1918 Tulsa Aero View

[AquaMan]

I thought it might have been a street car related building. Either a turn-around or a depot.

[Bamboo World]

What's that large building next to the 11th street Arkansas bridge?

Tulsa Cold Storage Co.

[PonderInc]

Such a gorgeous view of our past.  If we could simply plunk this urban form onto our modern city, it would be a great place to live.

The thing that strikes me most is how unobtrusively the rail and trolley lines fit into the urban fabric.  Compare this to the destruction wrought by the IDL. (I can't decide if it's more like the German blitzkrieg or simply Sherman's march to Atlanta.  Either way, thousands of buildings and homes were destroyed so we could create a concrete noose around our city.) Such a horrendous and inefficient way to transport people.  And then there's parking...

Just for fun, I created a little graphic to show how many downtown blocks were destroyed by the creation of the IDL.  The answer?  98. (Give or take.)  I used a normal block from the Riverview neighborhood to create the squares.  When the IDL is "only" half a block wide, I tried to space the blocks out to allow for that.



Just imagine if we'd stuck to trains and trolleys instead.  Imagine having almost 100 more blocks to create homes, businesses and jobs.  Then add several dozen more blocks that would not be wasted on surface parking lots.  Maybe we could fund our schools with the improved density, and we wouldn't even need to worry about state funding cuts to education...because we wouldn't even need money from the state.

A girl can dream, can't she?

[DTowner]

The thing that strikes me most is how unobtrusively the rail and trolley lines fit into the urban fabric.  Compare this to the destruction wrought by the IDL. (I can't decide if it's more like the German blitzkrieg or simply Sherman's march to Atlanta.  Either way, thousands of buildings and homes were destroyed so we could create a concrete noose around our city.) Such a horrendous and inefficient way to transport people.  And then there's parking...

Actually, I think a strong argument can be made that the IDL is an incredibly efficient way to move people into and out of downtown Tulsa.  As with most urban highway/freeway projects in the 1950s-70s, the engineers were very clear eyed about designing efficient highways to move cars/people.  Unfortunately, those engineers took no or very little account of any other short/intermediate/long-term impacts those highways would have on the people and communities they were intended to benefit.

Looking backwards from our advantaged viewpoint, it is hard to understand how or what kind of growth projections or other considerations the engineers were considering to deem it necessary to build such a tight noose around such a relatively small downtown geographically with such a low density.  However, our IDL looks a lot like the loops around downtown Dallas and Houston - two other cities that grew up during the automobile age and shared oil booms with Tulsa, albeit on much grander scales.

I suspect if you read or watch Tulsa Chamber promotional information from the 1960s and 70s, glowing talk of plans/completion of our shiny new IDL would have been as prominent then as stuff about “walkability” and downtown living is today.  It is pretty easy to imagine that without the IDL, Tulsa would be a much smaller city today than what it is.

[heironymouspasparagus]

Actually, I think a strong argument can be made that the IDL is an incredibly efficient way to move people into and out of downtown Tulsa.  As with most urban highway/freeway projects in the 1950s-70s, the engineers were very clear eyed about designing efficient highways to move cars/people.  Unfortunately, those engineers took no or very little account of any other short/intermediate/long-term impacts those highways would have on the people and communities they were intended to benefit.

Looking backwards from our advantaged viewpoint, it is hard to understand how or what kind of growth projections or other considerations the engineers were considering to deem it necessary to build such a tight noose around such a relatively small downtown geographically with such a low density.  However, our IDL looks a lot like the loops around downtown Dallas and Houston - two other cities that grew up during the automobile age and shared oil booms with Tulsa, albeit on much grander scales.

I suspect if you read or watch Tulsa Chamber promotional information from the 1960s and 70s, glowing talk of plans/completion of our shiny new IDL would have been as prominent then as stuff about “walkability” and downtown living is today.  It is pretty easy to imagine that without the IDL, Tulsa would be a much smaller city today than what it is.

Tulsa was growing fast during that time.  I moved for 4 years about 1959 to 1963.  From then, it went from Mayo Meadows - Fairgrounds - being at the edge of town to it being in the middle of town.  31st and Sheridan was the end of pavement going east - it was gravel from there on.  Got paved soon.  The BA was there when we got back.  Used to drive out to BA after school just to see what was going on with the sh$t-kickers in the sticks.... City kids just clueless about what is more important.

The IDL was planned probably about as well as could be done, but everything was moving so fast, it was overtaken by events and was not the best solution in just a few years - maybe 5 to 8 in the 60's.  By then, it was too late to stop, even though it was being built into the 70's.

And the move south was VERY well entrenched and developed - Ranch Acres, and Southern Hills were already in place in the early 50's.

[AquaMan]

Having fun with this. Its as much like an artist's rendering as it is a map. Found Owen Park, (but no Roosevelt) next to Duluth street (now Edison) but as you go south on Phoenix a warehouse building sits at Archer and Phoenix that is dated 1896 but doesn't appear to be a similar building on this map. Still much fun to pick out buildings you can identify by shape.

