Palookaville!

[FOTD]

Uh, not sure about this.

This "full service" community stuff goes against my grain. Money from revenue bonds based on future consumer demand? Sounds suspicious to me. Let me guess, Tapp and Glenpool secured financing a while back and with contingent funding they better move ahead or lose the backing....

Mr. Tapp must be speaking of Lowe's when he mentions a Big Box Store in 2 years. There aren't but one or two others left.... (see:http://www.tulsaworld.com/business/article.aspx?subjectid=32&articleid=20090327_32_E3_Therec400903
"Until the economy begins to turn around and local vacancies improve, we probably won't be doing retail," BOK)

Glenfool, Olasso, Sand Sprung, Brocan Arroe, etc. are our competition. We should refer to the outlying suburbs as Palookaville.

We'd hate for you to "depend on other communities to meet your needs", Mayor Buchanan......
http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=11&articleid=20090327_81_A11_Aritsr415846

[RecycleMichael]

I disagree with you 100%.

Glenpool has shown smart leadership developing their town and have now grown to the point where they can build big community centers. They were a sleepy little community that mostly served Tulsa workers an option for a surburbian school environment. Now, they have expanded the sales tax base, built a good road system and attracted some nice unique restaurants. Now that they have some new hotels opening, this seems a logical next step.

A conference center there will probably be very successful and fill a nice niche market.

Don't hate them just because they are a suburb.

[Gaspar]

Glenfool, Olasso, Sand Sprung, Brocan Arroe, etc. are our competition. We should refer to the outlying suburbs as Palookaville.

Why must we be in competition?  I think the surrounding communities complement Tulsa very well, like planets circling a sun.  The city needs the suburbs as much as the suburbs need the city.

[cannon_fodder]

I disagree with you Gaspar.

If Broken Arrow, Owasso, and Glennpool disappeared tomorrow Tulsa would be fine.  They serve as an alternative place for residents of Tulsa to go to sleep.  Recently they have been adding things to go do and even some places of employment, but in general they still serve as places for people who work in Tulsa to own land cheaper and not be in Tulsa.  If they disappeared, Tulsa would largely march on.  In my day to day like I wouldn't notice.

If Tulsa disappeared those cities lose 90% of the jobs of their residents instantly.  They lose a ballet, an opera, concert venues, a major airport . . .  pretty much all the reasons people live there (to be in a city without being in a city).  Very few suburbs contribute more to the core city than the core supplies to them. 

That's why new suburbs sprout up as close to the core as possible.  Owasso grew instead of Kellyville, even though Kellyville is closer to Glennpool.

[Gaspar]

Ok, we can disagree on that point.  I simply feel that without a flourishing suburban, the city would begin to stagnate.  Businesses and business owners looking to relocate see Tulsa's suburbs as a part of the package.  Bixby and Glenpool are the new suburban frontier, and the better they present themselves, the better we look.  Your bedroom analogy is correct, would you buy a house without one?

Sure Tulsa would march on without the suburbs, but if they disappeared we would march at a slower pace.

[cannon_fodder]

Or would parts of Tulsa develop to fill that niche?  Cities that started without prominent suburbs tend to be more dense, walkable, and sustainable.  Tulsa grew up with freeways and has a legacy of a low person per square mile ration to show for it.  Which increases our costs in almost every category.

But I agree with you, they are here and they are part of the package.  For better or worse we need to work with them.  But some competition is inevitable and lately, the suburbs have been winning (Bass Pro, Aquarium, Spirit Events Center), population growth, new sales tax revenue, development projects . . .

[Gaspar]

Or would parts of Tulsa develop to fill that niche?  Cities that started without prominent suburbs tend to be more dense, walkable, and sustainable.  Tulsa grew up with freeways and has a legacy of a low person per square mile ration to show for it.  Which increases our costs in almost every category.

But I agree with you, they are here and they are part of the package.  For better or worse we need to work with them.  But some competition is inevitable and lately, the suburbs have been winning (Bass Pro, Aquarium, Spirit Events Center), population growth, new sales tax revenue, development projects . . .

The only reason they are winning, is because while we are bickering about development, they are handing developers the keys to the city, opening doors, and making the process comfortable and profitable. 

We say we're hungry and then pick at our food until it's cold.

