That seems to constitute a fairly major revision, it almost seems like the plans have been downscaled even more? On a side note, along Reno they've reinstalled the old horizontal poles and just mounted the new traffic signals to them. Wow.

Just took these... Not a soul out there working in the middle of a Thursday.

Also, I tried walking from this spot to Devon and it's almost impossible. No sidewalks open on Hudson so once you get to the east end of Main, they only thing to do is run across several lanes of traffic right where Devon employees are pulling out of the parking garage.


http://www.okctalk.com/images/pete/p18061412a.jpg

http://www.okctalk.com/images/pete/p18061412b.jpg

It's going to have a great look when it's completed, but dang it's taking forever. Why can't they have crews stay on them until they're finished ? That bottom picture has been that way for at least a week now.

well every step of the way the city has to come by and "inspect it" they tear up the ground inspection the reroute elec. then inspection then plumbing then inspection then curb and gutter then inspection then they address what was wrong with all those inspections and start again. though by the looks of it they will start pouring the concrete next week based on the overall progress I see. once the concrete gets flowing it will be open about a week afterwards. I bet most of the delay with this crap is inspectors showing up way late if at all. I know when I was driving concrete trucks we would have to wait at some jobs for hours for the inspector and by that time the mud has already started to set so we had to go back to the plant and dump it. The City foots the bill on those and it runs about a grand a load of concrete to just waste like that. With all these projects all over the city, city leaders should have hired extra inspectors specifically for the downtown area. Leaders knew going into this that this would esentially add 50% to inspection workloads given the sheer amount of utilities in the area that must be relocated or extracted.

For all the trouble, expense and inconvenience to the local businesses and city workers at 400 W. Main, I really don't think this section should have been one of the few that was chosen while other streets are much more visible and were in much worse shape.

Look at the "before" photo for Google street view... Landscaped median, mature trees, wide sidewalk, street parking. This looks a hundred times better than lots of areas that were skipped completely.

http://www.okctalk.com/images/pete/westmainbefore.jpg

On a side note, along Reno they've reinstalled the old horizontal poles and just mounted the new traffic signals to them. Wow.

So are they going to have to replace every new horizontal pole already installed from Project 180 or was it just the ones along Reno that had a glitch?

That Q beats the heck outta me. Man I hope not. I was always willing to admit, for all my high-pitch blaming of City Hall, that what little work had been done on schedule with P180 was at least high-quality. Now not even that can be said. Ugh

I agree. I do not think P180 added anything to this street.

It is beyond me why City Hall is convinced that their P180 saplings are superior to any mature trees downtown already had.

Yesterday, I tried to walk from the DT library to where I had parked my car at Film Row. I'm not exaggerating when I say it was almost impossible.

And I wasn't the only one having to walk down the middle of Hudson, dodging cars that were also dodging all the construction, and that made it double dangerous.

This seems incredibly badly planned and coordinated. When we hear others that work downtown talking about how bad it's been just walking to their buildings, if anything they have been underestimating how bad it has been. And it certainly seems like in lots of places where things are completely torn up, there was absolutely zero work being done.

Just took these... Not a soul out there working in the middle of a Thursday.
http://www.okctalk.com/images/pete/p18061412a.jpg
Maybe they are all taking their lunch break inside Coney Island?


I agree. I do not think P180 added anything to this street.
To be fair, they aren't finished yet (landscaping etc), but I agree it is going to take a few years before the new trees are going to be as good as the existing ones.

Yesterday, I tried to walk from the DT library to where I had parked my car at Film Row. I'm not exaggerating when I say it was almost impossible.

And I wasn't the only one having to walk down the middle of Hudson, dodging cars that were also dodging all the construction, and that made it double dangerous.

This seems incredibly badly planned and coordinated. When we hear others that work downtown talking about how bad it's been just walking to their buildings, if anything they have been underestimating how bad it has been. And it certainly seems like in lots of places where things are completely torn up, there was absolutely zero work being done.

Try walking north along Walker, it's even worse.

I've spent the entire Thunder season walking from my office from 9th and Robinson to the Arena. While it is a straight shot down Robinson the walk was interesting to say the least from the Sandridge project closing the east side sidewalks to the P180 closing tearing up the street from down down south. When they finally did get the pavement laid for the streets they tore up the sidewalks so the only place to walk was on the street. That combined with unprotected holes in the ground I would be seriously surprised if there were not some serious injuries. But the worst really are Hudson and Walker. I did get some serious construction fatigue especially when they were working on the circle at 10th and Walker this spring. At least that only lasted a few weeks.

