Scissortail Park

[HangryHippo]

Two different kinds of parks. One is being built away from development on a river and the other is being built smack in the middle of downtown. They are going to serve two different purposes.

I don't see it this way at all, PluPan. They're both hoping to be gathering places for their respective cities and as both are central parks, I fail to see how they serve such different purposes. Also ours, while centrally located near the center city, is not smack in the middle. We've had repeated discussions about how we're plopping this park down in the middle of nothing and really need a plan for things to surround it. Their park has a great plan that appears to be beautifully executed so far, whilst ours seems to be poorly thought out and executed.

[bchris02]

I don't see it this way at all, PluPan. They're both hoping to be gathering places for their respective cities and as both are central parks, I fail to see how they serve such different purposes. Also ours, while centrally located near the center city, is not smack in the middle. We've had repeated discussions about how we're plopping this park down in the middle of nothing and really need a plan for things to surround it. Their park has a great plan that appears to be beautifully executed so far, whilst ours seems to be poorly thought out and executed.

The real difference I see is Tulsa's park is being built to serve an existing need while OKC's is a catalyst for developing the Core2Shore area. While I do believe they are both gathering places and quite frankly, Tulsa looks to be way ahead of OKC here, the purpose of the investment really is different. As I said in my last post, much like the original MAPS arena and the canal, I wouldn't be surprised to see a functional park built initially and then big improvements years down the line once development around it has taken off. That generally has been the MAPS way. I think the real question should be is whether that approach to public investment is the most ideal in a downtown that is now seeing a ton of private investment.

[hoya]

OKC's park is going to provide a framework for future growth. I see it serving a few purposes:

1) it cleans out a lot of trashy buildings from the area

2) it provides basic park amenities like trails and a pond, green space, etc

3) it is simple enough and basic enough that it will be easy to modify later to better fit the buildings that are constructed around it.

Right now we're getting a big generic park. 20 years from now it will be a much different area and we will make a lot of improvements to it.

[bchris02]

OKC's park is going to provide a framework for future growth. I see it serving a few purposes:

1) it cleans out a lot of trashy buildings from the area

2) it provides basic park amenities like trails and a pond, green space, etc

3) it is simple enough and basic enough that it will be easy to modify later to better fit the buildings that are constructed around it.

Right now we're getting a big generic park. 20 years from now it will be a much different area and we will make a lot of improvements to it.

Ding Ding Ding

[kevinpate]

... Right now we're getting a big generic park. 20 years from now it will be a much different area and we will make a lot of improvements to it.

Worked when they built the arena. Is pretty much the current plan for the convention center. No reason it can't work well for the park.

[HangryHippo]

Worked when they built the arena. Is pretty much the current plan for the convention center. No reason it can't work well for the park.

Would you say it worked well though? The arena is a success, even though they've added on in weird ways, but it doesn't seem to be working that well for the convention centers plans and I don't believe it to be the right way to build a park either. However, it appears I'm pretty clearly in the minority on this so I'll let it go.

[bchris02]

Would you say it worked well though? The arena is a success, even though they've added on in weird ways, but it doesn't seem to be working that well for the convention centers plans and I don't believe it to be the right way to build a park either. However, it appears I'm pretty clearly in the minority on this so I'll let it go.

It's definitely a great question to ask. I am not so certain that approach is best going forward being that OKC now has a downtown that is alive and growing. When the original MAPS was passed in 1993, OKC's downtown was dead and needed projects that were only functional to jump start growth. OKC didn't need an arena to compete with peer cities; it simply needed an arena to bring people downtown and to bring in events. The canal was a ditch offering boat rides to nowhere, but was the framework for what has become Bricktown. While I personally believe that approach may work for the park since its going into an area that is still dead, I think other projects like the convention center need to be more than simply functional since OKC will now be in competition with regional and national cities for big conventions.

[Plutonic Panda]

OKC's park is going to provide a framework for future growth. I see it serving a few purposes:

1) it cleans out a lot of trashy buildings from the area

2) it provides basic park amenities like trails and a pond, green space, etc

3) it is simple enough and basic enough that it will be easy to modify later to better fit the buildings that are constructed around it.

Right now we're getting a big generic park. 20 years from now it will be a much different area and we will make a lot of improvements to it.

+1

[hoya]

I am not sure that OKC residents are ready to pay the kind of money that would be required to produce a ready-made world class park of the size our Central Park will be. If MAPS 3 was a proposal for a $1.5 billion park, I think it fails by an overwhelming margin.

