Convention Center

[Plutonic Panda]

What I don't understand is this: Is nobody listening, watching, pushing for better, and trying to uphold what the city has worked toward this far? So far 2015 has been a really ****ty year for downtown. Is this the new normal? Are we doomed?

I really have lost a lot of enthusiasm I had for this city. I love OKC and hope it prevails, but this latest rash of news sucks and on top of that, there hasn't been much announced lately. Things have slowed down in last part of 2014 and now this.

[Stickman]

If we offer discounts to convention planners to get the conventions, and then discounts to the attendees for the rooms, when do we start making the money we were told the conventions would bring in?

The City doesn't. The restaurants and surrounding community, including hotels make the money.

[Teo9969]

I understand a convention hotel is going to offer discounts, but the discount on a $250 room down to $125 is still more expensive than a $125 room that a loyalty program offers to its members for $95, or another room that starts at $95. Some people are going to take that every time, even if they have to walk 15 minutes (and especially if the area they walk in has more amenities nearby). I'm just saying that to dispel the myth that the convention hotel is going to provide us everything we need, even for conventions that are relatively small (<500).

JTF, you make money at the airport, in the taxis, in the restaurants and bars (especially the bars), museums, satellite hotels, shops, etc. I've never gone to a convention where I don't participate in the tourist economy in some form or fashion, even if it's relatively small.

[Teo9969]

Thinking out loud a bit, but could it be that eventually the 10-minute walk time requirement will be a relic of an era (that currently exists) where the majority of the country was not used to urban environments and found walking to be a foreign concept. In 10/15 years when US citizens are at least more familiar with urban environments an walking more than they have the last 50 years, is it possible that convention planners will budge toward slightly higher walk times?

I'm not saying that we should bet on that by any means, but I do wonder how these sorts of cultural shifts will affect something like the convention business.

[Bellaboo]

I really have lost a lot of enthusiasm I had for this city. I love OKC and hope it prevails, but this latest rash of news sucks and on top of that, there hasn't been much announced lately. Things have slowed down in last part of 2014 and now this.

You checked the price of oil lately ?

[Plutonic Panda]

You checked the price of oil lately ?

Yes. Even before the drop it seems things were slowing down. Houston, Austin, and Dallas are still booming with new things still being announced.

[Stickman]

[jccouger]

Thinking out loud a bit, but could it be that eventually the 10-minute walk time requirement will be a relic of an era (that currently exists) where the majority of the country was not used to urban environments and found walking to be a foreign concept. In 10/15 years when US citizens are at least more familiar with urban environments an walking more than they have the last 50 years, is it possible that convention planners will budge toward slightly higher walk times?

I'm not saying that we should bet on that by any means, but I do wonder how these sorts of cultural shifts will affect something like the convention business.

I think the walk times have more to do with being able to make it somewhere & back in enough time so you don't miss the activities at the convention. Not necessarily just a persons "want" to walk that far.

[JRod1980]

One of the big advantages of a convention hotel is they can work with the cc and carve out big blocks of rooms, then guarantee them to event organizers often at a discount.

That's a pretty big deal in terms of attracting conventions and other events.

Not just that, but a ton of conventions/conferences/tradeshows are now charging participants an additional fee if they don't stay in the hotel deemed their "headquarter hotel". I've been to 4 conferences in the last 8 months and each one had anywhere between a $75-$150 fee if I didn't stay in their headquarter hotel. This is one of the ways that these groups get discounts from the city, by meeting a set number of room nights in a specific hotel. Sure you can stay with your brand loyalty hotel, but you will be away from all the activities. When it comes down to brand loyalty vs. convenience, 95% will likely pick convenience.

I also agree with you 100% Pete, this new hotel will absolutely work with the CC and give priority to their big blocks over someone staying 1 night. That's not saying they won't receive business from transient groups, put the main purpose of a cc hotel is to serve the cc. It's in their best interest financially to bend over backwards for the cc who will keep them filled 60-70% of the year.

[Teo9969]

Yes. Even before the drop it seems things were slowing down. Houston, Austin, and Dallas are still booming with new things still being announced.

You gotta remember that there's still a lot of stuff under construction, and a lot of investors are likely waiting to see if we're nearing saturation levels or not. You couple that with a downturn in our most important private economy and you can expect that things are going to take a step back for a moment.