Yesterday, I tried to walk from the DT library to where I had parked my car at Film Row. I'm not exaggerating when I say it was almost impossible.

And I wasn't the only one having to walk down the middle of Hudson, dodging cars that were also dodging all the construction, and that made it double dangerous.

This seems incredibly badly planned and coordinated. When we hear others that work downtown talking about how bad it's been just walking to their buildings, if anything they have been underestimating how bad it has been. And it certainly seems like in lots of places where things are completely torn up, there was absolutely zero work being done.

Pete - thanks for validation!
Now - imagine making that daily walk through the obstacle course in dark with a cane or walker. Or a wheelchair - it's like Sisyphus and the rock - you figure it out one day, but the rock moves again. We have a new hole at Robinson and Main, NE corner. No cones around it the other day - I can only hope people will carry flashlights to keep from falling in. No one appears to be working on that area, except for the cosmetics of ugly rocks and pathetic trees that are replacing the fully matured ones torn out last fall. Project 180 is one of the most ineptly managed projects I've seen! IM Pei must be proud.

Next time we should do one street, one block at a time. It might take 20 years, but it would keep things simple. We should then keep things the same, but change it all. And we should figure a way to make it mature on the day it is finished.

All kidding aside, this was an unprecidented project which it was decided less painful to do at once rather than prolong the pain over a long time. Pick your poison. Aside from this festering sore of a block, most streets have progressed fairly well considering everything going on downtown. Most cities I've seen have a renaissance, like Pittsburg, Cleveland, cinncinati, etc, it took much longer. We have little patience here, so we try to do everything at once. But by doing so we create an immense amount of inertia. It isn't without pain and problems though. I guess it all depends on whether the ends justify the means. We will know in about 10 years.

No Rover, this kind of work absolutely would not be tolerated in Cleveland. They just did a downtown streetscape program and the landmark Euclid Avenue Corridor which is 6 miles through East Cleveland (the former "Millionaires Row" that Rockefeller lived on). That was $200 million in under 3 years and they didn't do it all at once. This is utterly stupid to have your construction crews stretched so thin, ultimately, they appear to desperately need more workers because most of their construction sites don't get touched for days. Inspection doesn't necessitate that.

http://static.flickr.com/1090/643811840_a80f1a192c.jpg

An alternative to throwing more workers at the project is scaling the segments your working on at any given time to how many workers you have

I would think both options would be cost neutral, because you still have to pay for so many man hours for each job. More workers - much less time.

It can be cost neutral but more workers often leads to more issues in management and if anything causes a total work delay you are dealing with a larger payroll.

There's bound to be a sweet spot THOUGH, Somewhere between so few work ceases for days on end, and too many, which brings its own issues. From the outside looking in, it doesn't seem there's an interest in drawing closer to finding that sweet spot.

You mean to say that the City lacks the political will to even try harder on P180 because they've discovered they can just lip service their way through any headaches.

You mean to say that the City lacks the political will to even try harder on P180 because they've discovered they can just lip service their way through any headaches.

Ding, ding, ding!

No Rover, this kind of work absolutely would not be tolerated in Cleveland. They just did a downtown streetscape program and the landmark Euclid Avenue Corridor which is 6 miles through East Cleveland (the former "Millionaires Row" that Rockefeller lived on). That was $200 million in under 3 years and they didn't do it all at once. This is utterly stupid to have your construction crews stretched so thin, ultimately, they appear to desperately need more workers because most of their construction sites don't get touched for days. Inspection doesn't necessitate that.

http://static.flickr.com/1090/643811840_a80f1a192c.jpg

That was a good project that was planned for for almost 50 years. Ground broke in 2004 and finished in 2008 and 2009 . It was a single street cooridor wasn't it? At least that seems to be the case. Doesn't seem to be apples to apples with P180. I stand by my statement that we expect to plan, fund and do at a pace that creates problems. The project planning stages get abbreviated and these kinds of stupid delays happen. This was a complex planning project that I think was rushed.

That's actually not accurate, Rover, and I have no idea what you're talking about with 50 years, feel free to enlighten me. It was a corridor they originally planned to do LRT along, too expensive, so that got shelved.. revisited the idea and BRT entered the equation, but the majority of the expense was for the 6-mile long streetscape along with several collector streets around DT Cleveland.

But you said this kind of thing is commonplace in Cleveland, Pittsburgh, any downtown that is seeing a renaissance, and that in these places progress takes even longer. Progress is such a broad term. It is generally a standard to do work more than one day a week on public works projects, wherever you go, and experiencing a downtown renaissance shouldn't stretch out the construction timeline. I will not sit here and defend every city's public works projects that I don't know anything about, but likewise it's inaccurate to say that these kinds of P180 headaches go with the territory of downtown renaissances. There is actually not a benchmark for public ineptitude that is okay.

