Scissortail Park

[Pete]

They have started to relocate utilities in advance of clearing out all the streets within the park boundary.

This is immediately north of Union Station.

[kevinpate]

It's probably wishful thinking that Film Exchange demo not being featured prevalently here means it's not going to happen. Probably fits under "site prep", but I can dream, right?

Sorry, but it will be happening.

[Pete]

You can see them really gearing up all around the park now:

[Plutonic Panda]

I can not wait to see those power lines disappear!

[HOT ROD]

Mee too

[Plutonic Panda]

Cleaning up: Company finds minor environmental problems at site of MAPS 3 park | The Journal Record

[warreng88]

Cleaning up: Company finds minor environmental problems at site of MAPS 3 park | The Journal Record

Here you go. Sorry for the delay:

Cleaning up: Company finds minor environmental problems at site of MAPS 3 park

By: Brian Brus The Journal Record January 12, 2016

OKLAHOMA CITY – Soil and groundwater contamination across the planned MAPS 3 downtown park isn’t as bad as originally feared and is unlikely to significantly affect development on the site or its planned pond, according to Enercon, the company overseeing the remediation.

The Oklahoma City Council approved a memorandum of agreement with the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality on Tuesday to enable the city to comply with site-specific cleanup grants received from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last year. The city’s brownfields program applied to the EPA for three grants worth $200,000 each. A 20-percent cost share is required as well, funded through the MAPS 3 budget, bringing the total available to $720,000.

That’s where Enercon and its principal, Joe Foster, enter the plan. The company has been studying the northern section of the 70-acre park, an area that stretches from SW Third Street near the Myriad Botanical Gardens to Interstate 40, between Hudson and Robinson avenues. Assessments have included groundwater and soil sampling to gauge the nature and extent of contamination.

David Todd, program manager for the city’s MAPS 3 sales tax issue projects, said the properties acquired to create the park have been used for light industrial purposes such as fuel stations, lumber yards, oil storage facilities and garage repair shops over the last 100 years. He said the area was not expected to require heavy remediation.

Foster said his company found various compounds and metals such as lead throughout the park, primarily in eight small areas that are now slated for excavation. The materials will be hauled to a regulated landfill. He described them as minor environmental impacts. Clean soil will be brought in as needed; Foster said it’s difficult to estimate volumes needed because City Hall plans to put a pond in the park.

As for concerns of contaminated groundwater interacting with water features, Foster said the problem layer is about 25 feet down, well out of range of the shallow, lined pond. Foster’s
company will handle all the excavation work, separate from the contractors tasked with building the park back up, further reducing the risk of cross-contamination.

“The city of Oklahoma City is a highly conscientious client when it comes to looking at the environmental conditions of their projects,” Foster said. His company has also handled several city contracts at the state fairgrounds and during the first MAPS package.

Designs for the MAPS 3 downtown park – yet to be formally named – call for a cafe, leisure sports facilities, a lake-like pond and trails. The SkyDance Bridge over I-40 will connect the north section of the park to the south section. In November, City Hall announced the property acquisition process was underway for the southern portion of the park, which will run to the north shore of the Oklahoma River.

Property acquisition is already underway on the 40-acre upper portion of the park. The north section is slated to be finished in 2018; the south section will be done in 2021. The park’s targeted total cost is $132 million.

[Laramie]

I can not wait to see those power lines disappear!

They have been dismantling that substation since the start of the 2015 PCL baseball season. Passed there a number of times in route to the Downtown YMCA & OKC Dodgers' home games.

Did OG&E get their $30 million to remove that sub station; haven't kept up with the details?

[shawnw]

#OKC Boxscore for Monday, Feb. 1, 2016. | News OK

Park: Lower park designs will go ahead without a half-block parcel between SW 11 and SW 12 streets that was to be included; acquisition costs exceed the budget.

So we'll have a gap in the park?

[Pete]

^

That would be in the lower park, south of I-40.

Sounds like a half a block cutout.

[_Cramer_]

NOT THE OFF LEASH DOG RUN!?!? What ever will we do with our dogs??

[bradh]

Looking at a map, if it's Cusack Meats that's right in the middle. Hopefully it's something on the edge, right?

[Plutonic Panda]

Wow.

[hfry]

Pete will probably know best but I don't think Cudacks is even in the park area but fronting it on the west side. It's probably the car lot/slash automotive shop that they had already announced they would be tearing it down. Chances are it's just a tactic. I can't seem them letting their perfect park have a little piece out of it.

[Pete]

These new images show the one property between SW 11th & 12th as being excluded from the park.

It is owned by Cusack Meat but is vacant now.

[Urban Pioneer]

I am surprised that they simply didn't ask for contingency funds to cover the shortfall. How much was it?

[shawnw]

I am surprised that we so easily decided to skip that property, thereby impacting the architect's vision, yet we were so unwilling to do that for Film Exchange.

[Spartan]

We should do a land swap for Manuel Perez Park, maybe once redevelopment gets going down here. That shouldn't be difficult to arrange.

Have I mentioned that giving a damn seems to be in low supply lately?

[Urban Pioneer]

Dissolving Manuel Perez Park is apparently not politically viable with the Hispanic Community. Lot's of history there with families.

Just wondering if staff forced this on the consultants or otherwise. Seems a bit strange. If I were on the committee I would have asked for contingency monies to be expended to retain a contiguous park. That is, if the amount of underage can be reasonably absorbed.

[shawnw]

If staff forced it, why not do so for Film Exchange as well?

[Martin]

It is owned by Cusack Meat but is vacant now.

it's physically vacant but cusack uses at least a portion of it as parking for their store on the west side of harvey. -M

[hoya]

I thought they already had all the land they needed.

[Pete]

I thought they already had all the land they needed.

Not for the lower park.

Also, the City went in about 3 years ago and did assessments on the properties but have obviously delayed in acquiring at least some of them until now.

During that time, prices have increased dramatically which is exactly why they now have to cut this property out of the middle of that section of the park.

[Just the facts]

How fitting that a parking lot survives in light of everything recently lost.

[Spartan]

A parking lot and an iconic city park, Manuel Perez Park. Those are preservation targets that make sense. Buildings with architecture - come on.

Dissolving Manuel Perez Park is apparently not politically viable with the Hispanic Community. Lot's of history there with families.

Just wondering if staff forced this on the consultants or otherwise. Seems a bit strange. If I were on the committee I would have asked for contingency monies to be expended to retain a contiguous park. That is, if the amount of underage can be reasonably absorbed.

What is at Manuel Perez Park? Why can't the Hispanic community become involved with the lower C2S park? That would be such a no-brainer. The new park needs a community around it. Community doesn't want anything to do with this new park?

This park is honestly a blight. We can't even have this around such a public investment, whether or not we use it for a land swap.



Manuel Perez AND other Hispanic leaders should be honored in the new park.