PLANiTULSA - "Which Way, Tulsa?" - last day to respond
Time to stop procrastinating and pick a scenario for Tulsa's future growth. Tomorrow (June 18, 2009) is the deadline for completing the "Which Way, Tulsa?" survey.
Dear Tulsan:
Over the past 8 months, input from thousands of Tulsans has been gathered at public workshops throughout the city, collected through surveys and recorded during interviews. Based on all these ideas for Tulsa's future, the PLANiTULSA team has developed four different scenarios of how future growth in Tulsa might look.
The PLANiTULSA team wants your opinions, thoughts and feedback on these four scenarios. We've prepared a survey for you to rate various aspects of the scenarios. During a month-long survey drive, May 12 - June 18, we hope thousands of Tulsans will fill out the survey. The more the better! The survey results will drive the process of turning the four scenarios into one shared vision for Tulsa's future.
The survey is available online at www.planitulsa.org
Thank you from The PLANiTULSA Team!
MORE: Mike Easterling covers the end of the PLANiTULSA survey in today's new edition of Urban Tulsa Weekly:
John Fregonese, president of Fregonese Associates--the Portland, Ore.-based urban and regional planning firm charged with coordinating the city's comprehensive plan update under the auspices of PLANiTULSA--said his firm has received roughly 2,000 online responses and 1,000 paper responses to the four potential development scenarios for the city's future it unveiled during a rally on May 12 at Cain's Ballroom.The deadline for submitting responses is Thursday, June 18. Fregonese said last week his organization was making a coordinated, last-minute outreach effort to get input from as many groups as possible by circulating surveys at churches, rallies and meetings of various organizations. He said the firm was specifically targeting Tulsa's Hispanic community for more input.
In the end, Fregonese said, his firm expects to have 4,000 to 5,000 responses--a number that would be proportionate to what the firm's comprehensive plan update work in cities such as Austin, Portland and Salt Lake City has attracted.
Here's my May 20 column on concerns about the PLANiTULSA survey and what will be done with the results and my May 6 column previewing the scenarios.
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If the city and state had built outer rings around the city, the downtown might have remained at the center.
Only the east & south sides were built. That's a big reason why the downtown is so out of center that it's rediculous to invest in stadiums and arenas there.
The arena and stadiun could have and should have been built near I-44 & the BA expressway(across the road from the old Doenges Brothers Ford).
Transportation infrastructure molds the shape & location of a population.
I wonder if the challenges of Osage County being an Indian Reservation created difficulty in completing the optimal loop around Tulsa?
I don't think Tulsa is a "sacred cow". If Suburbs overtake Tulsa in population, so be it. Trying to "mold" growth usually results in retarding growth.
I don't think the reservation is the problem -- it's not really a reservation of the sort you find in Arizona or the Dakotas, anyway -- but having the county seat in Pawhuska (with land records and criminal courts) may have been a deterrent to growth in that direction. There's a story that Dr. Sam Kennedy refused to develop his extensive holdings near Tulsa in Osage County because his development plan had been rejected. Some of that land went on to become the Gilcrease Hills master planned development, which opened in 1969 or 1970.
The Sequoyah Loop / Gilcrease Expressway, and the Osage (Tisdale) Expressway were part of the original 1956 expressway plan, but they were never included in the Interstate Highway System. By the early '60s, the working class white neighborhoods in far north Tulsa, developed in the late '40s and early '50s, were showing signs of aging badly. Aviation workers started to move to new subdivisions with bigger homes in east Tulsa. Urban renewal was used in the late '60s to clear out Greenwood, and African-Americans were "encouraged" to relocate further north, further away from downtown.
From my perspective as a Tulsa resident and taxpayer, Tulsa is a "sacred cow." We need a higher population to maintain the level of tax revenues to be able to provide city services to the entire city. We used to benefit by providing retail to the entire metro area, but that's no longer the case. There's a danger of becoming another Detroit or St. Louis -- a hollow core at the heart of a growing metropolitan area. Part of the rationale behind a new comprehensive plan is figure out how to encourage and accommodate a higher population while maintaining our quality of life.
As a native Minnesotan, I think of how Minneapolis/Saint Paul remains well-centered within the "twin Cities" area.
Minneapolis has thrived, but the city population is much lower than Bloomington (which is where the Mall of America is located).
There are essentially 3 rings of highway looping around the twin cities metro area, as well as an "X" of highways cutting through the downtown.
Tulsa has the "X", but only 1/2 of the 2nd loop(I-44) & 1/2 of the 3rd, wider loop(Creek Turnpike).
If Tulsa really pushes to create a Oakhurst/Berryhill/Turley loop, so much change would happen.
You're right about the Osage County seat issue. I just know that anything that happens in Osage county has to be approved by the Osage Tribe.
They're a decent council, but Industry seems to have stayed clear of that county.
Downtown interests would be in a much stronger position if the city were heavily expanded northwestward.
Tulsa must make incentives, not restrictions on growth.
I liked options B and D, voted for D. Status quo is not an option for me.
Status quo, Scenerio A, all da way, baby! It's beating all others, with less than 2,500 votes!
I love Medlock's P-Tulsa dig on KFAQ this morning: The usual suspects who frequent crap like PlaniTulsa are cyclists who want bike paths, and other cranks who choo choo! Love it! Love it!
My first choice is D. Second choice is B.
I submitted my survey response today (9 hours before the deadline) with numerous written comments.
It will be interesting to see the outcome.