Oklahoma City Skyline and Downtown

[shane453]

Is that a shopping district downtown?

I think your'e talking about Bricktown, the area with the canal. It is one of the best recent urban rennaissance stories and it is reported to be the fastest growing entertainment district in the south. In the late 90s OKC constructed a $23m canal through an abandoned warehouse district and built a AAA ballpark. The area exploded into the center of OKC's nightlife, entertainment, and tourism scene and is now propelling downtown development that resulted from several public projects.

South of Bricktown there is a more modern area that has just been started in the last year, called Lower Bricktown. This area consists of new buildings and contains more retail than Bricktown. Lower Bricktown is home to a 16-theater cineplex with the largest screen in Oklahoma, Sonic Corporate HQ, Toby Keith's I Love this Bar and Grill, Bass Pro, and a clothing store called Firefly similar to Urban Outfitters. A hotel is under construction in LB and a condo building with canal level retail and 30 res. units is set to begin this year.

[shane453]

Some pictures from a Saturday in December 05 -- the night pictures are bad, sorry... shaky hands.

Skirvin Hotel, under renovation into Hilton Skirvin.

^^

From the 14th floor of the Chase Tower, looking North

Leadership Square

First National

Density! From the library

Canal and mural

Night Canal

Skyline from Myriad Gardens looking Northeast

Skyline from Convention Center looking North-NW

Toby Keith's Bar and Earl's in Bricktown on the canal

The Canal

[jbrown84]

I like the pics you took from the Chase Building 15th floor. I haven't seen any pics from those angles before.

[shane453]

Haha, yeah. I went with two of my friends downtown one day and we wanted to go in a tall building and look out some windows. Well, when we actually approached the building I started to chicken out because I didn't know if we would get in trouble. But we went in, and I talked to the security guard. He said they usually don't do it since 9/11 and he couldn't take me to the top, but he was bored I guess and he took us to the 14th floor where they were remodeling it. Great views. I'm actually glad we couldn't go up higher because I think I got good pictures that sort of look like I was hanging in the air...

[Urban_Legend]

What an amazing set of photos! I'm very impressed in the architectural diversity in this city!

[shane453]

Most people are surprised because they had an image of either a few teepees or a farmhouse.

Our building booms were sorta spread out, with one in the early 1900s just after Oklahoma's statehood and one in the 70's-early 80's during the oil boom. So that gives a lot of diversity to the architecture as both eras were quite distinct. Luckily, I think that our 80's architechture was a little advanced and still looks quite modern today. (Leadership Square, Oklahoma Tower)

[jbrown84]

There's also more modern stuff like Stage Center (a model is on display at the MOMA in New York), the new federal building, and the Chesapeake Boathouse. And we have a decent amount of art deco, just not as much as Tulsa. But Tulsa does have the second most (best?) art deco after Miami or something like that.

I couldn't find any pictures of the Stage Center. I'll have to take some.

the federal building:

[Mith242]

Interesting design. I hadn't thought about it but I guess I hadn't seen any pics of the new federal building until you posted those.

[weill]

OKC looking good!

[krazeeboi]

Lovin' the Skirvin!

[waccamatt]

I had no idea OKC had such beautiful architecture.

[rbdetsport]

Beautiful city, but OKC doesn't have much density does it?

[jbrown84]

It's actually pretty dense for about 16 square blocks, then all around that it is less so, with more surface parking and empty lots between buildings.

[shane453]

If you mean downtown building density, then it IS very dense. In fact, the most troublesome thing about photographing the skyline is that you can't get all the buildings in one shot because at least one or two buildings are covered up. I think downtown has a very high density of buildings, especially compared to, say, San Antonio.

If you mean population, then math will tell you that it is not dense. OKC has over 600 sq miles and it's the 3rd largest city by land area in the US. The average mathematic density is something like 800/sq mile. But I used the Census Zip Code data to show that 524,000 people lived within 212 sq miles for an average density of about 2500/sqmi. Still not super dense, but it's a lot better than 800.

