PREPARED FOR TAKEOFF
PLANS READIED FOR WHEELER DISTRICT DEVELOPMENT AT SITE OF FORMER DOWNTOWN AIRPARK
Blair Humphreys has spent the past three years planning an all new approach to creating an urban neighborhood along the Oklahoma River, but he knows the first question everyone wants answered: when will the Ferris wheel be built?
During an inspection of the unassembled parts of the former Santa Monica, Calif., Ferris wheel one year ago, Humphreys hoped to have it up and running by the summer of 2015. That deadline, however, came and went.
“The first Ferris wheel was conceived as an idea by George Ferris, manufactured from scratch, shipped to Chicago and constructed in time for the 1893 Columbia Exposition,” Humphreys said during a visit Monday. “Within six months after its opening, it had more than 1.4 million riders. All of that is to say, even people building the very first Ferris wheel have done it faster than we have. But of course, his last name was Ferris.”
Humphreys admits he learned a lot about what is involved in building a Ferris wheel along a river. Site work started several weeks ago, and over the next couple of months the structure itself will rise into the air along with a surrounding food truck court, public art and amenities.
The Ferris wheel, however, is just a small part of the task taken on by Humphreys when he took over development of the former Downtown Airpark and adjacent land to the east between the Oklahoma River and Twin Creek.
The first hint at how the overall project will proceed is included in a newly filed Planned Unit Development application filed with the city that will be presented to the River Design Committee on April 7 and to the Oklahoma City Planning Commission on April 28.
Humphreys hopes he will be ironing out final zoning with the city as the first visitors are sharing photos of their first ride on the Ferris wheel. That zoning, he said, will clear the way for constructing infrastructure in a first-phase development that will start around the former airpark terminal building.
The terminal building is the strongest surviving tie to the airpark, which was built and opened in 1947 by a group of city power brokers led by Dean A. McGee. The terminal, with a hint of Art Deco-style design, also was home to a cafe that operated from 1954 until the airpark went bankrupt and was sold in a 2005 auction to the Humphreys family.
Blair Humphreys said that he is looking at renovating the terminal building into a community hub (with more details to be revealed at a later time) and building a first phase of housing that will sell at an average price of $250,000 to $350,000. The zoning application also includes plans for what Humphreys calls “tiny homes” that might attract young couples and families just starting out.
“Phase one is 15 acres that includes a range of elements to create a village hub and what’s anticipated to grow into a full-scale district,” Humphreys said. “The first phase will include approximately 50 single family homes, including both urban houses and
multistory town homes, over 100 apartments, a three-story office building and the restored terminal building.”
It will be during this first phase that part of the original runway will be converted into a tree-lined boulevard.
“The commitment to restoring the terminal building and maintaining the memory lines of the runway are rooted in the importance of the site’s history and making sure that as the district evolves it stays connected to its authentic past and place within the city,” Humphreys said.
Other portions of the zoning application represent what Humphreys calls a “framework” to guide future development — but not yet firm plans. He confirmed talks are underway for a “duel immersion school” that enrolls English-speaking students with students whose dominant language is not English who are then purposely integrated with goals of developing bi-lingual skills, academic excellence, and positive cross-cultural attitudes for students.
Hispanic interaction
Planning for development of Wheeler has, from early on, included interaction with the nearby Hispanic community in the Riverside and Capitol Hill neighborhoods. The zoning application shows Humphreys reserving a 2-acre property on Wheeler’s boundary with low-income Hispanic neighborhoods to the west, as well as an opening of SW 15 that would link the neighborhoods with Wheeler, the Oklahoma River, and provide better direct access to downtown.
A deeper dig into the zoning application shows the extent of Humphreys’ efforts to create a new model for a urban neighborhood — denser mixed-use development, embracing older struggling surrounding neighborhoods, and encouraging pedestrian and bicycle traffic over cars with streets that do not follow the suburban template.
It’s not quite the task of designing and building the first Ferris wheel for a World’s Fair. But for Humphreys, an award-winning graduate from MIT who previously oversaw the Institute for Quality Communities at OU, it’s a worthy planning and development challenge that may have ramifications on Oklahoma City for years to follow.