My bet is that investors find that downtown more than weathers the next 12 months and 2016 is probably a big year for downtown (especially considering construction will be starting on a variety of these MAPS projects next year.)

[JRod1980]

And another thing about this distance from Bricktown or Hotels… We are still taking about a 5-10 minute walk and a distance of a quarter mile to half a mile at the most.

I was recently at a conference in Kansas City that took place in the Crown Center District which is just over a mile south of Downtown KC, Power & Light District area.

I went out with a group of people from both East and West Coast, who all looked at me funny when I suggested calling a cab because I thought it was too far to walk.

We ended up walking a mile to a restaurant downtown and a mile back to the hotel, and no one complained about the walk once. I think sometimes we forget that people in larger cities basically walk everywhere, so walking an extra 5-10 minutes to get to Bricktown or to the Skirvin is really not a DEAL BREAKER in a CC site. The purpose of the CC is to attract people from outside of Oklahoma, not to attract people that already live here.

[bradh]

And another thing about this distance from Bricktown or Hotels… We are still taking about a 5-10 minute walk and a distance of a quarter mile to half a mile at the most.

I was recently at a conference in Kansas City that took place in the Crown Center District which is just over a mile south of Downtown KC, Power & Light District area.

I went out with a group of people from both East and West Coast, who all looked at me funny when I suggested calling a cab because I thought it was too far to walk.

We ended up walking a mile to a restaurant downtown and a mile back to the hotel, and no one complained about the walk once. I think sometimes we forget that people in larger cities basically walk everywhere, so walking an extra 5-10 minutes to get to Bricktown or to the Skirvin is really not a DEAL BREAKER in a CC site. The purpose of the CC is to attract people from outside of Oklahoma, not to attract people that already live here.

Absolutely, that is a way bigger walk.

[JRod1980]

Absolutely, that is a way bigger walk.

It's the equivalent of walking from Broadway 10 Restaurant to the Chesapeake Arena.

[soondoc]

Yes. Even before the drop it seems things were slowing down. Houston, Austin, and Dallas are still booming with new things still being announced.

I too agree with PluPan. It seems everyone is so focused on microscopic stuff life walk times, etc. What needs to be the main focus now is shifting our energy and efforts and letting our voices be heard. The city officials and CC committee members need to hear our voices. I too am losing faith in this city by the day. We had a cool vibe and growth thing going that felt like a mini boom. Now it feels like a dark cloud over the city and you can you feel the energy being drained from what we had going. From the 499 Sheridan to the CC and CC Hotel project, these people have dropped the ball and showed incompetence and now some cronyism and that is unacceptable.

This city can and should be so much more than it is if it weren't for people like this and some strong arm politics going on. In fact it is a major factor in this state being held hostage for many years and that was because of decisions made down at the Capitol. I have talked to others who share the same feelings and many of the younger people who were eager to come or those that did because they felt this was a city that had this energy and cool vibe is now held hostage to stupid decisions and strong arm politics by a select few. In other words, we have officially become Tulsa in that regards.

[sooner88]

It's the equivalent of walking from Broadway 10 Restaurant to the Chesapeake Arena.

That's still too far if there's a 1 hour window for lunch.

[Jersey Boss]

So tell me, thousands of people exiting from a site with an hour to lunch, 20 minutes walking time, leaves 40 minutes to order, get their food , and eat? Plus you have regular downtown workers competing for a limited number of seats all at the same time? Just how many restaurant seats are needed for this amount of activity?

[Pete]

Things are absolutely not slowing down in Oklahoma City.

We have 499 Sheridan and four Clayco towers queued up. Two towers could be starting very soon with another three not far behind.

Then, we have over 100 other urban projects in various stages of planning and construction, including the just-started 21c which is going to completely transform an entirely new area of downtown. LIFT and Metropolitan are under construction and are the two largest urban housing projects to date. Steelyard is underway and East Bricktown is about ready to take off. The Tower Theater is finally under construction and that will be a game-changer on 23rd, which is already percolating very nicely. The Plaza and Deep Deuce are raging and Midtown is getting closer and closer to complete greatness.

I could go on an on.

