My streetcar proposal

I just wanted to once again draw people's attention to what I'd propose for a starter streetcar system:


How would I expand this and turn this into a city-wide system, you ask?

(The wide lines represent double tracks, although also keep in mind several single tracks are spaced just a block apart, effectively forming a double track/transit mall.)

Like this. Mostly, something divided into a northside system with 23rd Street as the main drag, and a southside system with Robinson Ave as the main feeder, and all of it coming together downtown. It would be a system with 3 separate hubs, a main hub downtown for the downtown-area streetcar lines and for cross-town transfers, and a north and south side hub to separately run those systems as efficiently as possible.

That is how I'd turn OKC into a big streetcar city once again. The lines look funny. The system is pretty big and overbearing. But it is quite simple when you break it down into southside and northside, with downtown being the point of emphasis between the two.

The starter system alignments matter. The future expansion alignments don't matter that much. As long as certain districts get served, it is not worth debating as much as the starter lines. The reason for the difference is that how a Phase 2 or 3 district gets served doesn't effect how other districts get served in the same way that how Mid-town is served will have MAJOR effects for how Plaza and Paseo get served, and so on.

I also want to say one thing intended directly for the subcommittee: You can't focus too much on development potential, because all of OKC has that, even North Broadway. Don't let someone tell you that Broadway is difficult to develop or already mostly developed, because that's insanity, and you're not a development task force, you're an infrastructure task force. You guys are experts on infrastructure and have studied streetcar systems, not development, and I assure you there are experts on OKC development in their own right, and they all have differing opinions of their own. You guys need to worry about initial ridership numbers and making sure that the starter system is successful. That means it needs to go somewhere and appeal to existing districts. You guys need to focus on the Bricktown, Mid-town, Arts District, CBD, Deep Deuce, Automobile Alley, and other districts. You need to connect those districts to be successful, and that involves actually touching them, not throwing bones. Be pragmatic about where people go downtown right NOW, not where they could go 20 years from now, which unfortunately won't come soon enough for the starter system.

A call for involvement

Dear Readers,

Lately I have been watching the PlanOKC proceedings and talking to some people, including trying to muster interest on OKC Talk, in getting together a small group of committed citizens to take part in a PlanOKC "meeting in a box." My understanding is that it would consist of going through some materials from the city and then jotting down suggestions and ideas from the group to submit.

My idea is having such a meeting sometime during the first week of Jan., or very soon after. There have been a half dozen or so interested but I'd like to try and assemble some more people to make this a healthy group.

Please email me or leave a comment (or shoot me a call/text those that have my number) and let me know if you're interested or have any suggestions. Thanks for your interest, and for caring.

-Nick

Christmas Wishlist 2010

As today happens to be Christmas Day, I thought I would take some time to lay out my ideal wishlist for OKC. It could be a lot longer obviously, as virtually everything could be done differently, more efficiently, and better. But I'll stick to the main points:

1. One thing I wish for is a serious Plan OKC process. In the coming weeks I am going to be trying to get together an urbanist group to do a Plan OKC "Meeting in a Box" over one evening. I would actually like to see OKC implement some innovative ideas (maybe even some that would make city planning conspiracy theorists' eyes bulge) that could legitimately curb sprawl. I'd like to see us creating fewer places devoid of real lasting value (thus creating future SLUMS) and like to see us move some more of our growth into the kind of development that will still be nice 30 years from now, and even still standing 100 years from now. I'm tired of cheap and low-quality being Oklahoma City's best selling-point. Even if that means prices are going to rise, we have to find a way to start building quality communities and to stop building slightly better than crappy communities. A friend once told me that OKC's motto is, "Better than crappy makes us happy." It's true, and how said is that?

