Downtown OKC 2033

[AP]

You're right, there are some strange correlations with the word commons.

Commons makes me think of something you would find at Hogwarts.

[ThomPaine]

Awesome! It didn't take too long for ths group of folks to find a creative solution! I like "Union Commons" but would be happy with "Union Park" as well. Great work!

un·ion


1. The action or fact of joining together or being joined together, esp. in a political context.
2. A state of harmony or agreement: "they live in perfect union".


com·mons


Land or resources belonging to or affecting the whole of a community.

[Just the facts]

Features should be named after 3 things: The founder, its location, or its use. The name should reflect the location, history, or purpose to help build a sense of community and chronographic continuity (connecting today with the past). I love the Union Park name - Union Commons is even better (see above) - and I'll put my GOP/Tea Party credentials up against anyone's .

I wouldn't mind getting away from the word 'Park' though. Perhaps use Mall, Green, Yard, Commons as the use identifier and combine it with the historical/location identifier such as Union, Land Run, Plains, City, etc...

So we end up with options like this.

Union Mall
Union Green
Union Yard
Union Commons
Land Run Mall
Land Run Green
Land Run Yard
Land Run Commons
City Mall
City Green
City Yard
City Commons

etc...

[BDP]

Wow, I have never seen such universal agreement on anything on this board. lol.

If we can all agree on it, I can't imagine that there'd be much resistance from the general public.

[DelCamino]

I too like the name "Union." Not only for the reasons already mentioned, but due to the central localtion, it could also be a unifier of our city, bridging the long time, century-old rift between the north and south sides of the city.

And a gentle note: The correct term is "Common," without the "s."

[ThomPaine]

I too like the name "Union." Not only for the reasons already mentioned, but due to the central localtion, it could also be a unifier of our city, bridging the long time, century-old rift between the north and south sides of the city.

And a gentle note: The correct term is "Common," without the "s."

Only amongst commoners... The more learned, landed, gentry will refer to it as the "commons" with the 's.'

[bchris02]

In 20 years, we'll be ready to tear down the Cotton Seed Mill and put in an NFL stadium.

I agree with this. OKC should look at trying to recruit the NFL when it reaches the 1.5-1.7 million MSA mark in my opinion. This city will be a perfect fit and if a stadium is part of MAPS 4 it could become a reality, especially if the team took the name "Oklahoma" rather than "Oklahoma City" as to not alienate potential Tulsa fans.

[Praedura]

.... I see our city developing so that Union Park (I'm gonna pull a Berry Tramel and just call it my own nickname from here on out) ends up bordered by a lot of high-end residential. It would be our own version of Central Park West. I could see a lot of very expensive mid-rise development, say 10-15 story buildings with a lot of ornate details.

Maybe, something like this?



(high rise condos in Chicago's Lakeview district)

Source: Urban Neighborhoods: Chicago's Lakeview | Metro Jacksonville

[Just the facts]

Maybe, something like this?

I wish. The biggest problem to that actually happening though is modern architecture - which is going in the opposite direction when compared to the modern television; unlike historic vernacular buildings whose pixels consisted of the individual brick, modern architecture's smallest pixel is a 4' X 6' pane of glass. That is why modern buildings don't show any sign of ornateness at the sidewalk and are best viewed from 10 miles away compared with historical buildings that don't even rise out of the surrounding urban fabric when viewed from Lake Hefner, but are crowd favorites at the sidewalk level.

[ThomPaine]

I wish. The biggest problem to that actually happening though is modern architecture - which is going in the opposite direction when compared to the modern television; unlike historic vernacular buildings whose pixels consisted of the individual brick, modern architecture's smallest pixel is a 4' X 6' pane of glass. That is why modern buildings don't show any sign of ornateness at the sidewalk and are best viewed from 10 miles away compared with historical buildings that don't even rise out of the surrounding urban fabric when viewed from Lake Hefner, but are crowd favorites at the sidewalk level.

