By Brad on Oct 2, 2008 in Our Town, Photography, Sights and Sounds | comments(0)
7:04am, Main Street Parking, Downtown Oklahoma City
Looking south from the 7th Floor of the Main Street Parking garage in downtown Oklahoma City, you can see the Ford Center, new home of the Oklahoma City Thunder NBA team, on the left and the historic Colcord Hotel on the right.
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* Taken with my iPhone
By Brad on Sep 30, 2008 in Our Town, Photography, Sights and Sounds, Trivial Matters, Weather | comments(0)
11:58am, Park Avenue at Robinson Avenue, Downtown Oklahoma City
Downtown bustles during the noon hour as people venture out to enjoy the beautiful day over their lunch break. Today is absolutely gorgeous and the perfect temperature!
(Check out the Google Maps Street View of this intersection.)
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* Taken with my iPhone
By Brad on Sep 29, 2008 in Family, Our Town, Photography, Sights and Sounds, Trivial Matters, Weather | comments(1)
11:59am, Richey’s Grill in the Oklahoma Tower, Downtown Oklahoma City
Karla joins me for an impromptu lunch date, an instant cure to the Monday malaise. (The gorgeous mid-day weather certainly helped act as an antidote to the Monday-induced mental dreariness.)
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* Taken with my iPhone. Standard disclaimer about the photography quality applies.
By Brad on Sep 23, 2008 in Our Town, Photography, Sights and Sounds, Trivial Matters | comments(0)
12:02pm:
A snapshot from my iPhone from the second floor balcony looking down on the first floor atrium area in Leadership Square in downtown Oklahoma City.
By Brad on Aug 21, 2008 in Amazing Stuff, Cool Stuff, Our Town | comments(0)
By Brad on Aug 20, 2008 in Cool Stuff, Our Town | comments(2)
Earlier today, Devon unveiled its plan for a new skyscraper in downtown Oklahoma City. It will be 54 stories tall, making it the tallest building in Oklahoma, 20th tallest in the country and 54th tallest in the world, according to News9.com. It will cost $750 million and is scheduled to be completed in 2012.
I’m really excited about it and it’s generating a great deal of buzz both downtown and in the community at large.
By Brad on Aug 5, 2008 in Crazy Stuff, The World, Things That Make You Shake Your Head | comments(0)
… at least Oklahoma City traffic isn’t quite this crazy…
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By Brad on May 28, 2008 in Our Town, Wordless Wednesday | comments(1)
Leadership Square, where I work, in Downtown Oklahoma City.
(© Brad Neese)
By Brad on May 9, 2008 in Cool Stuff, Family, Our Town | comments(4)
Our last stop on this tour (which was actually our very first stop that morning) is the Park Harvey apartments. I think these apartments capture the essence of downtown living, with tall buildings surrounding it and stunning views (from the higher-up floors) of Oklahoma City.
As you might expect from most downtown homes, space is at a premium, so these are not the most spacious homes (or the most economical). However, I thought the Park Harvey apartments did a decent job maximizing space and making it feel more roomy than the floor plan might suggest. On the down side, if you lease or buy one of these apartments, you’ll pay as much for 1000 square feet here as you might for a house more than twice its size somewhere outside of the downtown area.
Like The Legacy at Arts Quarter, you’re paying a premium for convenience — of course, that assumes living downtown would be convenient for you. For me, it would be very convenient because I work downtown and I could easily spend all my time downtown. If I lived in Park Harvey, I literally would just walk next door to get to my office building. You can’t get any closer than that without actually living within the same building you work in!
And, like the other urban housing places, you are also paying a premium for the novelty of downtown living. For some people it’s not worth it, but for others it certainly is. I, for one, like the convenience and the novelty of living downtown. I just can’t do it right now. 
Although the Park Harvey apartments didn’t rank as my first or second pick, it really would be a toss-up between Park Harvey and the Block 42 townhouse for my third overall pick. The building is dated because it was originally built in the 50s (see more details at the end of this post), but the developers have done a nice job of renovating the space and giving an updated look. The apartments themselves are quite nice, with modern fixtures, appliances and decor.
This one bedroom apartment that we looked was roomy enough for a bachelor or even a couple that didn’t mind smaller space. The views from this particular unit were pretty cool, although its south- and west-face windows are likely to make this room quite warm during the Oklahoma summer afternoons and evenings. But the morning, late evening and nighttime scenery would be quite awesome. Continued
By Brad on May 8, 2008 in Cool Stuff, Family, Our Town | comments(3)
The next stop on our downtown living tour (which in actuality was our last stop of our tour last Saturday) lands us at The Legacy at Arts Quarter. As its name suggests, this upscale urban apartment complex is situated squarely within Downtown Oklahoma City’s Arts District. One block to the south is the Civic Center, where we go to see off-broadway shows like Wicked and the upcoming Spamalot as well as Oklahoma City Philharmonic and Canterbury Chorale Society concerts and other similar events. Located on the next block south and east is the Oklahoma City Museum of Art. And Oklahoma City’s other arts and cultural festivals are typically within a short walking distance from this location.
Its location alone makes it a very desired home choice, especially for those of us who work downtown and who attend downtown’s many cultural events. It’s only three blocks from the building I work in, Leadership Square, which would make it a very attractive option if I was in the market because I could easily walk to work and save a lot on gas. More than that, it’s a nice development. In fact, the two-bedroom apartment we looked at was my second favorite of the day. It’s not quite as trendy as the penthouse that I fell in love with, but it is quite nice, it has nice amenities and it is convenient.
The Legacy has a clubhouse that seems similar to what you might find a nicer hotel, with a grand lobby, conference/meeting/banquet rooms and other nice amenities. Continued