2. When it comes to one of OKC's latest greatest projects with a 7-digit price tag, I'm not even going to say I hope for any kind of abstract, feel-good process with the convention center like an open or transparent process. I could care less about that at this point, because the bottom line is that if the convention center is right next to the park with no separation, it will ruin the park environment. If they think putting commie block apartments in the convention center facade is going to work, they must be kidding themselves. A convention hotel is not a mixed-use from a convention center, either. They need to either put the convention center somewhere else or if they insist on the mysterious OG+E payments, then they need to utilize my creative solution to set it back an entire block and bring Broadway back, allowing for a slender 1x4-block district to develop in between the two. The ULI panel noted that the convention center is being put on 40% more land than it needs, even if it's going to be expanded. Furthermore, I'm tired of the suburban thinking behind Core2Shore. There are block sizes and human scales that actually matter downtown. I get it that they don't understand or care about this, but you can't just recreate a site identical to what you'd do in the suburbs and put it downtown. In the suburbs you wouldn't notice an area (similar to what would end up running all the way from Park Avenue to Oklahoma River) that consists of over 100 normal sized city blocks consolidated into about 15 huge superblocks. Right now we have a large cluster of superblocks that has killed downtown, and ALL Core2Shore looks like it will do at this point is extend that huge miserable cluster further south. Has anyone noticed how the Myriad Convention Center and the Myriad Gardens interact with eachother?? "Oh, but it will be different this time.." If anyone buys that the nature of superblocks have changed, or that they can do the exact same thing and get a better result, they need to be locked up in the mental ward. Or shipped to Tulsa.

3. Come on Nick, tell us what you're planning. I mean Nick Preftakes, not myself. Years later I am still dying to find out what Nick Preftakes is planning to do with the entire block he bought up in the Arts District. I've been telling people it's going to be a game changer, especially with Devon Tower+park+retail+auditorium and the emergence of the Film Row area (which is coming along very nicely), the Arts District could potentially be unrecognizable if Preftakes announces a major development there. It will be absolutely essential that he maintains the historic integrity of the very-historic block, but there are some boarded up buildings there with some really amazing potential. It would be so worth it, especially when you look at the new lease on life the old Montgomery Ward building across the street got. The unfolding of these plans could potentially affect other things like the streetcar route. I've been telling people that I think the Arts District could potentially be a much bigger deal than it is now.

4. I want to see development in Bricktown get back to where it could be. I wish for Bricktown to come closer to being "completed" because once other districts get hot, it may never be able to attract more development. The big problem is that in my opinion Bricktown has gotten stale and has failed to reinvent itself in a long time, and in today's world, that can be fatal. Bricktown could suffer the same death that the West End did for a period if it fails to reinvent itself and stay fresh. It's not just for the sake of locals who have started to focus more on districts that are hotter right now, but for developers who are comparing cheaper asking prices somewhere like 10th Street or Broadway to astronomical ridiculously inflated asking prices in Bricktown, and the choice to pass on Bricktown becomes an easy one. I think Bricktown is relying too much on the streetcar spurring development along Sheridan to bother pursuing other ideas. The city absolutely is to blame, not the Bricktown merchants that put their money where their mouths are. Just because the ballpark and canal are in Bricktown doesn't mean that it's reached some invisible limit for how much city assistance a neighborhood can receive. Has the city turned its back on Bricktown?

5. The Bricktown point is a great segway into parking. Simply put, two things need to happen: It needs to be expressly codified into the city statutes that new surface parking downtown will not be tolerated, especially in lieu of previously standing buildings no matter the condition of said building, and parking lot moguls in areas like Bricktown need to be shut down and put out of business. Tell them to take their business to Tulsa or some city that will tolerate that, but we won't here in OKC, because a few of us are actually serious about building downtown up. How do you shut down the Bricktown parking lot lords? Public parking, and that can be done extremely easy. Watch closely a project that is underway with Automobile Alley to re-stripe North Broadway and take away a lane, add a turning lane, and change parallel parking to angled parking which will allow them to squeeze in hundreds more parking spaces. If they went with angled parking along every Bricktown street that is free or metered, they could easily shut down the Bricktown parking lots because more than enough parking would be available for free on the street. This should also be pursued in other districts if the results in A-Alley are as positive as it could very well turn out.

6. Oklahoma City has failed to grow downtown housing to the extent that we had hoped we would have by now. This is a simple fact in spite of the other fact that downtown housing is slowly on its way to becoming viable, with several hundred downtown residents moving in and taking up urban lifestyles. It could be more, it should have been more. The 2005 Downtown Housing Study said there was 5-year demand for thousands more units than we ended up getting built between 2005-10. Another downtown study that came out right around there recommended taking several steps to incentivize downtown development. Virtually none of those steps, except for rezoning, were actually followed through with. I assume the copies of it at the Planning Dept got filed in the big file cabinet full of other ignored downtown studies and surveys and reports and commissions. But it may be time to develop a REAL program designed to result in a boom in smaller infill projects. This needs to happen now, so that we can fix the problem with demand, before streetcar comes on line and results in a huge boom in infill and therefor makes the appearance of a problem go away. If we get the streetcar finished without an infill program, the results aren't going to be as positive as it would be if we got the streetcar in and an infill program. We need to evaluate our goals from 5 years ago, and the results we got, consider why it ended up that way (and be open-minded to reasons other than the popular excuse, "It's the economy, stupid"), and get back on track to recover lost projected units.

