2028 Olympics in OKC

[Urbanized]

The screen was also a hoped-for wind break. That said, the river benefits from being far below the grade of those berms. Even on very windy days it’s typically much calmer than area lakes.

[Southsider2]

Lol for sure I get it! It would probably be a big pain to re-route that stretch and even if that were done there would likely be environmental considerations (Phase I and II hoops to jump through). It just sticks out like a sore thumb and acts as a prominent psychological boundary.

[Pete]

Here are some old renderings showing the proposed grandstand on the south shore near the finish line, with screens behind:

[theBeat]

This may have been asked already, but if rowing were to come here also, any chance the city would go in and harden the shore of the river through this section? Or at least do something to better disguise the rip rap?

[catch22]

That railyard is an active switching yard for local industries along that line as well as for BNSF interchange traffic to Stillwater Central. Moving it would be very costly for local businesses who rely on that line and its cheap cost to interchange onto the Class 1 RR’s. Moving it somewhere else would probably double the switching fees and interchange costs.

[Pete]

That railyard is an active switching yard for local industries along that line as well as for BNSF interchange traffic to Stillwater Central. Moving it would be very costly for local businesses who rely on that line and its cheap cost to interchange onto the Class 1 RR’s. Moving it somewhere else would probably double the switching fees and interchange costs.

Yeah, no possibility of moving it.

Just screening the view. The City owns all the shoreline going back about 100-125 feet.

[Snowman]

This may have been asked already, but if rowing were to come here also, any chance the city would go in and harden the shore of the river through this section? Or at least do something to better disguise the rip rap?

For better or worse the rip rap is consider a feature for the course, and it's job of clearing water out of the city during heavy flooding.

Though there has been a trend of lowering how high the rip rap goes, since their now is a normal water level in each of the basin regions, verses the original cover all the bank strategy they did decades ago. Where you basically can not see it in the park area north of the Chesapeake Boathouse, and half of the North Shore of the Boathouse district had it removed almost to the waterline, for a sidewalk and making the bank more amenable for visitors to view races from.

Multiple renderings for the new resort have showed possibly doing major changes to the south bank near it, some even had concepts for the north bank too. Granted some versions seemed unpractical and plausibly interfering with the river being use as a race course, either way those seemed to have been toned back over time. I am not sure where the most recent renderings could be found or if what is being built is still similar to those.

[catch22]

I have mentioned this before but I really wish they would build a boardwalk over the riprap. This would conceal them, and allow an even closer view of the river without compromising the water calming abilities of it. My biggest complaint is how ugly the river looks because of the rocks, I do appreciate their function though.

[Just the facts]

Rip rap is the chainlink fence of riverbanks: cheap and ugly. There are litterally dozens of other options that look better and work just as well in controlling wake

[PhiAlpha]

I have mentioned this before but I really wish they would build a boardwalk over the riprap. This would conceal them, and allow an even closer view of the river without compromising the water calming abilities of it. My biggest complaint is how ugly the river looks because of the rocks, I do appreciate their function though.

I couldn't remember who brought it up originally but it was the first thing I thought of for improving the look of the river when Pete dropped the Olympic news. Seems like a great and feasible idea.

[Pete]

Some issues about a boardwalk: 1) we are talking about 3 miles of shoreline just between the Lincoln/Central bridge and Eastern; and 2) it would have to have a railing because to cover the rocks, the walk would be several feet off the water.

It's a great idea and maybe they just do it between Lincoln and I-35, but it would be an expensive proposition and I believe that is why the Riversport Foundation has set a bunch of other priorities they want to fund. I've never seen this idea mentioned in even their most aspirational presentations, and they do a lot of them.

[W8N2SKI]

I've never seen this idea mentioned in even their most aspirational presentations, and they do a lot of them.

Would you mind sharing some of the "aspirational" ideas that they have presented in the past? I know most are not feasible but it is nice to dream haha

[Pete]

Would you mind sharing some of the "aspirational" ideas that they have presented in the past? I know most are not feasible but it is nice to dream haha

The renderings of the grandstand, screen and other improvements came from one of those presentations.

