You be the judge.

This is an interesting article from downtownguy's blog! www.downtownguy.blogspot.com.

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"Lower Bricktown

Sometimes, it’s interesting to delve back into what was promised, what was envisioned, and what’s been delivered. So let’s go back in time, back when Moshe Tal was just beginning to ponder what a courtroom might look like. Today, we know the area as “Lower Bricktown,” but back in 1998, the property south of Reno Avenue didn’t have a canal flowing through it. It was just an industrial wasteland.



Perkowitz + Ruth Architects made the rounds back then, showing off designs they completed for Torchmark Hogan (now Stonegate Hogan). The designs called for an entertainment center that would revolve around a $30 million, 22-screen Edwards megaplex theater featuring an IMAX 3D component, plus 75,000 to 80,000 square feet of retail and restaurants in phase one, a colorful boulevard with kiosks for retailers, cafes, a high-tech video arcade, a new canal weaving through the complex, and extensive landscaping.
Phase two was promised to include a mid-size hotel and additional retail.
Names of other tenants were not released, but project sources said they had an eye on a high-tech restaurant/entertainment entity that would occupy 40,000 square feet.

So what else did they have to say?

Crafting a Visionary Oasis
"We are crafting what should be a visionary oasis where a diversity of entertainment, retail and commercial elements will attract local residents and visitors to a very special destination," commented Marios Savopoulos, director of design at Perkowitz + Ruth’s Newport Beach office.

Bricktown is the name given to the city’s warehouse district for its predominance of brick buildings. The Bricktown Entertainment Center is being built on 50 acres of vacant land where some of the smaller warehouse buildings once stood but were acquired and demolished by the city over the years. The new center will continue the theme with the liberal use of decorative brick, cobblestone-like pavers, slate accents and textured concrete, and will expand on an already popular community of restaurants in downtown Oklahoma City. According to Randy Hogan of Hogan Property Management, the warehouse district began converting to restaurants and office uses many years ago and now contains a variety of trendy spots such as Spaghetti Warehouse, Abuelo’s, Chilini’s, Bricktown Brewery and Crabtown.

Area Attractions Draw Crowds
Visitors to Bricktown topped 3.6 million in 1997, Hogan said, partly due to the restaurant traffic and partly for a series of events such as the annual Blues Festival and the July 4th celebration, which draws 40,000 to 60,000 people each year. The University of Oklahoma in Norman is a half-hour drive away and provides considerable customer flow on weekends, Hogan said.

At the core of Bricktown Entertainment Center will stand the 134,000-square-foot Edwards Theatres complex framed by two enclosed lobbies * a grand lobby for entrance and tickets, followed by an inner lobby for concessions. The 22 screens will accommodate 6,000 customers in extra-wide seats with state-of-the-art projection and audio equipment. Hogan said Edwards expects to draw 1.5 million viewers annually, adding that he hopes the Bricktown Center will boost the district’s total traffic to between 5 million and 7 million.

The nearest comparable movie theater is a new 20-screen Cinemark Tinseltown about four miles away in the northeast sector of the city, according to David Jones of the Oklahoma City Urban Renewal Authority (OCURA). "There may be an old movie theater closer in, but I don’t think so," Jones said, adding that he considers the Cinemark theater "a bit of a gamble" because there has been little retail development in that area, whereas Bricktown has an established traffic flow.



Phase one, which also will include 75,000 to 80,000 square feet of retail and restaurants, Savopoulos said, is expected to cost about $47 million, including the canal and public amenities. In the second phase will be a mid-size hotel and additional retail, bringing the total project price tag to $120 million. The cost of the hotel alone could be $70 million to $80 million, he said.

TMK/Hogan and Edwards Theatres Circuits Inc. paid $3 million for the land they will use, but the Urban Redevelopment Authority put that $3 million back into development of amenities along the canal. "You could say they got free land," said Stoll.

City council has set a January deadline for final development contracts to be executed, and groundbreaking will follow, according to Stoll. The final choice by the city council of TMK/Hogan was "a very controversial selection," Stoll said. The developer had been selected already, when a competing proposal from another local firm forced a showdown. A council vote to reconsider the developer selection ended in a 5-4 vote in favor of TMK/Hogan last May. Wounds from that battle are "healing," said Stoll.

"This is our first entertainment center," Hogan said. "We’re fairly active in retail in the area," he said, noting that his firm represents Home Depot in the Oklahoma City area and is developing a waterfront restaurant on nearby Lake Hefner. Torchmark developed Rancho LaQuinta Country Club in LaQuinta, California, where the "Skins" game is played, and Liberty Park, a 2,500 acre upscale planned community in Vestavia Hills, Alabama, outside Birmingham. The development includes retail and office complexes of a traditional nature.

Management and leasing will be handled by TMK/Hogan and financing is not yet settled, Hogan said. "We have a couple of options, with letters of intent. We’ll start on that next month." Groundbreaking for the Edwards Theater is scheduled for April, 1999, and the grand opening is set for April, 2000.

Personally, I was never thrilled about the original Bricktown Entertainment Center designs. It was too Spanish, too out of place in what is an old warehouse district.

So what happened?

Moshe Tal, whose own plans for the area were rejected by Urban Renewal and the Oklahoma City Council, sued. And he sued. And sued.

Edwards Theaters went bankrupt.

And for awhile, it seemed as if nothing would ever happen.

So what did we end up with?

Certainly, no IMAX. But IMAX isn’t the big deal we thought it would be. And the 16-screen Harkins Theater we did get features a CineCapri, which is in itself very impressive.

Is the design better? You be the judge?



True to his word, Hogan still included a fountain and plaza at the center of what we now call Lower Bricktown.
Still, some of the architecture doesn’t look much different than that being built along Memorial Road or in Edmond:

The crowds don’t seem to mind. Toby Keith’s I Love this Bar and Grill is looking good for an opening this summer. And construction of a $35 million hotel should start soon. But if you visit www.lowerbricktown.com, you’ll quickly discover that only three building pad sites remain to be built in Lower Bricktown. Will Hogan take the easy way out, just building more restaurants and offices? Or will he go for something exciting, a Dave and Busters, or a bookstore, or a second music hall or entertainment themed operation that would compliment Toby Keiths? Will Hogan give us a second hotel, or dare we hope, retail and housing?

The next few months ought to tell us what’s to come.

- The Downtown Guy
www.downtownguy.blogspot.com"