7. I want to see Full Circle move downtown. They could locate smack in between Heritage Hills and the booming downtown residential market. Downtown residential markets tend to be filled with creative types with disposable income WHO READ. If they went into a beautiful old building like The Packard at 10th/Robinson they'd have the potential to be one of the absolute coolest locally-owned bookstores in America. They already are, the only thing holding them back is their location in crappy (and rapidly-emptying) 50 Penn Place. Enough said.

Well that's the Top 6 at least. Quick summary: 1, Plan OKC; 2, convention center location; 3, Nick Preftakes development; 4, Bricktown development; 5, angled parking; 6, small infill program; 7, Full Circle.

I am thankful for all the really good things going on in OKC, for being included in a number of processes unfolding around downtown right now, and it's also good to be back in town. If anyone's interested in meeting for coffee or lunch, feel free to let me know, I'm always excited to meet with fellow urbanists. I know this blog doesn't get a lot of comments by the nature of the things it talks about, but I do appreciate the people who read this and hear me out on the ideas I have. Merry Christmas to all!

Compare to Tulsa City Council wards

I present to you, a ward map that makes sense. There aren't really any wards that traverse major boundaries and each area of town is given a great sense of autonomy by these districts. They also, for the most part, have smaller wards than we do. Tulsa, a city of 389,000 in the 2009 estimate, has 9 wards at about 44,000 each. Oklahoma City, with about 570,000 in the 2009 estimate, has 8 wards at about 71,000 each. This would tend to suggest OKC needs more wards in order to have as representative a body as Tulsa, and I would argue that 44,000/ward is still high. Also consider that Tulsa pretty much has 4 wards that represent the inner city. 2 for Midtown and 2 for North Tulsa. OKC's inner south has no ward that represents it, whereas North Tulsa has 2 that represent it.


Calgary is also redrawing lines in its 14-ward City Council. Here's a great map drawn up by a Calgary blogger..the color fills represent the new wards, the black lines represent the old. This redistricting is supposed to ensure a more representative council. So apparently it can be done by just redrawing lines. I would also mention that Calgary has a ratio of about 75,000 citizens to 1 alderman. You'll see that the UC area (Ward 7) and inner-north side of Calgary is being consolidated into one ward. Presently it's a lot like Capitol Hill--an area broken up by 3 or 4 wards depending on how you geographically define it.

Maybe what's interesting is that the redistricting in Calgary is taking place now that the overwhelming majority of the inner city has been gentrified. You're just as likely to see minorities in the burbs now as you are in the inner city, the only different is that the ones downtown are much more affluent and the ones in the suburbs got bumped out by the high rent in the Beltline (south of downtown). So basically the modus operandii while the inner city was fragmented and poor was to gerrymander and split it up into a dozen different districts that made no sense as long as each had a different area of town to counterbalance the minority votes. Now that the inner city is gentrified and affluent, the modus operandii is to go back and draw lines that make a little more sense. So does anything really change? OKC will probably follow the same trajectory. We won't do it this time just yet, but next time this comes up in 2021 we probably will finally get around to some wards that make sense. Lookin at you, Capitol Hill.

Hadden Hall renovation update

Apparently the deferral of historic preservation tax credits is not holding some projects back, more evidence of the godsend saving that tax credit was. The Hadden Hall project, on 10th between Robinson and Harvey (next door to the Packard Building project) is well underway. Midtown Redevelopment/Midtown Renaissance/Whatever recently issued a statement with the following information:

18 new units in all
All 1bd/br
$700-1000/mo
December 2010 completion

That this project is just 5 months away from completion is exciting news for downtown!

Paseo pics

After how pleased I was with deadCENTER, I guess I might as well put up some of my pics from the Paseo Arts Festival. Took about 100, but here's some of the highlights. All can be viewed here. The Paseo district certainly looked really good. Always a great festival.