It drives me crazy when we critique things here (like the issues around the cc, or our demolition ordinances) and a handful of people seize that opportunity to proclaim the entire sky is falling.

[JRod1980]

That's still too far if there's a 1 hour window for lunch.

To this day, I have never been to a large or medium size conference that made its participants go out to get their own food for lunch. Typically every conference I've been to provides lunch on site for their participants, which other CVB's use as their time to promote their cities. The only time that Conference participants are on their own for meals is dinner.

To clarify, in order for groups to get assistance/discounts for their conference they have to meet several requirements including:

- Total Attendance Number
- Total Room Nights with Headquarter Hotel
- Food & Beverage Minimums

The discounts can be applied to meeting space rental, nightly room rates, comp site visits, comp transportation from airport and rebates to the conference group...

[sooner88]

So tell me, thousands of people exiting from a site with an hour to lunch, 20 minutes walking time, leaves 40 minutes to order, get their food , and eat? Plus you have regular downtown workers competing for a limited number of seats all at the same time? Just how many restaurant seats are needed for this amount of activity?

That would be 40 minutes of walking, 20 minutes of eating if using the Broadway 10 to CHK arena (approx. 1.1 miles) roundtrip. If 1 hour is the magic number, there definitely need to be more options within that 10 minute window.

[Spartan]

I really have lost a lot of enthusiasm I had for this city. I love OKC and hope it prevails, but this latest rash of news sucks and on top of that, there hasn't been much announced lately. Things have slowed down in last part of 2014 and now this.

I appreciate the pause for thoughtfulness, but that's not the right message. If you're easily discouraged, then getting emotionally attached to a major US city might not be for you. The reality is that OKC still has the potential to be the best city in the world AND there are allies toward that end, it's just that anytime you have big things happening too fast, this is what you get. In every city.

Detroit built Comerica and Ford Field and tore down their historic Tigers stadium, and the combo of those silver bullets was supposed to revitalize all 300 sq mi (I think?) of Motown overnight, and the world was put on notice. That was like 10 years ago.

I have a theory that "special interests" (by the way, all interests are special) behind these types of silver bullet projects purposely speed things up so that they can put what they want (and otherwise wouldn't get) in the express lane.

If this confuses you, below I'm going to drop a little more insight that I've learned from working on the ground in other urban revitalization contexts...

People are definitely pushing for better in all sorts of ways.

And lots of others would if not for undue influence.

We have a bunch or great urbanist / preservationist developers in OKC now and notice how not one of them spoke out about about the Preftakes Block? I have been told by more than one that is not a coincidence. There is still a big price to pay for trying to buck power in OKC.

It is also important to note our own Planning Department only advocated for ONE of nine buildings, And Preservation Oklahoma didn't even appeal the DDRC's decision.

I agree, and I don't think you have to spell it out much more than that. However, let me bring this back to the post-MAPS context. I understand the clear distinction between urban development from/by/for the Chamber Junta, as opposed to urban development done by and for developers outside the Junta crowd (so not Devon, but Deep Deuce living, etc). The reason why I am discouraged is because if you pan out to the bigger picture, you contextualize this next to Devon's last project: an urban development masterpiece that demo'd nothing, could have been better, but overall was painstakingly designed to elevate the community's image. This was also done at a time that our other big kahuna in town, Aubrey McClendon, went out and bought us an NBA team to play across the park that Devon also gifted us.

All that was great. Now we have this, which is a wave of urban development that is obviously not as...wonderful. I would argue that SandRidge opened the door for this behavior, and now we see why Devon went to bat back then.

Then put Stage Center, Preftakes block, and all the other dozens and dozens of demo's lately - in context with the convention center fiasco. If you haven't heard, the CC is the crown jewel of maps that voters most wanted, so it is the priority. This is collectively the next wave of Chamber Junta projects, only this time the success of MAPS has made land assembly a little difficult. This is where a normal city evolves and starts looking at height. But not us, nope! - we're going to keep doing the same thing over and over, or as we like to say party like it's 1993!

