The Southwest Tulsa Chamber of Commerce needs $26,000 by mid-August to pay for a 154-foot-tall oil derrick replica at a Route 66 Station park under construction on Southwest Boulevard, reports the Tulsa World.
The newspaper reported that some pledged donations for the project have been pulled back because of the weak economy, hence the hastily made plea for funds.
Most of the derrick’s funding came from state centennial funds as part of an effort to capitalize on Tulsa’s Route 66 heritage. David Breed, who has been working on the project for more than five years, said plans also call for moving a refurbished steam engine to the grounds and building an historical village complete with a replica of the Red Fork train depot and an old-fashioned filling station.
For now, though, organizers would settle for getting the derrick in place.
“We’re taking it one step at a time,” Breed said.
The Tulsa County News has a few more details on the holdup of the project:
Steel for the derrick was purchased and the parts fabricated, ready for erection. But for various reasons, the project was delayed. Because some of the derrick design did not meet city building codes, access to the proposed observation deck was eliminated. The chamber pushed forward and entered into a lease with the city allowing the derrick to be built with the chamber maintaining the site for the next 10 years. In recent weeks, the city finalized its part of the project by completing a circular driveway onto the property from Southwest Boulevard; and piers for the derrick were set.
The next – and final – step is actual erection of the derrick’s steel parts. But there is not enough money left to do the job.
Earlier artist’s renderings of the planned Route 66 Station park can be found here.
–> Because some of the derrick design did not meet
–> city building codes, access to the proposed
–> observation deck was eliminated.
Tulsa’s building codes have to be one of the biggest money losing bureaucratic nightmares of all time. Whether they are holding up industry, putting off constructions at homes, or, in this case, dumbing down a great tourist attraction, they keep the money from flowing into the economy.
Without the observation deck this is just another oil derrick; take a picture from the car and drive on. With the deck you stop and take in the view long enough to get hungry and stop in town for food, drink, and maybe stay the night. No, its not THAT simple but its not much more complicated either.
Your complaint about building codes is well-taken, although I did come from a city in Illinois that was so constricting in its housing codes that it would take your breath away.
But I digress …
I’ve read accounts in the Tulsa County News and heard a lot of scuttlebutt about the SW Tulsa Chamber’s efforts to get this project off the ground, and I’ve come to the conclusion that the chamber is hardly blameless in Route 66 Station’s myriad problems.
Just sayin’.
I don’t doubt the chamber is at fault, but many times the fault is that they didn’t spend thousands of dollars on a lawyer to spend dozens of hours digging through all the building codes in hopes that their plans will be in line with the codes only to have the inspector show up with a bur up his %@#! when it comes time to give the final approval.
Sorry, I’m on a private property rights kick. I’ll get off my soap box for now.
BTW, I guess you see your twitter posts are sucking me back into your blog. – Devious! –
I’ll have a bit more about my Twitter posts later. Long story short: I’ve found that Twitter is quite handy and is a nice supplement for the main blog.
The more I think about it, the more you have to give the city the benefit of the doubt in making sure a 150-foot-tall observation deck meets building codes.
You’d better make sure a structure can ably support scores of people going up the steps and gawkers 10 stories off the ground. Not to mention you’d also better have a structure that can withstand the brunt of Oklahoma’s notorious thunderstorms.
“There’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend….”
— Bob Dylan