Traffic circles, streetcars, pedestrian malls, oh my!

I just want to congratulate anyone and everyone who participated in one of the Let's Talk Transit public forums and took their beliefs public. It's often so easy to sit behind a computer screen and type and keep typing until you've written a how-to essay on what you want to happen in OKC, but it's harder to make the time to meet people in person and go before a group of strangers including city leaders and state your case. Those who participated did just that and left COTPA with the impression that the community is interested and is watching. I want to thank COTPA as well for giving us the chance to do this through the public forums, for paying attention to everything we said, and also for giving me the opportunity to be the guest blogger. Without much further ado I'll go into more detail on a few key points:

Routes: We're being told that any routes we may see mapped out are only preliminary. I want streetcar planners to realize that we know these maps will be the starting point for their system planning, so we ARE going to analyze the routes. Just because they are "preliminary" doesn't mean they're only preliminary. On the Let's Talk Transit website, Walter Jenny made the following comment on a previous blog entry of mine:

- Identify the purpose of the streetcar. It's not to move people from Edmond to downtown, for example. It's to move people around downtown once they're there.

This got me thinking. I myself, and others as well, have said a LOT about the importance of connecting the Oklahoma Health Center to downtown but since stressing that importance I've been waffling on the issue. Blair Humphreys made his case in an OKC Central guest post that given the track miles we have to work with, it is not worth connecting the Health Center to downtown for the purpose of the lunch rush. Given the frequency of having streetcars run every 15 minutes and carrying less than 100 people in each run, he has a good point. Is the lunch rush the purpose for connecting both sides of I-235? Of course not, but the point remains.

One of the things I'm hearing a lot about is the lack of simplicity in any of COTPA's preliminary routes. A lot of people have suggested that the routes indicate not listening to the people who have clearly expressed a desire to see Sheridan, Walker, and Broadway. I contend however that the routes show COTPA is listening to everybody and not just the majority and the experts and FAILING to commit to ONE alignment through an area, and the complex web of streetcar they've drawn up does seem to touch virtually every street for at least one-two blocks. Someone needs to tell them it doesn't work that way. For example, you can't describe to an out-of-towner where they can catch the streetcar and where it goes without turning blue in the face. You also do need to COMMIT to a corridor and stick to those corridors instead of interweaving in order to please every proponent of every corridor. While I'm not certain of this route and while I realize it misses key areas such as Deep Deuce (although some Deep Deuce residents have told me they are used to walking), here is my proposal for SIMPLICITY:



That would be within the 7 miles we have to work with and within the physical constraints that each corridor seems to have. For instance, Sheridan can't have a double track going in both directions due to the heavy underground utilities that exist underneath the south half of the street (eastbound lanes). Other constraints involve the traffic circles, and others also involve the underpasses underneath the elevated BNSF railroad (they lack the clearance for streetcar cables). Sheridan however is by far the most popular corridor thus it NEEDS a streetcar line and more than the 3-4 blocks COTPA has proposed.

Not that the COTPA routes are all that bad. I think that the red route could be really awesome if slightly tailored, as such:

All I changed about the red route was instead of southbound cutting west to Robinson on 4th, I kept the streetcar going down Hudson until Park where it turns west to Robinson. By touching Hudson/Park you've got Arts District coverage that the streetcar didn't before. I like the idea of CBD coverage as well--most people's routes seem to touch all of the periphery neighborhoods that make up downtown but NOT the downtown skyscraper core. Just because an area doesn't currently have mixed-uses doesn't mean it lacks potential for streetcar vibrancy.

Traffic circles: In the $835 million 2007 General Obligation Bond that the citizens passed by almost 90%, apparently there was funding for several more traffic circles. Traffic circles have been making their entry to the downtown area over the last few years, most notably in the Midtown area on both sides of St Anthony's--10th and Walker has a traffic circle and 10th and Dewey also has a traffic circle. I love these traffic circles and not only do they make the intersections very efficient but they also go a long way toward creating defined space and anchoring an area with an interesting street form and well-maintained streetscapes (intensive planting in the middle of the traffic circle). These traffic circles are GOOD things. They are also helping to extend Classen Drive which cuts diagonally (NW/SE) between Midtown and Heritage Hills. In the Classen Drive extension there are new traffic circles proposed to go in at 9th and Hudson, 8th and Harvey, and I think stopping at 7th and Robinson. You can view the 2007 GO Bond projects here at okc.gov. Getting to the point: These traffic circles are going to affect the route and we need to figure out what the deal is with these traffic circles SOON and before going any further.