[Plutonic Panda]

I am not sure that OKC residents are ready to pay the kind of money that would be required to produce a ready-made world class park of the size our Central Park will be. If MAPS 3 was a proposal for a $1.5 billion park, I think it fails by an overwhelming margin.

Correct. I do think overtime this park can be made to be world class by adding and renovating certain parts of it as needed.

[Urban Pioneer]

Just curious... Are folks aversion to the MAPS 3 design primarily related to the lack of intimacy do to it being larger park? I mean it seems as though yeah, Tulsa's is smaller. So they are spending the same or more money on a smaller area. So I guess they are getting better finish materials and substance from the design because it is more intimate? It also seems as though the folks doing the renderings did a better job on reflecting details in Tulsa's plan. And the well rendered trees seem to make a big difference in the renderings.

I agree regarding the CC and Boulevard being potential barriers. It seems as though there is an effort underway to make sure the CC complex is split though to preserve the "Harvey Spine" and some of us are still working hard on the Boulevard.

[Laramie]

Without a doubt, Tulsa's park is going to blow ours out of the water. I'm also impressed that they're getting the corporate donations we were told our park would. I'm thrilled for Tulsa on this and hope the park lives up to expectations. On a related note, I wish like hell OKC had someone like Kaiser.

Tulsa has had its river parks since the late 60s. They had an aggressive plan (Tulsa Vision 2025) that included four phases. Their new park plan will be a nice addition to what already exists.

Oklahoma City Central Park will be in a position to improve; take on its own flavor. It doesn't have to be an extension or tied in with the Myriad Gardens although that plan would have its advantages.

Our sights need to be centered around the creation of our own character. Let's get the Central Park built; then we can add certain amenities to enhance its environment.

We're not in a race with Tulsa.

"Oklahoma City looks oh-so pretty... ...as I get my kicks on Route 66." --Nat King Cole.

[bchris02]

We're not in a race with Tulsa.

I understand what you are saying but I think OKC is unwise to simply dismiss Tulsa when they are huge competition for entertainment-oriented amenities as well as national retailers. If they got their act together they could be big economic competition as well. They are just the right distance from OKC that unfortunately the success of one city sometimes comes at the expense of the other. OKC is really starting to pull ahead in a lot of areas and I want to keep it that way. I want OKC to catch up with and pass Tulsa in areas that it is still behind.

[hoya]

We should want both cities to do well. The stronger they are, the better for the state.

[Urbanized]

^^^^^^^^^
Exactly

[Paseofreak]

I think Tulsa's gathering place is will be awesome and I applause their vision and thoughtful approach to it. As far as Our Central Park, I'm outraged at how little we got out of the design effort, how flawed the connection to the surrounding properties is, how unbelieveably arrogant the design firm is in responding to community concerns and mostly how city staff and city council haven't said a peep about what a lazy effort we're paying the consultant major bucks for. Reminds me of that story about The Emporer's New Clothes.

[soonerguru]

I hope Tulsa does well. I just wish Tulsa would get over its butthurt about OKC.

[CuatrodeMayo]

I think Tulsa's gathering place is will be awesome and I applause their vision and thoughtful approach to it. As far as Our Central Park, I'm outraged at how little we got out of the design effort, how flawed the connection to the to surrounding properties is, how unbelieveably arrogant the design firm is in responding to community concerns and mostly how city staff and city council haven't said a peep about what a lazy effort we're paying the consultant major bucks for. Reminds me of that story about The Emporer's New Clothes.

agreed.

[HangryHippo]

I think Tulsa's gathering place is will be awesome and I applause their vision and thoughtful approach to it. As far as Our Central Park, I'm outraged at how little we got out of the design effort, how flawed the connection to the to surrounding properties is, how unbelieveably arrogant the design firm is in responding to community concerns and mostly how city staff and city council haven't said a peep about what a lazy effort we're paying the consultant major bucks for. Reminds me of that story about The Emporer's New Clothes.

This is really what I was trying to say but wasn't able to articulate nearly as well. Very well said.

[Geographer]

Tulsa received a TIGER Grant today as well that will impact their park.

Riverside Drive/Gathering Place Multimodal Access Project

Applicant: City of Tulsa
District: OK-01
Region: South
State: OK
Grant Amount: $10,000,000
Total Project Cost: $38,558,729
Project Phase: Construction
Project Type: Road
Area: Urban

Description: The Riverside Drive Multi-Modal Access Project will rebuild and rehabilitate Riverside Drive into a complete street with improved pedestrian and bicycle facilities to better connect to the Gathering Place, a 75-acre recreational park and natural area funded by the George Kaiser Family Foundation slated to open in 2017.

