Comments on: Downtown Oklahoma City 2020

By: Monika

Monika — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 19:41:09 +0000

Reading the words “Downtown Oklahoma City 2020″ immediately made my mind jump to a blog that I was linked to a couple months ago… http://envisionokc2020.blogspot.com/ …which comes from a *dramatically* different future outlook. It made me wonder if anyone who will be guest blogging will be from that sort of background? (ie that the downtown we need to be working toward needs to be able to handle a potential future where gasoline is scarce)

By: Curt

Curt — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 17:30:52 +0000

The reason they had to raise the level of the highway is because they didn’t realize how high the water table is. They planned the highway without doing proper soil/water table research.

By: Steven

Steven — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 15:35:45 +0000

I’m going to have to agree with Curt. There is a lot more behind thes scenes than you realize or know about. The City and City Leaders aren’t exactly innocent for allowing “creative thinking” to rule. Here’s one for you, what does ODOT STILL have an off ramp coming into and dead ending in the “Central Park?” Why isn’t ODOT keeping the highway depressed as originally promised, and is now slightly below grade where it dissects the park, thus disjoining it and eliminating the potential FOR it to connect all the way to the river. If it was underground as originally promised, FYI there would be no need for Skydance Bridge BTW.

By: Curt

Curt — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 14:00:05 +0000

I just know what I heard from people in the Planning Department in OKC. They don’t like the design either. They know it can be much more functional.

By: Nick Roberts

Nick Roberts — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 07:19:20 +0000

Curt, I assure you that the main 3 planners with OKC ties had credentials..the best in the community. The problem is it got hijacked by a planning firm that came in with things any city would love to have already in mind, came to OKC briefly and only studied traffic patterns and existing development, then altered their McMasterplan and voila, you’ve got Core to Shore, they collect their money and run..to the next city.

I have a lot of respect for McDermid and Butzer, and the two are great architects. Butzer did a great job with the Skydance Bridge. I just think they might have been more interested in creating opportunities for dazzling urban design rather than creating a functional, free-flowing masterplan. The the planning firm are the evil culprits behind C2S in my opinion. And btw, C2S isn’t bad. It’s a vision that will make downtown a lot better, and in all honestly, its detrimental potential will be far outweighed by its positive change. The problem though is that the detrimental potential is far too great for us to not fix the mistake we are about to make so that we can truly get the best plan out of this.

As for Steve’s comment on Tulsa, I’d say that’s setting the bar pretty damn low these days. I used to have a lot of admiration for Tulsa, and things were looking up and dirt was moving on a lot of projects up the Turnpike but as of right now..dead. I have never seen it deader in downtown Tulsa before.

By: curt

curt — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 05:08:18 +0000

From what I have heard the original Core to Shore was hypethetical, and just showed what all could be included. Some people in sales in the Urban Design department in the OKC planning department have acted like the layout is set in stone. Everyone else in the planning department knows it is a bad design that it doesn’t flow well and is a horrible design, but nobody has the balls to stand up and say so.

By: steve lackmeyer

steve lackmeyer — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 03:26:04 +0000

I’ve always hoped that OKC and Tulsa could each become great cities with their own qualities, personality and vibe.

By: Steve K.

Steve K. — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 02:49:50 +0000

Whatever it is, just continue to make it better than Tulsa! ;o)

By: steve lackmeyer

steve lackmeyer — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 01:02:45 +0000

Curt, I’m a bit confused by your assertions here. As I recall, Core to Shore planning included architect Anthony McDermid, urban design and architectural professor Hans Butzer, and as I recall Planning Director Russell Claus and his staff were very involved in the sessions as well.
That’s not to say their work wasn’t flawed. Certainly there are many critics.
I’ve got no problem, however, getting and posting the list of people who participated in the planning.
If you know something that contradicts all this, let me know.

By: curt

curt — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 00:18:34 +0000

So, instead of reporting that the people that designed Core to Shore has no planning or design experience, and their design is set in stone to become Core to Shore for the city.

Why don’t you do some investigating and see that the Design cCommitte that did the Core to Shore is a group with people wwith business degrees but no architecture, planning, landscape architecture, or environmental design experience.

You have the power to put in the paper how the poor design of core to shore was kept out of the actual planners hands.

Do some investigating! I will gain some more respect if you can put some names with the committee that brought core to shore together. Show the people of OKC!