There are surely some solutions to cutting through a traffic circle as well. The OKC traffic circles have too sharp of a turning radius for a streetcar to actually navigate the curve normally but perhaps a traffic signaling system similar to crosswalk lights (embedded street lights in the pavement that flash, stopping traffic when a pedestrian pushes a button) could be used and the streetcar route could just cut through the center pavers inside the traffic circle. Granted, you would still not be able to have a streetcar curve or intersection in the middle of a traffic circle, you just might be able to transect it evenly. Maybe.

Funding: A lot has been said about the funding ever since I brought up my concern that system expansion is not feasibly going to happen any time soon due to the funding mechanism, and especially considering COTPA has yet to identify a maintenance funding mechanism for this current starter system. The belief (or illusion) shared by many behind the streetcar initiative is that future expansions will be funded by the feds who have already begun issuing streetcar grants to cities. Let me just say this: Any city that is counting on the feds for any streetcar-related capital investment is deluding itself and needs to get off its arse and fund the damn thing itself. I don't want my taxes paying for streetcar in every city when we here in Oklahoma will likely NEVER see a dime for fixed guideway transit of our own. The reality is that the feds are very strict when they evaluate transit proposals and go for bang for the buck as well as FEASIBILITY. And they have strict determining factors for feasibility which take into account density, not the potential for density.

Also consider the people we send to Washington. These guys do everything they can to thwart transit funding and they're not going to go out of their way to secure transit funding for OKC, believe me. Remember in the 1990s when OKC was about to get a LIGHT RAIL grant from the feds to go with the original MAPS projects and disgraced Congressman Ernest "I-Took" Istook put the breaks on that? Let me state it again. Consider the people we send to Washington, these guys aren't on board with transit and will never go out of their way to secure funding so that their own community can have as decent transit as everyone else. These guys are obstructionist, self-defeatist, they do not believe in the greater good for the community and thus do not believe in the future of OKC and they're going to bring us down with 'em if we decide to rely on them for future expansions of this system. /end rant

Pedestrian malls: Another really cool idea that I think we ought to consider is integrating a streetcar corridor with a pedestrian mall. The result would be a street that incorporates numerous transit types, virtually everything except cars. It would have a bicycle lane, street vendors, a pedestrian mall, and a streetcar corridor connecting to other areas of downtown. Since Robinson is already such a screwed up one-way then two-way then one-way corridor why don't we just use Robinson for this? Between Park and Sheridan (adjacent to the Myriad Gardens) is where we could do this. An alternative is using Broadway between Sheridan and 4th, PROVIDED that SandRidge keep their buildings and builds up a Broadway streetwall.

Think about it:

Cityshot LI

Bricktown on a Friday night.

Cityshot L

Pre-Film Row resurgence..

3 options (that don't stink)

These are the three streetcar routes that COTPA is going to unveil at the upcoming Let's Talk Transit meeting. I am impressed by the skill, knowledge, and patience displayed by COTPA staff and particularly their consultant, Mike McAnelly..and personally, I say they've come up with some GREAT routes given the length limitations we are going to face. Wish it could have gone further down Sheridan and connected Film Row and OCU Law, but oh well.

Route 1

6.75 miles

Route 2

5.47 miles

Route 3

6.35 miles

My comments will be brief, I am MUCH more interested in what readers think about these routes. I'm not a big fan myself of the green route--I don't think it connects enough existing destinations, unless you think that a potential streetcar system needs to serve the bus station and the memorial. My main preference is probably the red route, although I like the blue route, too.

Cityshot XLIX

Now that's a view.

