As a continuing part of PlaniTulsa, the city is now taking small area planning more seriously. In the old days, you'd come up with a plan, it would be approved, and then it would sit on the shelf and be ignored by everyone. Developers would cry that they'd never heard of the decade-long planning process, and then they'd do whatever the heck they wanted.
Since PlaniTulsa, the city has gotten a lot better at handling small area planning. It's more inclusive and more structured. There's a more formal framework for how it's done. And, miracle of miracles... even the Planning Commission seems to be paying more attention to them.
The Utica Midtown Corridor Small Area Plan was one of the first to be completed after PlaniTulsa. It has a north section (the area around Hilcrest) and a south section (the area around St. John). The plan was developed with lots of input from all stakeholders, including the hospitals, big boy developers/property owners, neighbors and small business owners. As a result, everyone was heard, and everyone had to give a little, but they seem to have come to a pretty good agreement.
So now there's a plan that sets out the kinds of development people want to see. It also includes expectations for where growth will occur and how to handle the transitions between intensive hospital / medical facilities and residential properties. And it shows how human-scaled mixed-use, streetscaping, lighting, landscaping, etc play a role in that. One of the major benefits may be that developers participated in the process, so they can't claim to be ignorant of what this stuff means or what is expected. (If I recall correctly, it was Bumgarner and St. John who really initiated the process, which isn't a bad thing, since the neighbors showed up in force, too.)
Here's the link to the Utica Midtown Corridor Plan:
https://www.cityoftulsa.org/media/359206/Utica_Midtown_Corridor_SAP_small.pdfThe re-zoning to IMX helps create uniformity and predictability. This is better than having a bunch of random, outdated PUDs cobbled together.
Having said all of this, I was not involved personally in the Utica plan. I'm sure that a neighborhood resident may have a different interpretation than the above. But I would assume that if Chip showed up to speak in favor of the re-zoning plan, that means the neighbors are OK with it. He's not afraid to speak up when he feels the neighbors are being screwed.