Architects will design what you ask them to (though the more famous will try to push the envelope - "why else did you hire me?"). If you want interesting street level design that ties in to the Union Commons, demand it. I hope if it ever develops, there is a limit to building height immediately adjacent to the open space, say 10 - 12 stories (like in the Chicago photo), or at least some variation.

[Just the facts]

The building community could use more people like this:

hope for architecture



We really can build them like we used to. Imagine, an arch that really is an arch and a column that actually holds something up.

[Plutonic Panda]

I wish. The biggest problem to that actually happening though is modern architecture - which is going in the opposite direction when compared to the modern television; unlike historic vernacular buildings whose pixels consisted of the individual brick, modern architecture's smallest pixel is a 4' X 6' pane of glass. That is why modern buildings don't show any sign of ornateness at the sidewalk and are best viewed from 10 miles away compared with historical buildings that don't even rise out of the surrounding urban fabric when viewed from Lake Hefner, but are crowd favorites at the sidewalk level.

Can you please explain exactly what you like about that photo. That fronts a street that is 6 lanes and 40MPH speed limit, I thought you were against that. Not trying to hate or anything, and I actually like the photo and the environment. It's interesting though with very nice buildings.

BTW, I still have yet to watch the New Urbanism vids you've posted in the thread and I will get it, just been really busy. I just wanted to know though, what you liked about it as it would seem this street would fall into a bad category for urbanism. Maybe I'm wrong though.

[HangryHippo]

The building community could use more people like this:

hope for architecture



We really can build them like we used to. Imagine, an arch that really is an arch and a column that actually holds something up.

Is the documentary available or when it will be complete?

[hoya]

Maybe, something like this?

(high rise condos in Chicago's Lakeview district)

That's exactly the kind of thing I'm talking about. Put a minimum height requirement along the edges of Union Commons, say 8 stories. Require very small setbacks from the street and the highest construction standards. You'd be setting it up to be very expensive from the beginning, which might offend some people with the appearance of elitism, but this sort of development is something that doesn't exist anywhere in the state. My brain visualizes a lot of art deco and gothic style buildings, with maybe something weird thrown in by Rand Elliott every now and then.

This sort of area would make a fantastic entrance to downtown. Imagine getting off the interstate on Robinson and seeing the First National Building directly ahead of you, and on your right you pass building after building like this:







There are enough wealthy people in this city who would pay through the nose to live in buildings like that.

[Just the facts]

Is the documentary available or when it will be complete?

I talked with the guy making the documentary last week and he wasn't sure when it would be done. He said he was about half done now. Last week we had an event here called One Spark which is where I found this. I am not sure if was just a local thing or part of a larger effort but OKC needs to look into doing something similar.

One Spark

[Just the facts]

Can you please explain exactly what you like about that photo. That fronts a street that is 6 lanes and 40MPH speed limit, I thought you were against that. Not trying to hate or anything, and I actually like the photo and the environment. It's interesting though with very nice buildings.

I liked 3 things in the picture.

1) The architecture
2) The streetwall
3) The bike street

On second look I can now see the 40 mph sign and if it is on a 6 lane road then that would be 2 strikes.

[Spartan]

I like Union Park. Commons makes me think of a windswept plaza in Chicago devoid of people.

Leave the word "station" out of it. It elevates the building and will be confusing to people who should be looking for Santa Fe Station who wander down there thinking Union Station is still operable.

I'd think most would conjure an image of the Boston Commons..

[zookeeper]

And a gentle note: The correct term is "Common," without the "s."

Actually, "commons" is correct in our application of the word. The Boston Common uses your usage of the word only because it's older than our country and language has evolved somewhat in almost 300 years. In fact Boston is the only usage of "common" in our context that I can even think of.

Hoyasooner, I loved those pictures. I like that style too, but "union" combined with buildings that look like Havana might be too much for the plutocracy. (Just kidding, LOVE it)

[Stew]

How about selling the naming rights to a corporate sponsor like they do with other city properties. The Devon Commons has a ring to it.