[Conan71]

FOTD would feel different if he owned more real estate in the outlying areas, I'm sure.  I know I would

[FOTD]

Bickering over development?

Not so.

Tulsa should have drawn a red line around the 1965 city limits and allowed no city services to be provided outside the area. Toll roads in and out of town. Stronger positioning as America's Most Beautiful City. Protectionism. Could have maintained and strengthen one of the country's best Public School Systems. Isn't hind sight easy...could'a would'a should'a...

2025 did not help....

White flight 21st century style did us in.

[FOTD]

FOTD would feel different if he owned more real estate in the outlying areas, I'm sure.  I know I would

The devil's den is my only real estate....

Hate to disappoint you. That game is played out for a generation.

[TheArtist]

Suburban growth is fine imo.  BUT, I think its wise to continually promote, encourage and educate for, good suburban growth just as I do for good urban growth.  Even if we had put a boundary around Tulsa, we put in place stuff that encouraged bad development and discouraged good. When its ILLEGAL to have traditional, pedestrian friendly, mixed use, main street type developments in the city, that's just asking for trouble.

2.  Tulsa needs to shift from relying on suburban growth within its borders and focus on now growing more dense and attractive "Urban Village" type developments. If for the most basic reason that its borders are starting to fill up and infill is going to be the next wave. And I don't think we really need to sprawl out to the east, though that option is available, and its likely that North Tulsa will be slow growing for a while. Drive around south Tulsa and you can see its pretty much gonna be filled in within the next decade. If we want to grow after that,,, where and what kind of growth will it be?  Its gonna be hard to grow lots of cheap, new, suburban neighborhoods on top of old ones. We are evolving into a new and different growth phase.

3.  Tulsa should work on becoming the CITY of choice and offer a great CITY lifestyle and CITY amenities. Let the suburbs be suburban and offer suburban lifestyle choices. Some day a lot of the kids those young families are having will look around and go... Where am I going to go to college? Where am I going to live that has a great night life, a creative vibe, cool urban living, etc.? What city will they choose? Lets make sure Tulsa is that city.

4.  Tulsa should be the hub that has the biggest and the best,,, performing arts, museums, entertainment options, colleges, jobs, hospitals, magnet schools, urban living options, wealthy/high end shopping and living options, cool funky neighborhoods, arts districts, etc. etc.

Its sad if Tulsas main focus is competing with runty little suburbs. If that's the case it should pull its head out of its arse, look around, grow up, and start worrying about competing with other CITIES. 

[Hoss]

Bickering over development?

Not so.

Tulsa should have drawn a red line around the 1965 city limits and allowed no city services to be provided outside the area. Toll roads in and out of town. Stronger positioning as America's Most Beautiful City. Protectionism. Could have maintained and strengthen one of the country's best Public School Systems. Isn't hind sight easy...could'a would'a should'a...

2025 did not help....

White flight 21st century style did us in.

Lovely, FOTD's own little micro-version of isolationalism.  Damn sure not protectionism.

While I don't like what a lot of the suburbs are doing/have done (namely Owasso), we all need one another for sure.  Drawing a big red line and saying STOP just freezes yourself in time and is a ludicrous idea.

How about continuing to wear size small shirts while growing up until you complete puberty?  You eventually bust out of the shirt and have to get a new one.

AOX/FOTD, you could always annex a suburb of your own and put a razor-wire fence around it, if that's how you feel about urban growth and development.  Or move to the country.

[Red Arrow]

Or would parts of Tulsa develop to fill that niche?  .

Maybe, maybe not. 

