Cool Weather in Tulsa

Yesterday, This weird thing happenned. A cold front came through! Can you believe it? In celebration, we went to the QT Park at 41st and Riverside for the afternoon. I've never been to this park before, I was amazed at how nice it is. Of course, I was not interested in the amazingly up to date and quality play equipment, but I thought the little waterfalls and fountains awesome. I couldn't believe that every time I'd run or ridden past it, I'd just looked the other way. I'm so glad that we have a company such as QT here that is willing to invest so much money on a park.

Other than all the flashy fountains and large shade trees, something else was developed there. There was a sense of community, vibrancy, and activeness. There were people riding their bikes and running on the trails, people playing frisbee and disc golf in the fields, a magician performing a tips only show. All of this giving the area a quality, authentic feel. It was the culture of Tulsa. A growingly active city, a relaxed city, and overall, a livable city.

Cherry Street Parking "Problem" Solved?

There is a project in the works to double the amount of parking spaces on Cherry Street this fall. Most of these will come from angled parking to be added along the north side of 15th. Overall, I'm glad to see this project moving forward, and I do believe it will make parking easier. I just wonder if it was really needed. Many of the frequent Cherry Street patrons come from the surrounding neighborhood. Would not a system of bike lanes and bike parking have been a better use for this money?

What do you think?

Tulsa needs bike lanes.

Has anyone else noticed all the cyclists around Tulsa lately? I have, and the number of them is ever increasing. So, with this constantly increasing number of cyclists, and all the road construction going on now, it begs the question, why aren't we installing more bike lanes? Now would have been the perfect time, with all the road construction going on, we could have just added them as we improved the road. I think this is an issue that should be on the agenda of our city leaders. Tulsa is already nationally recognized as a bike friendly city, and this would make us even more so. It would also be great PR for Tulsa, helping us lose our image of being a fat, lazy city.

Tulsa's bike culture is growing, and I can't tell you how proud I am to say that. It's time that we provide more adequate infrastructure for bikes. We've come a long way in recent years, so let's not stop here.

How can one person make Tulsa more urban?

I'd like to start this off by telling you my BEST (;D) kept secret. I am obsessed with all things urban. Urban cities, urban buildings, urban design, etc. It really kind of scares me. A kid my age, espescially one living in the suburbs, usually could care less about such things. Kids my age care about Facebook, Twitter, texting, and what car they plan on getting. While I do enjoy those things, they're not a driving passion, so to speak, for me. (Don't get me wrong, I have plenty of friends...:D) I have a passion, and it is for urban design. When I get out of college, I plan to buy/rent a loft downtown, and enjoy the hard core urban lifestyle for several years. If Tulsa doesn't have a fully urban and walkable area in about 7-8 years, I will move away for a while. Bottom line, I am going to be one of those young professional urbanites for a while. I will have this experience. If it has to be in another city, then so be it. But, I want it to be in Tulsa.

So, with that said, I would like to try and make a list of things that each of us can do to make Tulsa a more urban city. Some may be easy and quick, and others might require going out of your way a little, but I really want everyone who reads this blog to take them into consideration, and apply them to your daily life whenever you can.

1. Take the bus more often. (if its available to you) Even if it's just once a week, or once a month, ride the bus. Increased ridership numbers will mean increased interest in city leaders to better our public transit. It frustrates me so much to see all these empty busses driving around town. If it's available to you, use it! Even if it's only on occasion.

2. Walk. Walk wherever you can. If it's the restaurant a quarter mile away from your house, walk to it. There is no sense in taking your car a quarter to a half mile when it is not raining, hailing, sleeting, or snowing outside. Increased pedestrians enhance the feel of neighborhoods, and could help get zoning codes changed.

3. Ride your bike. If you have a bike, put it to good use and ride it! This sort of ties in with increased walking, it just gives you longer ranges. Instead of driving your car to go pick up the prescription from CVS, ride your bike. And unless there are bike lanes off the street, ride your bike in the road. This will eventually drive even the most anti-bikes person into advocating for bike lanes. They'll get sick of there being so many slow bikes blocking their Suburban's path.

4. Take advantage of the River Parks trails. We have fantastic trails and parks along the Arkansas River, so it's a no brained to visit them on a regular basis. What you don't use you lose, and we definitely don't want to lose these.

5. This is the last one, and the one that I feel to be the most important. Get involved in your community. Whether it's a neighborhood association, meeting friends for coffee, joining a running or biking club, a book club, a church function, or countless other things, they all help make a city livable. Nothing makes a city more livable than involved, connected citizens.

I hope that we can all put these five suggestions into our lives. Tulsa is a great city, filled with wonderful citizens who are capable of making a difference and changing the city for the better. So I ask you all, what else can we do to make Tulsa a more urban, or an overall better city? I welcome, no, I beg your input to this discussion. Please feel free to voice your opinion by leaving a comment, and by voting in the poll.

Boulder Bridge

First off, let me say that I really like the design of the new Boulder bridge. I am really quite surprised that it is not a boring, concrete, standard cheap looking bridge. It appears to have brick on parts of it and there will be artwork molded onto the walls. (I desperately hope not like that God-forsaken wall on 169)

With that said, why are there no bike lanes? Apparently bicyclists will be able to ride on the "extra wide" sidewalks. Yeah, that sounds like a fantastic idea. Imagine it now, as you walk down the sidewalk here comes some guy on the riding his bike on the sidewalk and runs over your four year old's toes. Why is he riding his bike on the sidewalk??! Because this is what he has been told to do. Personally, I don't think moving vehicles should share the same space as pedestrians. If we insist on not putting in bike lanes, then please let us not encourage bicyclists to ride on the sidewalk. Everybody with any knowledge of cycling knows that you are supposed to ride in the street, bike lanes or not.

Also, I'm pretty sure I remember hearing that there would be streetcar/trolley tracks built on it. While the rendering appears to show a streetcar, there are no tracks. Anybody else remember this?