[Just the facts]

How about selling the naming rights to a corporate sponsor like they do with other city properties. The Devon Commons has a ring to it.

We already have a Devon Green - won't that just confuse people?

[mkjeeves]

Downtown is already significantly Disneyfied (bricktown especially) and well on it's way to be more so. No need to import facades of olde architecture and attempt to make it more of what it isn't.

Coined by Hermenaut‘s hard-working Critical Affairs Department, fake authenticity is that which is false, in the sense of counterfeited. Need an adjective to describe bars and restaurants with ethnic, historical, or outdoorsy themes; or new items of clothing or furniture that have been distressed, weathered, stone-washed, and otherwise pre-aged for the purpose of looking like it’s been used or worn, for years, by someone who works on a farm/with his or her hands; or urban hipsters who adopt or otherwise admire what they imagine to be the non-white (or ethnic white), urban/rural (i.e. non-suburban), working class, and “outsider”-in-general style of life; or anything and everything re-enacted, “authentically reproduced,” and Disneyfied in general? Try: fake-authentic.

It’s important, however, to distinguish between the fake (which can mean “insufficiently authentic,” but which usually just means fake) and the fake-authentic. Returning to the language of our Camp/Kitsch issue [#11/12], whereas the fake is simply kitsch, which can be transformed by the lovingly ironic person into camp, the fake-authentic is cheese. Let’s use, as an example, one of those restaurants which try too hard to seem Italian — by hanging overly sentimental postcards of Rome all over the place, or something. This may not be your idea of authentic — shouldn’t the theme to The Godfather be playing in here? — but so what? As writer Al (Thrift SCORE!) Hoff asks: Is the food good, or not? The insufficiently Italian restaurant is harmless kitsch, and it likely offers beautifully weird rewards to anyone with eyes to see them [see my "Interview with Daniel Clowes," this issue]. There is nothing you or I can do about the bad taste of people who can’t distinguish between fake and authentic, people who wear imitation leather jackets and “Kiss Me I’m Irish” T-shirts like they mean it… but again, so what? Which is really worse: honestly enjoying the whitebread stylings of Pat Boone, or just pretending to enjoy cheesy Cocktail Nation send-ups of whitebread? [Note that not all Cocktail Nation-era musical acts are cheesy; Combustible Edison isn't.] Irony, the engaged kind of irony which does not preclude real emotion, nor even seriousness, is still possible in a world of fakeness; but in a world where fake authenticity has triumphed, nothing remains but sincerity on the one hand, and a glib, mocking version of irony — cheese — on the other.

Sentimentality is one of the problems, sure, but only if we can’t replace it with real emotion. The Olive Garden, for instance, which is one of these places where you’re “treated like family” and the portions are too enormous to be believed, is not the answer to Italian-restaurant kitsch. It’s worse: It replaces the (cheap, degraded) emotion of the ersatz facsimile with the cold calculation of the simulacrum, the replica which has replaced that which it was only supposed to replicate. The fake, as Baudrillard has said for years, is charming; the simulacrum is not.

This is why cities like Los Angeles and Las Vegas no longer seem as awful to us, today, as they did to progressive types forty years ago. A culture of fakeness has inoculated these places against fake authenticity (though not for much longer, surely). But here in Boston, fake authenticity has long since won the day. Through a process which America’s favorite columnist Slotcar Hatebath (misappropriating the term from the museum world) calls authentication, everything here in the Hub of the Universe which was actually old has been made Olde instead; historical façades and interiors have been restored not to how they used to look, but to how (city planners imagine) tourists want them to look; every incident of (family-friendly) historical importance which has ever transpired within city limits is now re-enacted in an entirely Disneyfied manner.