[catcherinthewry]

As far as Our Central Park, I'm outraged at how little we got out of the design effort, how flawed the connection to the surrounding properties is, how unbelieveably arrogant the design firm is in responding to community concerns and mostly how city staff and city council haven't said a peep about what a lazy effort we're paying the consultant major bucks for.

What would you have done differently?

[Paseofreak]

I would have provided for open, obvious, welcoming entrances to the space at least at every adjacent intersection instead of isolating the space with a tree wall. I would have responded to Steve Lackmeyers inquiry about what is special about this park, and I would have addressed incorporating the Film Exchange building with something more eloquent than "that'll cost ya". I would have never included the unnatural sawtooth shaped water features. The consultants will be paid about 15 million dollars for their efforts. That's a bunch of money to not explain themselves and not be responsive to their ultimate clients. I just don't see 15 million dollars worth of effort here.

[hoya]

I think Tulsa's gathering place is will be awesome and I applause their vision and thoughtful approach to it. As far as Our Central Park, I'm outraged at how little we got out of the design effort, how flawed the connection to the surrounding properties is, how unbelieveably arrogant the design firm is in responding to community concerns and mostly how city staff and city council haven't said a peep about what a lazy effort we're paying the consultant major bucks for. Reminds me of that story about The Emporer's New Clothes.

The surrounding buildings look like crap. They purposefully don't want to use anything from them in the park design. Now I like the Film Exchange buildings and wish we could have kept them, but I can see how someone else wouldn't.

Part of the problem is we don't know what the surrounding area will look like in 10 or 20 years. At all. We don't know if it will be housing (and if it is, whether it will be 4 story apartments like Deep Deuce, or 10-15 story midrises like we don't have yet, or even a 30+ story residential highrise), or if it will be office towers, or hotels, or even if it's still vacant. Without some idea of what is going to surround the park, I don't think you can tailor your design to the area.

What we've got is a pretty basic modern park design. You can see the weirdly shaped pond, the multicolored path, paths that cut odd geometric shapes into the grass. Not exactly my favorite type of park design, but I guess it's what is currently fashionable. I'd prefer an iron fence around it, with gray stone pillars, a stone bridge, a big white gazebo, basically a park that looks like it was designed in the 1930s. That's what I like best, but I don't know if people are building parks like that anymore. And honestly I don't know if most people on this website would like a park designed by me any more than they like this one.

That's why I think the design we're seeing here has merit. We're spending like 132 million dollars for what looks like maybe 20 city blocks worth of park. That's not too bad.

[adaniel]

I can't speak for how the planning process for this went, so I'l defer it to other people.

But the beauty of MAPS projects has been fundamentally different than anything Tulsa has done. We have built projects that are of decent quality but basic enough to a) afford to pay cash for it and more importantly b) can serve as a catalyst point for activity and businesses while being easily "improveable" should the demand warrant it.

Think about it. OKC builds a baisc canal through Bricktown and lets the surrounding neighborhood form around it. We dam up a river and make improvements and over time the Boathouse district forms through little city help besides the initial river improvements. We build a basic arena and let events and teams use it more over time until we land a permanent NBA franchise and make the needed upgrades. The canal, arena, and river were nothing special but they were built to be magnents that eventually drew in private businesses and individuals to shape them into what the community really wanted.

This is not to suggest that what Tulsa is doing is better or worse. The park looks fantastic, and they can do that because a millionaire just opened his checkbook and gave them $300 million. I gotta be honest I think Tulsa will get a great park out of this but they may regret the funding mechanisms in the long run. This sets a pretty slippery precedent that should the city continually vote down muncipal projects some rich guy will just step up and foot the bill. Particulary in a town that has a legacy of being vehemently anti-tax.

Like I said I can't speak for the planning process but I am a bit disappointed in how many people have ripped this project when in esssence its development is really no different than any other wildly successful MAPS project. I have to wonder if Tulsa would even be doing AGP if MAPS 3 did not include a central park. I for one am really looking foward to the construction and development of this area.

[Teo9969]

adaniel is pretty much right on. Honestly, the same could be said of the street car. If in 20 years from now we have not expanded on the street car, than that project will have been a massive failure. Heck, if we don't start construction on a next phase 5 to 10 years after we finish the downtown circulator, it's probably reasonable to label it a bust.

It's probably worth giving any one of these 3 major projects a chance to finish out before we totally rail on it.