Frontier City

[jbrown84]

There is no reason why the park can't be very successful on the edge of town. If they improve it and expand it, then people will come.

Worlds of Fun is on the edge of KC.
Six Flags is outside of Dallas and Fort Worth
Fiesta Texas is on the edge of San Antonio
Disney World was way out in the boonies when it was built.

If the park is nice, location is not that big of a deal. Hotels and retail will be attracted to the area. It's much more practical to expand and improve the current location.

[metro]

I agree jbrown, and I'm not in favor of the city and our tax money supporting a private company to move their operations to a better location unless it's a major Fortune 500 company from out of state wanting to relocate a large HQ with lots of high paying jobs to downtown OKC. Even then I don't think that is a MAPS sort of project but rather some sort of fund. MAPS should be public works projects unless we create some sort of economic development fund as one of the projects.

[bigjkt405]

I would love to see Frontier City be remodeled and rebranded. I know its probably a pipe dream, but it truly could be a good regional park for the south Kansas, west Texas, eastern Arkansas area. I think a Universal Studios (Island of Adventure type park would help. It would take some investment, but you could see the area maybe turn into less of an eyesore when you come from I-44 and I-35.

Then you could actually have the adventure district (Zoo, Omniplex, Remington, theme and water park, Tinseltown, along with the Hotel amenities to match).

[Jon27]

metro and jbrown, you both have a good point. I stand corrected!!

[Steve]

Just read it and wow, it's so wrong in so many ways. The factual errors are way out of line.

[Thunder]

Posting a link... Frontier City - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Steve, feel free to tell us what is wrong.

[Steve]

I know that Frontier City wasn't opened in response to the loss of Delmar Gardens and Springlake because Delmar had closed in 1910 or so, long before Frontier City, and Springlake and Wedgewood were still going strong in 1958.
Also, I doubt Premier Parks even existed when Frontier City opened.

[venture]

The beauty of Wikipedia, you can modify incorrect information.

[Steve]

Yes, that's true. But the beauty of this thread is it can serve as a reminder that Wikipedia is not a good source of information.

[Jesseda]

so bringing up frontier city, did you here parc management is having problems. the magic springs park they own, most of there rides have been shut down this season, plus they replaced a high up personal person, I went to frontier city 2 weeks ago, and it looked okay, even though the log ride was shut down and i did notice they dont have many log flumes that are in working condition left, they closed the inidan river canoe ride in tiny timber town, all it has is plants and weeds grown into the ride which i thought was wierd, why leave a ride to where people can see weeds and plants taking over it, seems like a creepy closed park area. well im talking the kids again since we bought season passes for one day price, cant beat that..

[Steve]

Sorry to hear that. It would be a shame to lose Oklahoma's last amusement park. One has to wonder about the future for amusement parks across the country. Coney Island, I saw, is about to lose Dreamland.
One final weekend: Back rent still unpaid, Coney Island's Dreamland reopens for Labor Day

[USG '60]

Frontier City was cobbled together from things left over from the Semi-centennial Fair. I THINK it was all bought by a local plastic surgeon (Dr Dunn, maybe) and moved to it's present location. I might should have read it before I posted this, but I didn't. I'll do it now.

[USG '60]

Frontier City was cobbled together from things left over from the Semi-centennial Fair. I THINK it was all bought by a local plastic surgeon (Dr Dunn, maybe) and moved to it's present location. I might should have read it before I posted this, but I didn't. I'll do it now.

Well, they got the 1958 part and State Fair parts right.

[Generals64]

Well, they got the 1958 part and State Fair parts right.

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Somewhere in my piles of "Junk" I have some pictures of the Semi-Centennial...1957....And, yes there was an old frontier town in the pictures. The two guys who owned the candy shop at Frontier City were in the '57 centennial and they moved to the present location with the move. They have both since passed away....The move was to get the rest of the fairgrounds available to build the State Fairgrounds as we know it today. The race track put the demise to the old Taft Stadium Stock Car Races....those were fun and exciting......

[Steve]

General, dig those babies up for the next southside meeting. In exchange, I'll bring gallys of the Skirvin book for you folks to get an advance look of (that's the reason I've been absent the past couple of months).

[venture]

Personally, I think present day Frontier City and White Water Bay need to shut down.

Going into dream mode here...

I would like to see a group of local investors take advantage of the "adventure district" area up there. Buyout the assets of the current parks and close them down. Then partner with a company like Cedar Fair and redevelop Frontier City in or near the same location. Introduce new rides (to Oklahoma), expand the offering, and freshen up the area. Then build a new White Water Bay next to Frontier City, but increase the size and offering. I would recommend even an indoor water park/hotel that you tend to find up north a lot, even now in Dallas. Having it next to Frontier City will allow people to travel between the two.

Then I would like to see some sort of transportation method from the theme park area of the district down to the Zoo, Science Museum, Western Heritage Museum, and Remington Park. Eventually extend this to the Bricktown area.

I also wouldn't be half against relocating Frontier City/WWB to near the Zoo/Remington now...but I'm just afraid of the animal smell. So now we have a connection between the two...monorail or whatever (dreaming here remember). The new locally backed Adventure District Group (ADG) will handle managing the relationships and will setup programs such as season park passes to all of the attractions with admission. Will also be the main advocating group for additional development of the parks to grow their offering. Ideally with joint partnerships helping to grow the parks, we would be able to keep expanding their offerings and even promote further development in the remaining empty areas between the two locations.