The Samuel Adams Brewery complex, in 2010

Even the 19th century brewery building (now owned by the company which invented Samuel Adams beer, itself an excellent example of fake authenticity) in which this publication is headquartered trembles on the verge of authentication. No doubt we will soon be forced out, to make way for fake-authenticity-seeking suburbanites who want “artist condos” in an historical building where someone else’s ancestors once roasted hops. (Luckily, we have a money-making scheme in the works. All I can say right now is: Pre-Off-Roaded SUVs. Beaten with chains and tumbled around in a gigantic clothes dryer. Beep me, babe, I’ll fedex you the prospectus.) Boston is not a “museum,” as hipness-deprived college students, transplanted New Yorkers, and ex-suburbanites complain — because museums are supposed to preserve the past. Instead, this city has become a simulacrum of itself, a gift shop(pe) writ large.

http://hilobrow.com/2010/06/01/fake-authenticity/

[hoya]

Wow. I'm not sure if I could sound more pretentious and full of myself if I tried.

[Just the facts]

I'm curious mkjeeves, what style of house do you live in? Surely it is a modern shipping container, or do you prefer the retro old fashioned brick?

Vernacular Architecture - Definition

[Rover]

I think current architecture that is inspired by and borrows elements of classic architecture of old is fine and great but when it is just trying to be a movie set it is like Las Vegas. OKC's history and culture isn't exactly Parisian, or even Bostonian. Using modern materials and styles while integrating lessons from our past is great. Hopefully OKC's great developments of the future reflect who WE are and what our heritage is, not some trumped up wanna be style. When we learn to be great on our own we will be GREAT. As pointed out in another thread (Lincoln Park golf course), OKC does not have a "style". We need to evolve one, not copy one. We don't need to be LIKE anyone to be great ourselves.

This is one of the issues I have with dogmatic new urbanistas... cities don't need to be made cookie cutter and predictable whether it is the current suburban or the new urbanist enclaves. Cities evolve and reflect a lot of history. They are messy. They are organic. They can be quirky. Every street doesn't need to be a perfect uniform grid, two lanes + one bike lane + parking with buildings up to the street and totally mixed use with all the same types of shops, restaurants, etc., all made of limestone and granite with ornate elements to look like faux Paris. Cities need to be different and interesting and reflective of the people who live there...warts and all. And, cities need to age...like wine...and become better and better.

[HangryHippo]

I think current architecture that is inspired by and borrows elements of classic architecture of old is fine and great but when it is just trying to be a movie set it is like Las Vegas. OKC's history and culture isn't exactly Parisian, or even Bostonian. Using modern materials and styles while integrating lessons from our past is great. Hopefully OKC's great developments of the future reflect who WE are and what our heritage is, not some trumped up wanna be style. When we learn to be great on our own we will be GREAT. As pointed out in another thread (Lincoln Park golf course), OKC does not have a "style". We need to evolve one, not copy one. We don't need to be LIKE anyone to be great ourselves.

This is one of the issues I have with dogmatic new urbanistas... cities don't need to be made cookie cutter and predictable whether it is the current suburban or the new urbanist enclaves. Cities evolve and reflect a lot of history. They are messy. They are organic. They can be quirky. Every street doesn't need to be a perfect uniform grid, two lanes + one bike lane + parking with buildings up to the street and totally mixed use with all the same types of shops, restaurants, etc., all made of limestone and granite with ornate elements to look like faux Paris. Cities need to be different and interesting and reflective of the people who live there...warts and all. And, cities need to age...like wine...and become better and better.

Good post. I happen to believe that architecture and design are two factors that had much more to do with some of these cities becoming the epicenters they are, but you make some great points. I see nothing wrong with OKC trying to emulate Paris, or Vegas, or whatever city, but not at the expense of lessons other cities could teach us; lessons we tend to miss when we're too focused on becoming the next Dallas, Austin, KC, Paris, etc. There's obviously a very happy medium somewhere in all of this that we can continue to work toward by learning from a variety of cities. But many of us would do well to keep what you shared in mind.