And even though the Euclid Avenue Corridor project was much more efficiently managed than this P180 catastrophe, they still ended up venting their construction ire in the "Hastily Made Cleveland Tourism Video" that is viral. I agree with you though that P180 planning was rushed, unfortunately, they didn't feel the same haste was necessary with the streets dug up. Perhaps someone at City Hall legitimately thinks construction, as a "sign of progress," looks good in a city and should be dragged out as long as possible.

I just had recalled from being there on a project some time back that tHere was controversy there too. So, I googled it and found the information I posted. According to the Plain Dealer the project idea had existed for 5 decades. My point was we tend to want to microwave everything here. We want immediate and we sometimes skip critical planningprocesses that result in snafus. We want downtown to immediately be done. I think we rushed into this project just as soon as we could get our hands on a checkbook.

My point was we tend to want to microwave everything here. We want immediate and we sometimes skip critical planningprocesses that result in snafus. We want downtown to immediately be done. I think we rushed into this project just as soon as we could get our hands on a checkbook.

I won't disagree with a word of that...downtown is definitely getting nuked by the current city leadership.

I just had recalled from being there on a project some time back that tHere was controversy there too. So, I googled it and found the information I posted. According to the Plain Dealer the project idea had existed for 5 decades. My point was we tend to want to microwave everything here. We want immediate and we sometimes skip critical planningprocesses that result in snafus. We want downtown to immediately be done. I think we rushed into this project just as soon as we could get our hands on a checkbook.
This is true, Project 180 was at the insistence of Devon that DT be worthy of a national headquarters...the timetable and Devon's willingness to loan the City the money for the Devon TIF...they disn't want to wait the way TIFs usually work, where the TIF doesn't happen until after the improvements are made...they wanted it done by the time their building opened...it hasn't exactly worked out the way they wanted...prob for the very reasons you mentioned.

Don't get me wrong, this was a great, ambitious plan...but it has fallen short of presentations and reality...it is still nice but as Pete as well detailed, incomplete and not as nice as they said it was going to be.

Yesterday, I tried to walk from the DT library to where I had parked my car at Film Row. I'm not exaggerating when I say it was almost impossible.

And I wasn't the only one having to walk down the middle of Hudson, dodging cars that were also dodging all the construction, and that made it double dangerous.

This seems incredibly badly planned and coordinated. When we hear others that work downtown talking about how bad it's been just walking to their buildings, if anything they have been underestimating how bad it has been. And it certainly seems like in lots of places where things are completely torn up, there was absolutely zero work being done.

I can totally relate. A couple months ago, walking from the municipal courthouse to the county courthouse, I didn't realize I had essentially walked onto a peninsula sidewalk (surrounded by construction on 3 sides) until I'd walked an entire block.

Yeah, the planning/coordination of this thing, what with the Finals in town is totally amateur hour.

I guess when going downtown you should always pack a hard hat, orange vest, and rubber boots.

I can totally relate. A couple months ago, walking from the municipal courthouse to the county courthouse, I didn't realize I had essentially walked onto a peninsula sidewalk (surrounded by construction on 3 sides) until I'd walked an entire block.

Yeah, the planning/coordination of this thing, what with the Finals in town is totally amateur hour.

So true, why they couldn't start this major overhaul of downtown at 5:00 pm on a Friday and be completely finished by 6:00am on Monday is beyond me.

So true, why they couldn't start this major overhaul of downtown at 5:00 pm on a Friday and be completely finished by 6:00am on Monday is beyond me.

No, but they could have picked one street and completed it all the way through and then moved to the next street instead of replacing sections all over the project site in an apparent random fashion. What screwed them up was having to do the streets around Devon first. They should have done all the E/W first. Then the N/S steets starting with EKG and working west.

No, but they could have picked one street and completed it all the way through and then moved to the next street instead of replacing sections all over the project site in an apparent random fashion. What screwed them up was having to do the streets around Devon first. They should have done all the E/W first. Then the N/S steets starting with EKG and working west.

I don't think they did the Devon streets first, they were down on Reno first and around the Memorial.....

I don't think they did the Devon streets first, they were down on Reno first and around the Memorial.....

Devon and MBG were surrounded on all sides by phase 1 and phase 2. Instead of focusing on linear streets, they tried to encirle city blocks.

http://www.okc180.com/index.php?id=2

Everyone understands this is a massive and very disruptive project.