I know it is all a dream, but when you step back - you can look and see the opportunity here to create an actual resort destination that people in the region can go to. I would like to see more man made water features and hotels built in the area. Also the old airport in the area, I think would be a great location for a new Air & Space Museum. The runway isn't serviceable, but most aircraft don't have to be flown in - or it could probably be redone with donations that normally are put together for things like this.

Blah blah blah. Yeah it is a big long shot dream. However, a concentrated area of attractions like this offers something very few cities have. We need to take advantage of it.

[Jesseda]

but this has alrady been thought up, plus fronteir city isnt not even using half the land it already owns

[Generals64]

but this has alrady been thought up, plus fronteir city isnt not even using half the land it already owns

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There is an old adage that quotes:....Location, location, location...However, it needs to be customers, customers, customers.....We can all sit here and think up ways to spend other peoples money but, I haven't been out to frontier City in years how about the rest of you????? If WE the locals don't financially support these places, what makes an investor want to spend his/her money here....Animal Smell????? Go to Allen, Texas and see the old Outlet Mall that is Flourishing tremendously....We don't support our outlet Malls...Oh, that's right, we demolished them because they went broke from lack of support.....on any given day you can see numerous Oklahoma Tagged cars in Allen....Hmmmmm..

[Thunder]

A few years ago, Frontier City was rumored to relocate to a huge land on the corner of I-240 and I-35. That plan fell thru. Personally, I want Frontier City to NOT close. They have a long way to restore and they are getting there. Relax, this is only the 1st year under new management.

[Steve]

OK, I've posted my own history on Frontier City at www.okchistory.com

[zipper]

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Somewhere in my piles of "Junk" I have some pictures of the Semi-Centennial...1957....And, yes there was an old frontier town in the pictures. The two guys who owned the candy shop at Frontier City were in the '57 centennial and they moved to the present location with the move. They have both since passed away....The move was to get the rest of the fairgrounds available to build the State Fairgrounds as we know it today. The race track put the demise to the old Taft Stadium Stock Car Races....those were fun and exciting......

so there were stock car races at taft. i thought i rembered going there with my dad back in the late 50's or so and watching races there and even a destruction derby or two?

[USG '60]

so there were stock car races at taft. i thought i rembered going there with my dad back in the late 50's or so and watching races there and even a destruction derby or two?

Both tracks ran for a few years overlapping. Quarter mile track at Taft and Half mile at the Fair Grounds. And, yep, there were destruction derbies at Taft.

[scootinger]

A few years ago, Frontier City was rumored to relocate to a huge land on the corner of I-240 and I-35. That plan fell thru. Personally, I want Frontier City to NOT close. They have a long way to restore and they are getting there. Relax, this is only the 1st year under new management.

First year? This is the third year that the park has been run by PARC...Six Flags sold it to them in 2007. Although I think that they have made some improvement by improving the rides (adding the Steel Lasso and Quick Draw), I think that they have a long way to go as far as customer service goes. I worked at FC while both Six Flags and PARC owned the park, and I have to say that the "new management" is just as bad (if not worse in some ways) as far as attitudes towards customers and employees go.

They need to figure out how to get employees who do not suck and who actually care about their jobs....because the majority of good employees are going elsewhere to work. And heck, they need to figure out how to get enough employees to begin with to staff the rides department. Most of the time I worked there, there were days that they did not have enough employees to even open all of the rides (even with the temp agency workers they brought in).

I truly do want to see a park like Frontier City succeed...but sadly I don't see it going anywhere with current management.

[MikeOKC]

Steve is so right about the Wikipedia entry on Frontier City being riddled with errors. I thought surely this had to have been discussed on this forum before and knowing the name of one of the three guys who had Frontier City in some its biggest days back in the early 80's, Gary Story, I did a search on his name and found this old thread: http://www.okctalk.com/okc-metro-are...html#post15886 So you don't have to click over, here was the post -

"Frontier City was going to be razed and turned into a shopping plaza along I-35 until Gary Story took over."

Actually it was saved by Tierco Properties which was headed up by Brad Swickey and another guy whose name escapes me. When they bought the park in the early eighties it was run down and on its last shallow breath of air. Swickey hired Gary Story from Six Flags Over Texas to "save Frontier City." The rest is history. Story went on to become President and CEO of Six Flags, Inc. after Tierco became Premier Parks and Premier purchased Six Flags. Had it not been for the last gasp efforts of a few visionaries at Tierco, who were determined to save Frontier City as a theme park, it would be as Pulse correctly wrote, a strip center. Swickey was a banker at heart and went back to his first love to (I think) Local Federal. Today, he is a founder and president of Valliance Bank. Quite a story that I heard recited not too long ago at a Chamber function. It shows brilliantly that it sometimes just takes one or two to see something different, and turn certain failure into huge success. Frontier City is still a part of our city (and it became much more than that) because a couple of guys sat in an office and saw possibilities. Their decision to bring the then little-known Gary Story to Oklahoma City changed everything - and is a chapter in itself of Oklahoma City history.

That's also the way I remember it. There was a few years there, four to five, where Frontier City was one great little park. Beautiful landscaping, redone walkways, new rides, fresh paint, that new management.

The Wikipedia entry is seriously flawed.

[kevinpate]

Gary did a lot for the park, and for the local BSA council. I suspect he had his hand in several other improvements in the area as well.