Myriad Garden is wayyy underutilized, but I went to a workshop this past Saturday with plans to revamp it. Myriad Gardens still would have happened and been sizeable even if we would have/should have saved Biltmore.

hey j, from what i read in steve's blog... i think the lunchbox became a restaurant around the WWI era, but has been in that particular location since 1947 (which still is significant)... but yeah, i'd rather see a tower.

The more I think about it, I could see Preftakes turing the Black into a hotel again, putting in a highrise residential unit where the 2 one story building are (he also owns a one-story building that faces Main St under the name Main Street Developers or something like that), and keeping the Autohotel as parking for both buildings.

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Oklahoma City - The surprise your family has been looking for.

I agree, I'd like to see him open Hotel Black up again, then tear down the one story building on Main and Hudson (the theatre, I think it was Lyric Theatre). Put a condo tower up there and keep the rest of the block in tact (unless he wants to build a tower where the parking garage is).

Hot Rod-
I appreciate your enthusiasm for OKC and I share it. As a fellow ex-pat, I talk up Oklahoma City every chance I get. And I fully agree that the city has turned a corner and is moving in the right direction. I probably spent hours reading about the Devon Tower and studying the renderings.

I further agree that Larry Nichols has done, and continues to do tremendous things for OKC. By saying the word "dump" I did not mean to imply otherwise.

I guess I am curious what you know about American Fidelity "most likely" snapping up Devon's current tower. I know that it has been speculated, but I was not at all sure that that was more than a fleeting rumor. As for Chase Tower, I am sure that it will draw interest. But again, 17 floors is a lot of space to fill. When you say "Who wouldn't want to be in the signature leasable tower?" I would respond by saying that I would love to office there and most of the people on this board would love to office there. But just wanting it to be the case won't make it so. Let's think about the big suburban office users - do we have indications that any of the big ones are chomping at the bit to come downtown and just waiting for the right opportunity? If so, I would love to know who they are. If current downtowners move over there, that's fine but they will leave a hole wherever they are currently and that's not any more than a wash.

Again, I don't want to dampen your enthusiasm, as a matter of fact, I want to be even more optimistic about downtown than I am. But I still say there are a lot of unknowns and a lot of leasing activity to be contemplated before we could anticipate new office skyscrapers downtown.

stl, I appreciate your enthusiasm too. It is wonderful to have so many people who care about OKC - and now we all have pride in the city too.

I always knew it had potential, now it's nice to see others also and see the city reaching for those stars.

Continue the Renaissance!

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Oklahoma City, RENAISSANCE CITY!

Do you think the next high rise will be residential or office tower? And why?

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ProjectOKC.com

Luke, it depends on your definition of a high-rise. Are we going with 500ft as a high rise? If so OKC may go awhile before seeing something that tall again other than Devon. Otherwise, we may see a mid-rise residential or smaller corporate tower. Say American Fidelity, but I doubt they will build or even need anything taller than 500ft.

I think that there is a third option for a high rise and that is a hotel. Especially if the new convention center is built. I would not bet money on it but it is a real possibility.

i think we really need a residential highrise.... the only option we have is park harvey which is nice and pretty affordable but not much of an option... there is nothing over 6 floors i can think of or have found since i'm looking for a place.... i really want the downtown highrise living experience and i know i'm not alone.... so i really think we need a residential highrise soon, very soon.... please!

actually there is Regency Tower which is around 20 stories, ALL residential.

Sounds like the top 18 floors of City Place will soon be apartments/condos.

regency isn't bad, not a big fan tho... i'm just sayin we have 2 maybe 3 options

I would like to see apartment high-rise with real underground parking. I don't want to walk away from the building like Park Harvey. The regency is not impressive to me, it is really dated. Lakeview and Tiffany are a joke. I am sure we will see something nice soon.

Ran across this vid about demolitions. Check out what's at 0:39.
LiveLeak.com - The mother of all demolition VIDs

The Classen and 360 are not a joke, but very nice, and pricey too!

AH! this really pisses me off! everytime i see something referring to it, or see pictures of how dense our DT would be i get so pissed!