The "this has nothing to do with Tulsa" mega-post

[heironymouspasparagus]

Interesting discussion yesterday with a friend who works in the medical equipment industry - Varian.  I have been "jawboning" two of their people I know for quite a while now to look at NE Oklahoma for a possible location to move manufacturing from high priced Bay Area CA.  Have gone through the entire list of pros/cons repeatedly with both, from technically trained workforce to lower cost of just about everything.  The type of places that might be considered would be Las Vegas.  Denver.  Atlanta.  Orlando.  Dallas/Ft Worth.  Not Oklahoma. 

And yesterday was the first time we have finally gotten to the true core of the matter - why they and other 'high value' equipment manufacturers will never move to Oklahoma.  I was literally told there is 'no draw there' - neither in OKC nor Tulsa areas.  By that, there is no high-end tourist type 'attraction' that would get their clients/customers interested in visiting the place for training, factory visits, etc.  Or even to get people to move here to work, if there were specific jobs that needed particular people.   I mentioned casinos but the counter was that Las Vegas has casinos....

If one of us gets an IKEA, that may all change - we might have a shot.!!


By the way, that is also why Amazon would never come here, too!

[TheArtist]

The streetcars were among our visions with MAPS I; we didn't get the federal grant needed to help plan the 1st streetcar; Salt Lake City got that money for their streetcar roll out for their winter Olympic games.

We went with the Vintage Rubber bus tire trolleys for downtown.  They were unpopular; we were hyped for the streetcar which had we gotten--expansion talk would be the topic of conversation now.  Also who knows, maybe we weren't ready for the streetcar and it would have failed.  Will admit that OKC officials have learned from early MAPS 1, 2 and Hoops initiatives.

OKC is a victim of its own success.  The popularity of future MAPS initiatives are being questioned.  Instead of having multiple projects on MAPS for which the initiative became so popular because most voted yes because they had a project they liked on the ballot, we are now IMHO seeing people who don't want certain items on there--they are threatening to vote no.  Might be just a few disgruntled voters.

IMO, I still say Tulsa is ripe for a streetcar.  Light rail tracks now run $13 million or more per linear mile--it's not going to get any cheaper in price.  I sense some posters don't want a streetcar because OKC has one.  The streetcar will be a great item for downtown transit.  Everyone knows how difficult it is to get around downtown once you park.  Tulsa could use a streetcar; build one for Tulsa--not because you want OKC to be envious.   OKC didn't have Tulsa in mind when we voted for MAPS in the 90s.  We saw a big old raggedy, ugly town getting uglier by the degrees--losing tons of young professionals to Texas along with Fortune 500/1000 companies.  We have a lot to do in OKC. It's a balancing act between needs & some wants like the streetcar which many here consider more of a novelty item.

I don't know who this "Everyone knows how difficult it is to get around downtown once you park." people are. Most people I know or have ever heard talk about downtown never mention that.

[TheArtist]

Americans don't walk.  I think a downtown circulator will be necessary for OKC to Tulsa rail success regardless of whether the circulator is rail or rubber tires. I would like (real) trolleys or light rail to connect the various hot spots in Tulsa but it's beyond my capability to predict if it would be a financial success. Maybe we just need to to it as a social service.

Americans will walk and do walk.  Ever been to Disney World or NYC?  I could also name a hundred other examples. Lots of people from our neck of the woods don't walk in Tulsa because...

1.  We haven't designed our city to be a place that is easy and comfortable to walk in.
2. We have instead designed a city that makes it easy and comfortable to get around in using a car, at the expense of the pedestrian.
3. Our culture is used to 1 & 2 so even in the small "starter pedestrian areas" we do have going people are idiots about them.

[TheArtist]

The thing about rail is it creates denser development. When planning a new rail system you need to mix between connecting existing places to create demand and then traveling past empty land for development. Rail through its very presence encourages dense infill. Oklahoma City is doing a good job of this. I would traffic calm Cheyenne and 4th, remove three lanes of car traffic from each for dedicated rail and run it north to Pine, south to 15th and east to TU and west across the river to the OSU Health Sciences Center.

You can have all the "denser development" in the world and it still be a miserable place I wouldn't want to live in.  

I still say, creating great places that people will want to walk and bike in is first and best priority.

I go to Dallas all the time and see density that we could only dream of. High-rises out the wazoo in some areas. Nobody walking, horrid experience. Even the areas around their transit stations seem fake and devoid of real urban life. Dallas is just a high-rise suburbia. Its not a real city. I know smaller cities than Tulsa that offer better, safer, more lively, enjoyable, more beautiful, attractive and competitive urban lifestyles.

Our zoning is mostly auto centric.  We have NO pedestrian/transit zoning anywhere in the city. None.  Zilch. 

We now have some areas that "allow" pedestrian/transit type developments to occur.  But any moron could see what might happen over time to these small islands of pedestrian/ transit "allowed" in an ocean only auto centric zoning. They will flounder and struggle. Tulsa has so much potential. If we do things right, we could be fantastic. We are not reaching our full potential and not going anywhere as fast as we could be.

[Red Arrow]

Americans will walk and do walk.  Ever been to Disney World or NYC?  I could also name a hundred other examples.

I agree Americans will walk around in the districts but I don't see Americans walking from the Blue Dome to Cherry St or a similar distance.
https://goo.gl/maps/yw3ZnjrSmhm

Been to Disney World, Disney Land and Universal Studios in FL. Lots of walking but it was, as I remember (long time ago), like walking around a district or maybe Blue Dome to the Arts District.