Tulsa was ruled by builders and developers in the fifties and sixties. They populated all the key positions as commissioners, school board members, and authorities. Together with bankers and real estate brokers, they decided the older neighborhoods were expendable to keep the suburbans coming downtown. And they kept cutting costs by eliminating sidewalks, parks and grid patterns. Built profit by opening and closing schools that were no longer neighborhood schools but area schools. Consider how little need there actually was for a Broken Arrow expressway at that time. Broken Arrow had no more than 7000 in population in 1967. Most folks entered downtown on Admiral, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 6th and 11th. Packed every day and convenient. But the realtors/builder/banker coalition really salivated at all the flat, cheap, easy to build on land between here and the suburbs. We needed the homes for burgeoning boomers but half the city wasn't considered choice enough (west and north) and cheaper taxes outside the county would fuel growth there and possibly take our tax base. Then we had to have some way to get them back into downtown where their jobs were. So, we needed the modern Trump wall, the IDL.

Show me whose on your school board, your commissioners (fire, police, water, streets etc.) or your councilors, who your largest banks are and I'll show you the kind and location of your city's growth. They were all white, middle aged male veterans with the requisite biases. Many still are!

[Bamboo World]

Roosevelt School was built after 1918, as far as I know.

There's no warehouse at Phoenix and Archer.

There was never a 15-story skyscraper on the south side of 4th, between Main and Boulder, as far as I know.

[AquaMan]

I'll drive by there today to refresh my memory. The two story warehouse is on the south side of SS expressway and has the date emblazoned in stone. Roosevelt, not sure but its architecture would be right for 1918, similar to Central and the Owen Park neighborhood certainly pre-dates 1918 so likely they had a school to serve them. My father (born 1919) went to nearby Irving.

[AquaMan]

Roosevelt School was built after 1918, as far as I know.

There's no warehouse at Phoenix and Archer.

There was never a 15-story skyscraper on the south side of 4th, between Main and Boulder, as far as I know.

One block west of Phoenix at Quanah and Archer is the 1896 warehouse now Cowen Construction. Roosevelt was 1926. I don't know about a 15 story you referred to. Is the 1911 Waterworks building on the map?

[Bamboo World]

I think 1896 is a reference to the year Cowen Construction was founded, not when a warehouse was constructed near Quanah Avenue and Archer Street.

[Bamboo World]

On the Aero View, there's a skyscraper shown on the south side of 4th, between Main and Boulder, about 15 stories tall.  As far as I know, there was never a building of that size at that location.

[heironymouspasparagus]

Having fun with this. Its as much like an artist's rendering as it is a map. Found Owen Park, (but no Roosevelt) next to Duluth street (now Edison) but as you go south on Phoenix a warehouse building sits at Archer and Phoenix that is dated 1896 but doesn't appear to be a similar building on this map. Still much fun to pick out buildings you can identify by shape.


Consider how little need there actually was for a Broken Arrow expressway at that time. Broken Arrow had no more than 7000 in population in 1967. Most folks entered downtown on Admiral, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 6th and 11th. Packed every day and convenient. But the realtors/builder/banker coalition really salivated at all the flat, cheap, easy to build on land between here and the suburbs. We needed the homes for burgeoning boomers but half the city wasn't considered choice enough (west and north) and cheaper taxes outside the county would fuel growth there and possibly take our tax base. Then we had to have some way to get them back into downtown where their jobs were. So, we needed the modern Trump wall, the IDL.

I poke at Broken Arrow, but it was - and almost still is - a nice little town.  It is now getting way too big and getting way too messed up from people moving in from bigger places and bringing all their 'baggage' with them.

Friends and I started driving the BA when they first opened it and when you got off at 161st exit, went down to 61st, then turned left to go to town.  Straight ahead was a little bit of town and a gravel road that went to the river.  Could get from Hale parking lot to downtown BA in about 10 minutes.  Wasn't much traffic and could go 90+ mph pretty easily...

[Bamboo World]

Actually, I think a strong argument can be made that the IDL is an incredibly efficient way to move people into and out of downtown Tulsa.  As with most urban highway/freeway projects in the 1950s-70s, the engineers were very clear eyed about designing efficient highways to move cars/people.  Unfortunately, those engineers took no or very little account of any other short/intermediate/long-term impacts those highways would have on the people and communities they were intended to benefit.

The expressway system and the IDL are efficient in moving traffic to/from downtown.  But it depends on exactly where downtown.  If the location is near one of the IDL interchanges, then it can be very efficient.  However, if driving to/from the location requires circuitous routes on a series of one-way streets, then it can be less efficient. 

The IDL disrupted the fine-grained pattern of Tulsa's streets and blocks.  The disruption caused longer trips for many local origins/destinations.

Looking backwards from our advantaged viewpoint, it is hard to understand how or what kind of growth projections or other considerations the engineers were considering to deem it necessary to build such a tight noose around such a relatively small downtown geographically with such a low density.

In the mid-1950s until around 1960, the planners and engineers were projecting population growth through the year 2000, and traffic volumes through 1975.

[AquaMan]

I think 1896 is a reference to the year Cowen Construction was founded, not when a warehouse was constructed near Quanah Avenue and Archer Street.

As unusual as that would seem, I think you are correct. Too much of a coincidence that Cowen was founded in 1896 and the building built in 1896. They probably chiseled that date many years later. Its pretty old though.

And in answer to my own question, yes the façade of the Waterworks building 1911 is clearly visible.

[mrrbot1]

yep agree