This is the latest masterplan:

[Snowman]

Would you mind sharing some of the "aspirational" ideas that they have presented in the past? I know most are not feasible but it is nice to dream haha

For years OU was shown as having their own boathouse (between UCO's and what is now the Whitewater building), though at some point OU seems to have shifted to building an on campus training facility and continue to use the small boathouse at Exchange ave in the next basin over. There seemed to be pretty complete plans and renderings done by the same designer who did the others in the area. With indications there was a fourth unnamed university that was considering another one too.
They even built the chevron retaining walls for both, eventually the whitewater center took the land the unidentified collage could have built a boathouse, the space where OU might have built there's now has tent structures on.

Stands on the south side, with a floating stage

Extend the terraced viewing area either to around the whitewater center or i35

Towers from the walkways on both sides of the waters edge to Lincoln bridge, shortening travel between the sides, it at least had stairs. Maybe there was an elevator too (my memory is fuzzy on this)

The windscreen along the length of the course, which also could be used for a projection surface

Lighting for all 2000m of the rowing course, 500m were built

A number of things were aspirational for years, but some variation got built even if not where or how was originally proposed.

Edit: I forgot there was a small window they were considering making sort trails (plausibly small docks or ramps too) to carry canoes from different basins around the dams for portage races (though presumably could be used if you wanted to travel the river more casually too), the race type implies you have to carry the canoe over land some minimum distance a couple times during the race. Though instead they set it up more as a loop, where the land portion has them carrying it on the wide sidewalk in front of the crowd.

[Pete]

^

Regarding OU, I was told they decided to stay in the modest facility down near the stockyards because that section of the river is far less congested than Boathouse Row, which has several teams training.

They have slowly made improvements to what they have, as well as the on-campus training facility you mentioned.

I think the idea of OU building on Boathouse Row has been completely dead for several years, although there were sexy renderings of it for some time.


And to be completely fair, what once was aspirational (finish line tower, most of the boathouses, the zip lines and slides, recreation equipment, the e-sports center, improvements to the pump track, connection of the river trails, surf and ski facilities, and even the whitewater facility itself) all started out as "dream big" ideas from the Boathouse Foundation (or more specifically Aubrey McClendon, Mike Knopp, and Rand Elliott).

It would take me a long time to list all the improvements that have been made over the last 15 years. They have been continuous for so long, I had forgotten most of it until I went back to read the beginning of the Boathouse Row thread, when there was only Chesapeake down there.

[CCOKC]

I just so happened to attend a rowing session at the Rio Olympics, mostly because the tickets were cheap and the link to Olympic rowing and OKC. The grandstand that Pete showed in the renderings look every bit as sufficient as the temporary grandstand that was in Rio. The one thing that we may not have room for is ticketing and staging areas. The rowing in Rio was held at a lake and I seem to recall a lot of temporary barriers around the lake at the rowing venue so people could not have an access to viewing the race except from the paid stands. I imagine something like that would be necessary along the river to some extent.

[Swake]

I wonder if they are considering holding the BMX events in Tulsa at the Hardesty National BMX Stadium?

https://www.usabmx.com/tracks/2011

[HOT ROD]

I doubt it as LA probably has venues for it.

[HOT ROD]

Oklahoman in on it now. https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news...s/70297615007/

[chssooner]

Another problem will be getting more upscale hotels. Those who go to these events aren't poor, and likely would want to stay in nice, top-notch hotels.

[HOT ROD]

yes, hopefully the market will respond in kind. Would LOVE to see highrise Marriott, Hyatt, Westin, and Hilton added to downtown. ...

[soonerguru]

Looks like the Oklahoman let Pete do their reporting again without any attribution.

[PhiAlpha]

Shocking

[catch22]

The Oklahoman would make a decent pee pad for a puppy in potty training, then again I don’t think I would subject the poor creature to such reading material while using it.

[Swake]

It wasn't possible until the IOC changed the rules in 2019.

They added that flexibility specifically for situations like this: even the biggest cities have to absorb massive expenses to build facilities that have little to no value after the 2-week Games are over.

It's getting harder for cities to make the Games work financially, so they added this alternative.

LA's initial plan was to build a temporary facility for close to $100 million and then immediately tear it down. Through this change, this type of wasteful expense can be avoided and the Games will have a brighter future with more cities bidding.

That's not true, the 2008 Beijing Olympics had events in Hong Kong, Qingdao and Shanghai