However, there are many examples of plain bad planning and probably poor project management as well.

I actually had no idea how almost impossible it is to simply walk from one block to the next until this week, when I walked almost every square inch of downtown. Several times I ended up so surrounded by construction where I not only had to climb over dirt and broken pavement, I actually got stranded in an area and had to walk in and through traffic lanes and lots of other people were doing the same thing.

Also, lots of things were mis-marked, such as directing you to use the other side of the street only to end-up in a construction dead-end. And some of the temporary street signs were wrong (Robinson marked as Broadway, for example).



Most know I am a positive person who tends not to be overly critical but it really is a bad situation in several different areas and these are not short-term little glitches. Often, these situations go on for months or in some cases, more than a year.

I guess when going downtown you should always pack a hard hat, orange vest, and rubber boots.

About the same outfit to visit the capitol, but you might want to substitute steel toed boots over there.

Those cones and safety vests are Thunder orange...that is the citys way of showing their support:Smiley122

182518261827 Cheers!

Wow...wow....WWWWOOOOWWWWW...

Any idea how that second photo would look if taken at night? Would look like the whole Earth was covered in lights?

Any idea how that second photo would look if taken at night? Would look like the whole Earth was covered in lights?

It would look pretty cool but to my knowledge there isn't a fisheye lens in existence that is faster than f2.8 which simply isn't fast enough for night aerials. It's a struggle enough shooting with f1.2 fixed focal length lenses mounted on a gyro stabilizer rig.

I went by that section of Main Street in front of Coney Island again yesterday, and one week later absolutely no more work has been done and there wasn't a construction worker in sight.

I went by that section of Main Street in front of Coney Island again yesterday, and one week later absolutely no more work has been done and there wasn't a construction worker in sight.

It's been setting that way (the sidewalk) for 3 weeks now. This is the instance that should be cause for an email campaign.

Those workers are taking a looooooong lunch (hopefully inside Coney Island)

Any chance we can set Lindsey (from the 2nd St light debacle with OG&E) loose on the P180 staff to get the ball rolling? Surely her persistence could get the ball rolling...

I second that motion

Any chance we can set Lindsey (from the 2nd St light debacle with OG&E) loose on the P180 staff to get the ball rolling? Surely her persistence could get the ball rolling...

That is so funny. I was just at FLINT last night before I went to Bye Bye Birdie at the Civic Center. It was the MOST ridiculous thing I have EVER done in my life. I literally had to walk out of my way just to end up walking through more than a block of entire construction area - dirt, gravel, equipment ! There were NO signs directing pedestrian traffic or anything. It's SHAMEFUL. Isn't the whole point of the project to make downtown more pedestrian friendly? Or at least one of the points?

Also, the streets in front of the Colcord which are finished do NOT have adequate sidewalks. There are literally holes in the ground and I haven't seen a construction worker there in - I don't know how long! Why are they starting projects and then not finishing them? What is the deal?!?!?!? Are the contracts of a nature where the project are divided up into sections and the companies are doing the biggest sections first (thus getting the big paychecks)?

And walking down Park Ave today I notice a HUGE hole in the road that has essentially become a trashcan. The hole is surrounded by four cones and some flags. I mean, really? How the City has NOT been sued over this I have NO idea. When I walk around downtown all I can think is: LIABILITY!

Get me the contact information and I'll get on them...Thanks!

Here is the response I received from Shannon Cox at Project 180: "The sidewalks and landscape will begin next and anticipate to be complete in a couple of months" That is literally all the email said. I emailed back and asked her if there was a start date and if they had a more concrete date for the anticipated completion. I also asked if there was some sort of method to the madness of starting one project and leaving it uncompleted while starting another one. It sure seems there are many streets downtown where the actual streets are finished but the sidewalks are still torn up.

We will see what answer I get next. But trust me, that bare bones generic answer isn't going to fly with me.

Go get em..
1883
No offense intended to those that own the breed

Talked with Shannon from Project180 who called me. She was very nice and easy to get answers from. Apparently, a lot of the hold up on finishing the projects is blow back from the buildings in the area that P180 has to coordinate with - especially the ones with only one entrance. She said they are going to start the sidewalks on Robinson next week and will work from Park and Robinson south until they finish. She said it would take a few months. The construction around the Civic Center is suppose to be done in December. I suggested P180 design a walking map similar to the driving map they currently have in place now. I told Shannon I'd be watching to see if the crew started on Robinson next week and if they didn't I'd be back in touch. What do you guys think? It seems as if we may have to put up with this mess from 6 months - 1 year. Any suggestions?

