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Old Posted Nov 22, 2010, 5:12 PM
shane453 shane453 is offline
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Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Oklahoma City
Posts: 755
A little rundown of current activity in OKC, lots of good economic news and two major urban development sets are brewing pretty quickly.

JOBS/ECONOMY
-550 more Boeing jobs coming to OKC from California
-OKC ranks 2 (behind Austin) in private job growth between 09-10, with over 10,000 new jobs for 2.4% growth in the private sector.
-Some corporation looking to relocate has purchased the nice 20-story office tower that Devon will no longer need in a couple of years. Speculation generally agrees Continental Resources, an Enid, OK energy company looking to triple in size in the next few years, has purchased the building. However, other rumors about the purchaser include Hertz and Boeing- Boeing could move its defense division offices from St. Louis to OKC where most of their defense manufacturing/repair takes place now.

Apparently a British firm, Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, that is doing the London Olympic village is busy with a lot of work in OKC, at all of the sites mapped below:



Some renovation projects include a 5,000 sf single family home in a historic bindery, a conversion of a warehouse into commercial/condos, a warehouse-townhome conversion. There will also be new construction, including 30,000 sf retail building with rooftop parking, and a 228-unit apartment development in the rapidly infilling Maywood-Deep Deuce neighborhood.





Another big announcement was that the downtown Ford, Lincoln, Mercury car dealership will be closed so that its owners can develop it into a mix of retail and housing. The property (about 10 acres) is a prime location to say the least- Bordering the future boulevard and central park, the current Myriad Gardens (neighbor to Devon Tower), the Ford Center, and the Cox Convention Center. The site is shown below:



There's no way to know for sure how the property will be developed, but I can make a good guess that there will be a mid- or high-rise involved... The developers say they have been planning commercial/residential for the property and talking to the Chamber retail specialist and city officials for years, and this 3-block property between the Myriad Gardens and the future central park has ALWAYS been represented as a mixed use development with two towers in all Core to Shore planning materials. We'll see what happens!







Devon Tower has been exciting but we are starting to get back into another wave of development like the one that began in 2005.
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