorry.

To steer it back on topic, I'll amend my previous statement and state that I believe this project could certainly turn out as nice as or nicer than LEVEL because of the use of brick.

HUD/FHA.....

The Edge is being financed by a privately held mortgage company that is approved as an FHA multifamily lender. HUD/FHA will provide mortgage insurance. It in no way has anything to do with the income level of the residents that will live there. The Edge will be 100% market rate. There will NOT be any section 8, or low-mod income tax credits associated with it. FHA mortgage insurance is merely a financing mechanism. The Seiber, The Classen Tower, and Legacy at Arts Quarter are all financed with FHA insured mortgages.

New Rendering from NewsOK:

http://photos3.newsok.com/cache/r960-cc09ee265cbe01d92eca6aec4fa8b449.jpg

and Steve's story: http://newsok.com/heritage-hills-residents-protest-upcoming-oklahoma-citys-midtown-housing-development/article/3640196

..........wow..........reminds me so well of section 8....

..........wow..........reminds me so well of section 8....

I wonder if they will allow pit bulls? You can't be too careful in a scary neighborhood like that.

I wonder if they will allow pit bulls? You can't be too careful in a scary neighborhood like that.

The people of that neighborhood apparently don't mingle with the outside world enough to be considered a threat.

You never know. When the property values start plummeting in HH and MP those people might resort to muggings.

You never know. When the property values start plummeting in HH and MP those people might resort to muggings.

They may do it anyways because they might not have enough water or electricity to stay clean and happy. Plus they already feel betrayed because nobody told them about these apartments that have been publicly known for months.

That rendering looks great.

Now that I'm done criticizing the kind but clueless folks of MP and HH, I will say that that rendering is impressive to say the least. It surpassed my expectations and my expectations were fairly high to begin with.

Now that I'm done criticizing the kind but clueless folks of MP and HH, I will say that that rendering is impressive to say the least. It surpassed my expectations and my expectations were fairly high to begin with.

Hey! I object to being called clueless and kind (I'm neither). We aren't all clueless in MP, can't speak for the HH people though. And yes that rendering is stunning, but I'm still holding my breath to see how the final product looks (I'm optomistic, but cautiously so).

Let's not forget councilwoman Meg Salyer lives in H.H.

Holy crap - wait until they find out the streetcar runs down that street as well. Get ready Jeff.

On a side note - this is one of the problems with clearing land with no immediate plans to build anything else.

Let's not forget councilwoman Meg Salyer lives in H.H.

Actually she moved downtown proper.

Regarding the streetcar, yep... Although we do have serious support by a great many people in that area that want to use the system.

Also, I talked to a good friend who suggests that MP is looking much more kindly on The Edge as Steve's article seems to reflect.

Hey! I object to being called clueless and kind (I'm neither). We aren't all clueless in MP, can't speak for the HH people though. And yes that rendering is stunning, but I'm still holding my breath to see how the final product looks (I'm optomistic, but cautiously so).

After reading UP's most recent comment I will cut you MP folks some slack.

http://blog.newsok.com/okccentral/2012/01/14/perspective-and-context/

“Downtown is where it is because of who we are,” said Carolyn Hubbard, Coley's daughter. “They want to leach off of us.”

Read more: http://newsok.com/heritage-hills-residents-protest-upcoming-oklahoma-citys-midtown-housing-development/article/3640196#ixzz1jTfIWvbQ

Makes my heart warm...

Makes my heart warm...

Yeah, I thought that was kind of strong...

Makes my heart warm...

So many people here wanted to try and avoid the Dallas mindset/attitude but it looks like we're too late... ='(

These clueless Heritage Hills boozers are so much like the small town yokels that protest when Wally World comes to town...except that would be comparing them to good, hard-working people who have a valid concern. Nevermind then!

These clueless Heritage Hills boozers are so much like the small town yokels that protest when Wally World comes to town...except that would be comparing them to good, hard-working people who have a valid concern. Nevermind then!

But Spartan, we owe all of downtown to them. How can we forget them?

Steve's latest from his blog.

http://blog.newsok.com/okccentral/2012/01/15/thirteen-years-of-proposed-dense-housing-development-at-nw-13-and-walker/