Here is the response I received from Shannon Cox at Project 180: "The sidewalks and landscape will begin next and anticipate to be complete in a couple of months" That is literally all the email said. I emailed back and asked her if there was a start date and if they had a more concrete date for the anticipated completion. I also asked if there was some sort of method to the madness of starting one project and leaving it uncompleted while starting another one. It sure seems there are many streets downtown where the actual streets are finished but the sidewalks are still torn up.

We will see what answer I get next. But trust me, that bare bones generic answer isn't going to fly with me.

I'm surprised you got any answer from Ms. Cox. It's been nearly a year since Robinson between Sheridan and Main has had sufficient safe places to walk on either side of street. Shannon Cox is simply a parakeet repeating the same non-information. (Apologies to all upstanding parakeets.)
Lindsey - just saw second post - bravo for actually getting an audience with her highness.

Thanks for leading charge - I'm re-energized to start again. I too will be watching.

Lindsey, did she really blame the building owners for the slowdown?

Sometimes this city just blows my mind.

Steve has a new blog post today about the lack of work crews on the multiple P180 sites:

http://blog.newsok.com/okccentral/

Said he only counted 16 people working today over many, many work sites.

It's exactly what I observed when I was all over downtown a couple of weeks ago for multiple days: lots of work in various stages all over the place and in many instances, nobody was doing anything.

I know big construction projects are tough to manage but I just can't understand what is happening here. If I was a downtown merchant, I would have probably gone insane by now.

I suspect budget issues have led to consolidating the same type of work (finishing pavers, for example) over many sites at once, which means that some sites lie dormant for months while they wait for other spots to reach the same point. It would be nice if the city manager would at least provide an explanation.

Steve has a new blog post today about the lack of work crews on the multiple P180 sites:

http://blog.newsok.com/okccentral/

Said he only counted 16 people working today over many, many work sites.

It's exactly what I observed when I was all over downtown a couple of weeks ago for multiple days: lots of work in various stages all over the place and in many instances, nobody was doing anything.

I know big construction projects are tough to manage but I just can't understand what is happening here. If I was a downtown merchant, I would have probably gone insane by now.

I suspect budget issues have led to consolidating the same type of work (finishing pavers, for example) over many sites at once, which means that some sites lie dormant for months while they wait for other spots to reach the same point. It would be nice if the city manager would at least provide an explanation.

Maybe all the "specialists" have been hired by Devon at premium wages and have put lower-paid city work on back burner?
We're lucky we have half a sidewalk to walk on - I've given up going to Robinson Rennasaince (sp?) for a quick lunch because of the difficulty in getting 2 blocks by walking six.
Unfortunately, I only work in OKC - not live there. Perhaps it's fortunate for City Council - 'cause I'd be at every meeting raising hell. At least our "customers" can't take their business elsewhere.

It's occurred to me that I think the projects can be sped up if you bring your own 2X10 20 foot plank downtown and drop it in the middle of a work zone. Maybe they'll realize that crap needs to get done!

Come on guys. This is OKC we are talking about. How long did it take for them to complete the I-35 south improvements? 5-8 years? WE all know OKC has been horrible in completing these types of projects. I believe they are just trying to lengthen the project until the next contract comes along. (My own theory). Give it another 8 months and Failure 180 will be done, off budget and less attractive then we all HOPED it would be.

Wouldn't I-35 improvements be a State (ODOT) or even Federal responsibility?

Come on guys. This is OKC we are talking about. How long did it take for them to complete the I-35 south improvements? 5-8 years? WE all know OKC has been horrible in completing these types of projects. I believe they are just trying to lengthen the project until the next contract comes along. (My own theory). Give it another 8 months and Failure 180 will be done, off budget and less attractive then we all HOPED it would be.

Highways => ODOT, city streets=> City of OKC. Two totally different departments my friend.

Come on guys. This is OKC we are talking about. How long did it take for them to complete the I-35 south improvements? 5-8 years? WE all know OKC has been horrible in completing these types of projects. I believe they are just trying to lengthen the project until the next contract comes along. (My own theory). Give it another 8 months and Failure 180 will be done, off budget and less attractive then we all HOPED it would be.

Granted ODOT is a bit off topic, but they have plenty of road that need done, the issue is they only can spend money they have, most cases the contractors loose money by being late.

...or money that they don't actually have in hand but plan on having (Boulevard)

Looks like the end is near for the Main Street saga:

http://sphotos.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/428424_498752976807997_694017033_n.jpg