NYC was long ago too.  Our family went to the NYC Boat Show a few years. Dad had it all planned out.  Drive to the park and ride in NJ, take the bus to NYC, then I think the subway to the boat show.  I think we did walk to dinner since the cabs wouldn't take 5 (Mom, Dad, 3 kids).  I don't remember how we got back to the bus to get back to the park and ride.  I was in Chicago about 20 years ago for a trade show. Several of us took a cab to some bars.  I think we walked back to the hotel.  I had no idea of how to get from here to there so I followed the leader.

[Red Arrow]

OKC streetcars cost $5 million each, our contractor was Brookville, PA. 

Streetcars last a lot longer than rubber tire buses.  I think streetcars average 30 years but SEPTA ran some early 1930s cars into the 70s.  I believe the 1940s cars ran to the mid 1980s.  Brookville has rebuilt several PCC trolleys with new running gear for San Francisco, Philadelphia and I think a few others.  https://www.brookvillecorp.com/streetcar-restoration.asp

IIRC the OKC streetcar system can be converted to run off-wire.

I think it can run for some distance off wire where the wire is impractical.

[Red Arrow]

The streetcars were among our visions with MAPS I; we didn't get the federal grant needed to help plan the 1st streetcar; Salt Lake City got that money for their streetcar roll out for their winter Olympic games.

I believe even now OKC is footing the bill because you are using Girder Rail in the streets, which is the correct rail to use.  The last I saw, no Girder rail is made in the USA which means that you cannot use it if you get federal funding.  (Unless that has changed since I last looked a couple of years ago.)
http://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=%2fdl75omG&id=835136469A7FC50CA50952367528A1E4C4BE174B&thid=OIP._dl75omGdamYPsH9enbVagHaFj&mediaurl=https%3a%2f%2fmaxfaqs.files.wordpress.com%2f2010%2f10%2fimg_7868.jpg&exph=768&expw=1024&q=girder+rail&simid=607999477198489934&selectedIndex=0&ajaxhist=0

We went with the Vintage Rubber bus tire trolleys for downtown.  They were unpopular; we were hyped for the streetcar which had we gotten--expansion talk would be the topic of conversation now.  Also who knows, maybe we weren't ready for the streetcar and it would have failed.  Will admit that OKC officials have learned from early MAPS 1, 2 and Hoops initiatives.

Those buses are good for short term things like the shuttle to events like Octoberfest but rarely hold a ridership for continuous use.

[Laramie]

Larentay Walker, one of the construction workers who installed the rail, signs a rail Thursday at NW 5 and Robinson in downtown Oklahoma City. From Staff Reports
Published: Fri, October 26, 2018 5:00 AM[Photos by Sarah Phipps, The Oklahoman]

The Oklahoma City Liberty Streetcars offer seating for up to 30 passengers and the capacity to comfortably transport up to 100 passengers. Notably, the Liberty Streetcars feature more than 70 percent American content, meaning they would meet Buy America compliance if the project is awarded Federal funding in the future.

Brookville Equipment Corporation Delivers First of Seven Liberty Streetcars to Oklahoma City for MAPS 3 Modern Streetcar Program:  https://www.brookvillecorp.com/BROOKVILLE-Delivers-First-OKC-Liberty-Streetcar.asp?news=news-streetcar.asp

[Laramie]

Embark hosted a Oklahoma City Streetcar open house Monday, April 2, 2018:  http://okiehomegirl.com/oklahoma-city-streetcar-2/


For first 3 weeks, streetcar will be free:  https://newsok.com/article/5613926/for-first-3-weeks-streetcar-will-be-free

Oklahoma Streetcar (Youtube Video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8gnRi-3QSA

[dbacksfan 2.0]

Looks like the light rail cars we have.

[Laramie]

Oklahoma City Streetcar maintenance & storage facility with the I-40 E/W Crosstown interstate upper left. Pic via OKCTalk Transportation, Streetcar thread.  11-04-2018

[TulsaGoldenHurriCAN]

Oklahoma City Streetcar maintenance & storage facility with the I-40 E/W Crosstown interstate upper left. Pic via OKCTalk Transportation, Streetcar thread.  11-04-2018

what does this have to do with Ikea rumor? Can we please kill this thread or rename it OKC general discussion?

Entire thread created about an Ikea rumor that was completely false and turned into a OKC vs Tulsa debate and now a general OKC discussion.

[Rattle Trap]

And yesterday was the first time we have finally gotten to the true core of the matter - why they and other 'high value' equipment manufacturers will never move to Oklahoma.  I was literally told there is 'no draw there' - neither in OKC nor Tulsa areas.  By that, there is no high-end tourist type 'attraction' that would get their clients/customers interested in visiting the place for training, factory visits, etc.  Or even to get people to move here to work, if there were specific jobs that needed particular people.   I mentioned casinos but the counter was that Las Vegas has casinos....

It's always interesting to me when people from other states, especially coastal ones, think there's nothing going on here. I work for a company with a fairly large "temporary" office in Tulsa, where the majority of employees are from the Northeast. Most of them are completely surprised at how nice it is here and how it's really not that different form any larger city they're used to. If anything they comment how nice everyone is, how there's very little traffic, how it's a great place to raise their kids, and how they can still have plenty of entertainment and things to do like they would back home. Several of them have volunteered to stay when a permanent office is eventually built.

It's all part of the stereotypes and national narratives about "flyover country". Unfortunately, whether it's true or not, it keeps people uninterested in the city, state, and region. That's why I think there needs to be a constant effort to market the city to both people and companies and to push for things that bring consistent national attention to change the above mindset.

[Tulsasooner78]

The IKEA rumor is not false.  IKEA has been inquiring into a site for OKC.  Fact.

[swake]

The IKEA rumor is not false.  IKEA has been inquiring into a site for OKC.  Fact.

IKEA is not expanding the United States. All planned and prospective stores not already under construction as of mid 2018 were canceled. All of them.