Life coming to upper floors in Bricktown

[southernskye]

It's a cultural thing. People think that they should be able to park right in front of where they're going.

No, it's a laziness thing.

[BDP]

It's a cultural thing.

No doubt. But we're not talking about that much space really. Do we really not have enough people in Oklahoma City that value the experience of living or working in an area with dozens of nearby services and amenities to choose from more than making sure they don't walk 300 feet more every day? How do we even know that the entire culture is against this when developers haven't really given people in Oklahoma City a choice? It seems to me that it is a constant scapegoat for developers to justify leaving this stuff vacant.

The reality is that we really don't know how many Oklahomans might choose a real urban setting to live and work in because they don't have much choice. The fact that we can get it at all given the lack of amenities downtown should indicate to at least some of these developers and tennants that there would be even more demand if the area actually offered a complete urban option, where not having immediate parking every second of the day is more than made up for by the amount of services offered within walking distance.

It could certainly be that working in an office park surrounded by a large moat of black top, parking half a dozen times instead of once to run errands, and putting as much space between each other is simply the culture of Oklahoma, but I just can't wrap my head around the idea that a metro area of 1.2 million can't support at least one vibrant, fully occupied, and fully serviced urban district.

The thing is that the parking problem will not be solved by adding more parking as much as it will be solved by making the area more desirable than front door parking. You really have to make it so that the choice is 1) working in a wasteland with no walkable services, but front door parking or 2) working in a vibrant community where, after you park once for the day, you never need your car again. So, really, the way to get over the parking problem, imo, is to fully develop the area to maximize its density potential and mitigate any parking concerns by offering an experience unavailable anywhere else in the city.

The area can not compete by simply converting to the sprawl model that guides development across the rest of the city. It needs to find a way to actually deliver what it promises and it will never do that until it gets over the parking obsession. Anyone who is even considering moving to the area obviously does not put the same priority on front door parking as someone who finds it better to build a campus on memorial or nichols hills. They want more, yet, ironically, it's this obsessive over emphasis on parking that is keeping our city from offering it to them.

[dismayed]

The thing is that the parking problem will not be solved by adding more parking as much as it will be solved by making the area more desirable than front door parking.

I totally agree with this statement, both from a retail and from a living standpoint. About once a year I consider moving down there and look into it a bit, and decide against it. I want to live in "Manhattan," not "the Bronx." There is a serious lack of unique and livable amenities down there. It does get better every year though, which is encouraging. Unfortunately it has been moving at a slow trickle for more than a decade now.

[OKCMallen]

No, it's a laziness thing.

You are so contrary sometimes. We're saying the same thing.