Then lastly, consider the comments made on the horseshoe. All around, literally. REHCO (gee what have those schmucks done for our city?) apparently should have done the city a solid (you know, for the TIF money) by accepting a lowball asking price so we can pull off a retrograde superblock project. Many suggested REHCO was in some way traitorous. Nobody celebrated the fact that land right smack downtown is now too valuable for a low-rise, retrograde, outmoded superblock facility. Nobody celebrated all that REHCO has developed and has done for OKC (Midtown anyone? Film Row anyone?). To me that is one helluva development partnership, and I don't doubt that land is worth every penny.

Instead of looking at it that way, and really wanting success out of MAPS, downtown revitalization is supposed to live and die by the Chamber Junta. That kind of breathtakingly small-minded thinking is why the original projections for MAPS-caused development were off by a mile. They really didn't believe that downtown "belongs to everyone," and they really did only want $200 million or whatever. $10B+ worth of real estate development just gets in the way of what is really important. That's why, as Pete points out, not even the Planning Department and rogue Councilman can fight to save the right historic buildings (the most viable ones).

Watch and see what happens next time REHCO needs TIF for their next wave of transformations, which by the way TIF has become standard on nearly every major urban new construction.

[Teo9969]

The CC could be built on top of the Ballpark and most people are still going to avoid a wide-swath of Bricktown eating establishments simply for lack of time go to through a full sit-down meal.

I honestly think with the opportunity to cap the Boulevard with enough space to put a food truck park over the top that we'd be better off putting the thing in C2S south for lunch purposes. No way a 15 minute walk is as big of a deal at dinner when people have more time to plan.

[Pete]

We are getting off track here but Spartan, I don't think it's fair to say we don't have much good urban development. We actually have a ton.

It's just the demolitions that are the killer and very high profile, and those happen because companies like SandRidge and Devon know that not only will they get their way, there will be almost no backlash.

I don't want to get too far into this but I'm starting to see things shift. I actually think we'll look back at these last few months with 499 Sheridan and the convention center and recognize it as a point where things peaked in terms of undue influence and started to slowly turn the other direction.

And I have specific reasons I believe that to be true.

[Spartan]

We are getting off track here but Spartan, I don't think it's fair to say we don't have much good urban development. We actually have a ton.

It's just the demolitions that are the killer and very high profile, and those happen because companies like SandRidge and Devon know that not only will they get their way, there will be almost no backlash.

I don't want to get too far into this but I'm starting to see things shift. I actually think we'll look back at these last few months with 499 Sheridan and the convention center and recognize it as a point where things peaked in terms of undue influence and started to slowly turn the other direction.

And I have specific reasons I believe that to be true.

Well, it will have to be because they got what they wanted. Of course undue influence will wane.

By the way, I am sorry for getting the conversation off of specific convention proposals. I think I make a few really important points though (edited my post above to be more specific), and I do think that the CC is a huge part of this. That's why I'm for balancing the city's needs so that everybody, including the Chamber/CVB/Bricktown, get exactly what they need.

[Pete]

Well, it will have to be because they got what they wanted. Of course undue influence will wane.

Actually, I think for the first times they aren't getting exactly what they way; or at least that path has more obstacles in the form of scrutiny and awareness.

[soonerguru]

Things are absolutely not slowing down in Oklahoma City.

We have 499 Sheridan and four Clayco towers queued up. Two towers could be starting very soon with another three not far behind.

Then, we have over 100 other urban projects in various stages of planning and construction, including the just-started 21c which is going to completely transform an entirely new area of downtown. LIFT and Metropolitan are under construction and are the two largest urban housing projects to date. Steelyard is underway and East Bricktown is about ready to take off. The Tower Theater is finally under construction and that will be a game-changer on 23rd, which is already percolating very nicely. The Plaza and Deep Deuce are raging and Midtown is getting closer and closer to complete greatness.

I could go on an on.

It drives me crazy when we critique things here (like the issues around the cc, or our demolition ordinances) and a handful of people seize that opportunity to proclaim the entire sky is falling.

Thank you for this needed perspective. I have not been immune to the bad vibes lately, not only due to the recent news about the CC, which is a downer, but also the recognition that our state legislature and overall political leadership is laughably insane and backward. The city's is better, but there are fissures appearing.

Hopefully the CC issue will be resolved in a sane and equitable manner. I'm deeply concerned about the corrosive effect the CC could have on future city initiatives if it isn't brought back on track, and in a manner that won't jeopardize other MAPS projects.