GARAGE TALE
New parking garage proposed to neighbor Civic Center Music Hall
The Oklahoma City Police Association is preparing to build a 262-space parking garage across from the Civic Center Music Hall as the first step in developing several surface parking lots along Main Street.
Ed Hill, association chairman, said the group is preparing to start construction of the five-story garage at 601 W Main next year. The 102,800-square-foot structure would include retail and office space facing Main Street and Colcord Drive.
“Urban Renewal would like to see development of our surface parking lots along Main Street, but before we do that, we have to have a place to park our employees,” Hill said. “So we want to start off small with one of our smaller lots.”
The garage represents the second attempt at developing structured parking west of the Central Business District. The association previously proposed building a garage on the now vacated police head- quarters, which is set to be torn down this next year.
That negotiation stalled when the two sides could not come to terms.
Main Street has several surface parking lots, and most are owned by the association. A master plan was developed for those lots in cooperation with the planning department and Urban Renewal, Hill said.
Over the past two years, interest in Main Street has heated up with the opening of the 21c Museum Hotel and a $70 million mix of retail and housing now under construction.
Historic building restorations, meanwhile, include the once-blighted Main Street Arcade.
“Somebody has to break the ice and start the chess game of giving us more capacity to park downtown and develop the other lots,” Hill said.
The site is one block west of the Arts District Garage, the city’s newest public parking, which is running at 53 percent occupancy.
The garage plans will be reviewed at the August meeting of the Urban Design Commission. Construction is expected to
take eight to 10 months.
“We’ve had preliminary discussions with the Civic Center and others that use parking in this area,” Hill said. “If everything goes right, we will work through the process and start construction after the arts festival next spring.”