When my father accepted a transfer to here from suburban Phila, PA area in 1971, my parents wanted a large lot for the pets and to need the phone to reach out and touch our neighbors.  We were tired of living 25 feet from our neighbor. If there were nothing but row homes and apartments, it is unlikely we would have moved here. Neither did we want to live in the sticks.  Yes, I want to live near but not in a city.  Tulsa was actually like living in the sticks compared to Philly.  We found we could get anything we wanted just like in Philly. The only difference is that it was a day away by UPS from Dallas.  I like the idea of a major hospital being nearby.  A city can support businesses that a small town in the middle of nowhere cannot.  Dad worked downtown but neither my brother nor I have worked downtown.  When we moved here we shopped at Sears at 21st & Yale, Penney's and Froug's at 41st and Yale etc.  There wasn't much in Bixby except Doc's grocery store.  Although we lived in the political boundaries of Bixby, we spent most of our money in Tulsa.  We still do. The biggest exception is probaby Lowe's which is across 111th from Tulsa. Shopping at 121st & Memorial has been touch and go for 30 years depending on what's there. I must admit to buying my hot pepper plants from Carmichael's and Conrad's in Bixby. If you want to go there, we will charge a toll to get off US 64. BA will charge a toll to get off the BA Expy to go to the Bass Pro Shop.  Not, we want your business.  Until Tulsa has an alternative to the car, roads and parking are a cost of doing business with the suburbs, even the suburbs within the political boundaries of the City of Tulsa.  Many of the suburbs are buying water from Tulsa, supposedly at a profit to Tulsa. OK, I have no problem with that.  Tulsa is not providing fire and police protection to Bixby. (TPD officers taking their cars home is another issue. I agree they should stay in Tulsa City limits.)  In fact, some on here even protest providing services to SE Tulsa within the city limits.

It is possible that Tulsa proper could support the Ballet, Opera, Theater, etc but does the support from the bedroom communities really hurt that much?  Like it or not, much of Tulsa is its own suburbia. Most of Tulsa outside of the IDL is suburbia in my opinion.  If you have enough grass to need a lawnmower, you are not in an Urban environment.  Where do you want to draw the political boundary?   Yes, I use "your" roads. I mostly use them to get to a place to spend money. Some of those roads are either State or US routes.  I suspect that money from outside Tulsa should help maintain them.

There is nothing wrong with an Urban environment.  I wish Tulsa had more of it just to attract the specialty businesses that we cannot currently support.  It is just my lifestyle choice to want a bit more room than a condo, apartment or row house. Could New York City survive without Connecticut, Long Island, Yonkers, White Plains?  Maybe. They have a better mass transit system that makes all that possible.   There is probably not enough living space for everyone to be within NYC city limits unless you want to be like Hong Kong or maybe Tokyo.  Tulsa area, including the suburbs, needs to think of itself as a region offering different opportunities.  It's kind of like the push for diversity but on a bigger scale.

[waterboy]

I agree with you Red. After reading the last few posts, I am reminded of an appearance by Joan Baez on the Tonite show back in the seventies. She said something to the effect of "Flags cause wars". Defending them, glorifying them, deifying them results in conflict. Once you set up intangible boundaries and plant your flag, it then follows that others are outsiders. Different from us even though they are merely across a street or a river. It then becomes true. Thats what is happening here. The small outlying towns display as much hubris and arrogance as midtowners thats for sure. Their chauvinism is just a waste of time to me.

I love the old area of town. I have lived in areas north of 31st and west of Darlington my whole life. But the burbs have always offered their own advantages (if you don't mind living as much in your car as your home!). Those include space, new home amenities, shopping, solitude and new schools. And the travel times are really not daunting if you've ever travelled much in larger metros. It makes sense to many people to centralize culture and entertainment away from where you mow your lawn and raise your kids. That's fine as long as they are willing to help underwrite that culture and entertainment and not attempt to expropriate it out to the burbs, thereby repeating the whole process. Jenks, Owasso and BA tend to want to do that.  Whether driven by developer/tax economics or chauvinism is irrelevant. It creates artificial division and inneficient sprawl.

The whole metro should be centralized in its organizational governance but separated in its physical governance. IOW, a confederation of satellites that all work together in practical matters like infrastructure and services. Not contracted out to some group of non accountable, unelected planners like I perceive INCOG. But, centralized where the refinery of government operates (downtown) yet retain outlying local centers for executing policy in a more localized manner.  One could argue that occurs in reality anyway. If so, its pretty clunky and episodic in nature. County govt. unfortunately is not suitable and we all know why. Annexation is tantamount to declarations of war. So it seems kind of common sense that the overhead of government should be shared when the community is really not that expansive like say OKC. If we were starting the metro off blank slate that would happen. Only local politics and chauvinism keeps it from happening. Until then its rather hard for citizens of "center city" to pay much attention to the chauvinism of the burgs or their wailings of misjustice.