[jbrown84]

Downtown from Regatta Park

Chesapeake Boathouse

The Oklahoma River from Regatta Park

Regatta Park plaza

Regatta Park waterfall

Regatta Park and Chesapeake Boathouse

[soon-to-be] AT+T Bricktown Ballpark

Johnny Bench statue

Sonic headquarters in Lower Bricktown

a couple pieces of the Oklahoma Landrun Monument

construction on new Residence Inn

downtown view from Bricktown

Santa Fe Station--northern end of Amtrak's Heartland Flyer

art deco light fixture on Sante Fe station

more art deco on Santa Fe station

freight docks will become shops

plaza between the Ford Center and the Cox Convention Center

Colcord Hotel with county courthouse in background

Bricktown

Federal Building

old Central High School

[Southernyank]

Those are beautiful pics! The Oklahoma River looks so charming.

[jbrown84]

Thanks. Come visit us.

[Mith242]

Those are some great shots jbrown84. If I make it over for a visit I'll have to ask you on some areas to visit.

[dimebag1980]

Great pictures from both of you. Oklahoma City is one of the cities I still have yet to visit, but it is on my list.

[shane453]

The river and skyline view from it are really looking good in your pics Jbrown. Too bad the grass is yellow...

[shane453]

Oklahoma City

Friday March 17, 2006

St. Patrick's Day

NCAA National Wrestling Championships

It was a busy weekend for downtown and inner city retailers in, perhaps one of the busiest on record. More than 1000 cases of beer and more than 60 kegs were delivered to Bricktown restaurants, bars, and clubs! I went down to check things out on on St Patty's Day. There were tons of people downtown, and even as late as 2:00 I had to wait 15 minutes for a lunch table at the new Rio del Fuego Mexican restaurant in Lower Bricktown.

Note: It was a cloudy day so I had to mess with the brightness/contrast/etc on the computer to make things show up right. Sorry about the blurry/dark/weird pictures...

Starting off in Bricktown

Walking in Bricktown on the second level walkway on the upper canal.

Bourbon Street Cafe

Canal and Miller Jackson

People waiting at a restaurant (Might be the Bricktown Brewery?)

There is a vacant corner parcel along the upper canal, one of the last remaining pieces of land in upper Bricktown. I can't imagine what they're asking for lease or sale!

I found a leprechaun! (though he was rather tall.) He wanted to know where my green was.

I liked the sign on this "Mercantile" building. The top three floors are for rent in the building.

New Nonna's Ristorante and Gift Shop across from the Ballpark.

The block party! A surface parking lot was turned into the center of the St Patrick's Day Festival. There was green beer, bands from 12-12, and moonwalks.

After Bricktown we headed off to the CBD and Myriad Gardens to walk off our lunch.

A MetroTransit bus goes by the Galleria and Gardens

The Colcord Hotel will have 150 luxury hotel rooms, the Soleil restaurant, and in the basement a nightclub called XO.

CityPlace scraping the sky.

Skyline from the Myriad Gardens

Ducks frolic beneath I.M. Pei's Crystal Bridge.

This picture with the solitary man going up the stairs was pretty lucky.

Skirvin Hilton has scaffolding up

Finally, here's the "Teepee Church," a Deer Creek landmark with a $3 million renovation grant, in far NW suburban Oklahoma City.

[jbrown84]

I tooks some more pics, mostly of the memorial and OU Medical Center.

The Hightower Building

county courthouse

statue on courthouse plaza

Leadership Square

[shane453]

I only have one bad thing to say about Leadership Square:

It's so beautiful that sometimes you forget to look at buildings that are around it like this great one:

Oh yeah, and WHY, oh WHY DIDNT THEY GO WITH SIXTY STORIES?!?!?!

[Southernyank]

Great shots. I like the look of leadership square.

[jbrown84]

Bank of Oklahoma

Kerr-McGee Tower through alley

Post Office

First Methodist

Colcord Hotel

Myriad Gardens