Quote Originally Posted by dankrutka View Post
No, it was not destroyed and, yes, it could have been restored. Have you all seen some of the buildings that have been restored? Just look at those houses on 9th street as an example and they were just simple buildings.
Exactly this. Look, if the Marion Hotel building at NW 10th and Broadway could be saved, *almost* anything else can be saved too. I don't know if y'all recall, but the Marion was in extremely rough shape before rehabilitation began. The interior structure had to be mostly rebuilt. This is what it looked like before renovation started: http://www.abandonedok.com/the-marion/ (see also: http://www.okctalk.com/showthread.php?t=29747)

But the Marion still had some of it's original bones, and was rebuilt within it's original footprint. I see some people calling to preserve the original building facades of the buildings before the OG&E data center went in, but... facadism is just hideous. I mean, just look at these examples from the UK: https://www.theguardian.com/artandde...oric-buildings I wouldn't want that anywhere near OKC. So if the facade hidden under those gold panels is the only original part of the building left, I see little value in keeping the shell just to place a modern building behind the mask. The damage has already been done, the soul of the building is already gone.