Quote Originally Posted by BDP View Post
I think saturation is a consideration, but this looks like it would have been a new option for downtown. I think the real threat could be building a lot of the same thing at this point, which we may be seeing (though demand seems to be keeping up). However, an owner occupied or even just a luxury high rise option would expand the market and possibly attract a new type of downtown resident that want to live downtown, but is not currently not interested in what's available. 3 or 4 of these would be a bad idea at this point. 1 or 2 is probably doable, imo. Regency seems to do well and it's kind of shabby. And even the Classen does very well and, honestly, it falls short on its promise of "luxury". A new building with well kept amenities and quality services would probably have no problem maintaining a good occupancy rate.
Agree with that too. A development like this would really only have the effective impact of two Edges or similar developments, and I don't think we would worry about those for a second. I think we're far from saturated.

JTF makes interesting points about new suburban housing subtracting value from existing suburban neighborhoods (which would be amplified in a city without positive population growth), while new urban actually adds to the appeal of the existing urban. In 20+ years of downtown advocacy I had never thought about it in those terms (personally I don't like pitting urban vs. suburban), but I think that point actually makes a lot of sense.

That doesn't of course change the fact that supply CAN exceed demand (will probably never happen in downtown OKC due to the fact that we effectively started at zero).