Fixing SandRidge Commons

What if we could make some simple changes to the SandRidge Commons proposal? By making minor strategic changes, accepting Preservation Oklahoma's request to preserve historic buildings on the site, and by moving the cubist structure proposed at 120 Robert S. Kerr, you accomplish a handful of things:

1. Getting 120 RSK out of the way extends SandRidge Commons against the Park Avenue streetwall, creating more room in front of RSK.
2. SandRidge Commons becomes a viable green space because it extends it up against a straight southern edge, creating a well-defined space and a regularly-shaped space..which will lend themselves to enhanced functionality.
3. By selling the buildings the Preservation Oklahoma wants to protect, you've reinforced the streetwall along Robinson and once the buildings are restored as mixed-use redevelopment projects, you inject a ton of life deep into the heart of downtown.
4. By moving 120 RSK to Broadway, adjacent to a preserved India Temple building, you also create a NEW streetwall that reinforces Broadway.
5. Increased and improved sightlines about--from the main tower you can see straight to a clear edge on the south of the project boundary, the sightlines are improved from Broadway coming in from A-Alley, and the cubist recreational building (an awesome piece of architecture) gets enhanced visibility as well.
6. As a result of enhanced visibility for the recreational building, the restaurant on the ground level that opens up to the SandRidge park may be viable and not require a subsidy that it would if placed on Robert S. Kerr, a corridor with ZERO traffic and visibility, unlike Broadway.

An unpopular, controversial $100 million project becomes a well-loved $50 million project, an asset and a jewel for downtown. Sometimes less is more. SandRidge can sell the buildings off to prospective developers and recoup a small profit as well as save the large demolition expense. By rearranging the site plan to something that makes more sense, it is possible that the restaurant will be remarkably more successful than it would have been with less visibility.

Cubist recreational building proposed by SandRidge for 120 Robert S. Kerr.

SandRidge....again

Brief recap from SandRidge appeal today:

Meeting began at 1:30 pm. Did not end until 5:30. Settled nothing. We brought our A-game, and Preservation Oklahoma made an incredibly impressive and persuasive case--so I suppose it's to their credit that the meeting didn't end at 3 o'clock with a vote of 0-4 against the appeal.

The meeting has been rescheduled. I think June 28th? I'll have to double check that now. Currently using WiFi at a coffee shop downtown..very tired, and worn out. My own jarbled speech did not go as hoped--despite being guaranteed by the BoA bylaws of 5 minutes speaking time we were all hurried up in the interest of time, and I had no complaints with that! Didn't get to many of my points, but got through some..initially brought talking points to the meeting, rewrote them several times during the meeting, opted against talking points for the most part while I was speaking..only had to pause once to regain my train of thought and get to my next point.

All of this would have been prevented if we didn't have this broken process. In order to do largescale development projects like this a developer SHOULD be holding neighborhood meetings like they do for development in many, many other cities. A neighborhood meeting would be the appropriate venue for us to air our concerns and meet an amenable solution.

It would be a heckuva lot better than this stupid process where we are pitted against an entity that could do a lot of good for downtown. In order to send this back to the drawing board and satisfy community input it will require a "NO" vote, and that's unfortunate.

Now I'm exhausted..I'll do more of a recap later. And I am STILL trying to get around to doing a recap of last week's transit meeting, it's just that SandRidge is on the front burner for now.

Here goes another..

The old Grace Cleaners bldg at 529 W. Main Street -- targeted for demolition. The proposed replacement: Surface parking.

Cityshot XLVI

The Tower Theater's recently-restored neon sign lights up the Uptown 23rd corridor late last Friday night.

AHL team to be unveiled

Anyone remember the naming contest we had for the new NBA team 2 years ago, and how Barons seemed to be the most popular choice? Well tomorrow we expect the new AHL team will be unveiled. I would guess that Bennett and McClendon opted against the Barons because surely Seattle would have had a hey day with the "OKC Robber Barons." Fortunately the AHL is in no such precarious position. My prediction: OKC will finally get a pro-level "Barons" mascot.

We'll find out tomorrow.

Cityshot XLV

Devon Tower construction.

The Better Block Project: Complete streets

For less than $1,000, look at what a community can do to better itself. This example comes from the south side Dallas neighborhood of Oak Cliff, which is a largely low-income inner city neighborhood with a cool main street strip. Oak Cliff has been a really sleepy, poor inner city area until recently when the Bishop Arts District came alive recently and now, Oak Cliff's main street is showing some promise.



They took an existing street and without doing an expensive million-dollar streetscaping project, they divided the wide street into multiple uses..one lane for car traffic, another for car parking, and a strip for bicycles denoted by green paint. Most importantly they also brought the sidewalk out further and put in a patio seating area and adorned it with extensive greenery.

They took their concept to the Internet. Here are the videos:





If Dallas can do it, OKC certainly can.