(PROJECT) A Gathering Place For Tulsa

[heironymouspasparagus]

What causes these decisions?

Low bid.  With the appropriate amount of "return on capital" to the decision maker.  Maybe something like a nice golf weekend to a nearby resort.... Or a pickup truck!

[tulsamatt]

Thought I'd share a few more photos of these crazy lights on Riverside...





And this third photo taken from my yard over a block away... Just glad I don't have any windows facing west.

[patric]

Searched the interwebs for a lighting plan for The Gathering Place with no luck.  The pretty renderings dont show any lighting at all so I guess it either shuts down at dusk or glows on its own. 

Any pointers?

[Townsend]

Reopening of Riverside Drive pushed back by weather-related delays in Gathering Place construction

It seems a little strange that weather is to blame. 

I'm all for taking their time with the park but I'd love it if Riverside Drive could open back up.

[SXSW]

What is the timeline for Zink Dam and the new pedestrian bridge?  Will those coincide with the opening of the second phase and the Children's Museum? 

Per the TW article the Children's Garden is supposed to open in January but how do you access it without Riverside open?  Through the neighborhoods to the north on Boston?

[bacjz00]

This is very disappointing.  While I'm 100% supportive of the project in general, I think there should have been more planning or evaluations around the closing of Riverside Drive.  4 years is a long time to be without a major arterial into downtown.  The amount of traffic that an already undersized US 75 corridor is having to shoulder on a daily basis is absurd. 

[sgrizzle]

This is very disappointing.  While I'm 100% supportive of the project in general, I think there should have been more planning or evaluations around the closing of Riverside Drive.  4 years is a long time to be without a major arterial into downtown.  The amount of traffic that an already undersized US 75 corridor is having to shoulder on a daily basis is absurd. 

I moved to midtown recently so I can sit on my porch and shake my cane at this one too.

[Conan71]

This is very disappointing.  While I'm 100% supportive of the project in general, I think there should have been more planning or evaluations around the closing of Riverside Drive.  4 years is a long time to be without a major arterial into downtown.  The amount of traffic that an already undersized US 75 corridor is having to shoulder on a daily basis is absurd. 

To be quite honest, I really didn't notice any more traffic than before along Highway 75 coming and going through the downtown loop out to W. 41st and I made that commute for 12 years until March.  I assume the heavy NB traffic I'd see when I did venture south of I-44 in the morning was due to more people locating to Jenks and Glenpool and didn't attribute that to Riverside being shut down in midtown.

[johrasephoenix]

With Riverside closed, I still have yet to encounter a real, major-city grade traffic jam.  You can breeze up and down Peoria or Denver or Boston no problem. 

[rebound]

With Riverside closed, I still have yet to encounter a real, major-city grade traffic jam.  You can breeze up and down Peoria or Denver or Boston no problem. 

Exactly.  I live not far off Riverside and 31st.  Certainly, I will use Riverside when it opens back up.   But I have seen very few major backups, and had very little inconvenience, using Peoria or one of the other N/S arterials.  It's just not that big a deal.

[DTowner]

I must be hitting Peoria on the exception days.  The dozen times or so I've traveled on Peoria around rush hour it's been much more congested than before Riverside Drive closed.  In general, I would say it's like major streets in larger cities at rush hour.  Not insurmountable, but worse than it was before.

[sgrizzle]

I must be hitting Peoria on the exception days.  The dozen times or so I've traveled on Peoria around rush hour it's been much more congested than before Riverside Drive closed.  In general, I would say it's like major streets in larger cities at rush hour.  Not insurmountable, but worse than it was before.

My experience has been similar to yours. The fact you can't turn left going south at 15th or 21st and Peoria is a huge pain too.

[Gold]

The traffic in midtown is much worse since Riverside closed.  There are several factors involved with this:
1. Fix Our Streets closings (all of the parallel streets from Riverside to Peoria have been closed at different intervals).  Utica had major construction for a time.  21st has been under construction at different times (21st and Lewis is always under construction, it seems).  
2.  ODOT closings.  75 was mentioned above and that was poorly timed.  They closed lanes on the Broken Arrow expressway into downtown.  They closed the Cincinnati ramp downtown until next year and that's a major entrance to the BA downtown.  The bridge over the BA on Boston was closed for the better part of a year.
3.  Stupid things that shouldn't happen.  Corner Cafe has a delivery truck that sometimes parks on Peoria during morning rush hour, but I think enough people have honked and thrown obscenities that they stopped that.  Palace Cafe occasionally does the same thing.  The powers that be like to throw out some orange cones in Brookside at 5 pm on random days.  I have noticed more semi-trucks on Peoria (they have to drive somewhere) and that road is just too narrow to get around them most of the time.  31st and Peoria should allow a right on red.  That light at 19th and Utica is a crime against reason most of the time.  

Some of these things should have been handled better.  The 75 construction really needed to wait.  I will attest that since 75 became a parking lot, my drive home along Utica is much worse.  Taking Peoria to get to downtown is just terrible with all those stoplights -- my morning commute looks like the last Mad Max movie.  My wife and I are very busy and spend a lot of time in our cars running around town.  Those extra 20-30 minutes for some car trips really adds up.  The resulting bad traffic is just bad optics for living here -- for example, there are days where traffic on Utica is blocked up to Baumgardner's faux Italian monstrosity from the light at Terwilleger.  People here don't know how to handle this type of traffic and I see douchy things that I haven't seen north of Dallas throughout midtown.

I also find the excuses asserted by the Gathering Place folks to be contrived and unpersuasive.  It always rains here in the Spring.  If they didn't plan for that, I'm concerned about what other things they haven't planned for.  If they actually communicated some concern and respect for people affected by this, that might go a long way.  They keep telling us it will be great when it opens.  My take is this: if it never opens, it ain't that great.  And right now it feels like it will never open.  They better not ask for another extension.  (Oh wait, they don't ask, the extensions are just decreed from on high by an unelected city engineer.)

I'd like to see the city provide some leadership here, but I have heard nothing so far.  They like to blame ODOT in that ODOT appears to just randomly inform them of projects.  Those need to be coordinated better.  

I'm not some tinfoil hat, anti-development person.  I want to see the city grow and the Gathering Place should do a lot.  But Riverside is a public right of way and that should be respected more than it has been.  

And ODOT.  They suck.  

[TheArtist]

They probably did get pushed back some due to weather (though indeed its not as though we haven't got lots of rain in the springs before etc. and that should have been in the planning for something this big).  But I can also imagine the extra push to have things be officially finished up late spring next year is so that the "grand reveal/opening" can make more of a splash.  I am sure they want to make this a big media event, and even a national one.  Having the park open during the winter for example, even if its a "soft opening" will mute the opportunity for the "big splash" for even that late fall or winter opening would get some news which would lessen the novelty of having everything, including the street, open all at once when everything is green and planted and looking top notch.  They surely want the "theater" to be right on this.   

[Weatherdemon]

The 75 project was poorly planned is being poorly executed not only south of I44 but the project tearing down the bridge at 36th street north.
Cones seem randomly placed and are are set up to instruct you to move sometimes only a block from the lane is closed.

As for the Gathering Place, we have not had any more wet days than usual over the last year. The stuff with the trees may be legit, I don't know though but, I'm not sure how they have chewed up all of there swag time already.
Maybe the the first contractor dropped out because it couldn't be done on time.