ACCESS Oklahoma

[Scott5114]

Donna McCrory's family has owned, lived on, and farmed more than 140 acres since 1919, but with all the work they've put in, they're now concerned that it will be torn down and cleared away for this particular expansion, a project they've been told could help cut the drive from Tulsa to Dallas by 50 minutes.

"And so for fifty minutes they're going to wipe out the flora and fauna. And the people and the community, the tiny towns,"  she said. "I've seen my family put blood, sweat and tears, literally, to maintain and keep the property and make it our home."

"It's a functioning farm,"  said McCrory of the family's land, which they currently leasing to another farmer in the area.

Collecting those rent checks sure is a lot of work. Why, sometimes I even get a paper cut on the way to the bank!

[Plutonic Panda]

Donna McCrory's family has owned, lived on, and farmed more than 140 acres since 1919, but with all the work they've put in, they're now concerned that it will be torn down and cleared away for this particular expansion, a project they've been told could help cut the drive from Tulsa to Dallas by 50 minutes.

"And so for fifty minutes they're going to wipe out the flora and fauna. And the people and the community, the tiny towns,"  she said. "I've seen my family put blood, sweat and tears, literally, to maintain and keep the property and make it our home."

"It's a functioning farm,"  said McCrory of the family's land, which they currently leasing to another farmer in the area.

Collecting those rent checks sure is a lot of work. Why, sometimes I even get a paper cut on the way to the bank!

Dude that totally sucks! If you ever need me to take one for the team I'll be around! LOL

[skluth]

Donna McCrory's family has owned, lived on, and farmed more than 140 acres since 1919, but with all the work they've put in, they're now concerned that it will be torn down and cleared away for this particular expansion, a project they've been told could help cut the drive from Tulsa to Dallas by 50 minutes.

"And so for fifty minutes they're going to wipe out the flora and fauna. And the people and the community, the tiny towns,"  she said. "I've seen my family put blood, sweat and tears, literally, to maintain and keep the property and make it our home."

"It's a functioning farm,"  said McCrory of the family's land, which they currently leasing to another farmer in the area.

Collecting those rent checks sure is a lot of work. Why, sometimes I even get a paper cut on the way to the bank!

Dude that totally sucks! If you ever need me to take one for the team I'll be around! LOL

Those family farms also wiped out much of the indigenous flora and fauna back when the land was first settled. Today the only flora and fauna is corn, wheat, soybeans, rodents, birds, and any deer they haven't shot. And maybe that tiny cannabis patch their son hid behind the rows of corn.

[Cerlin]

I'm not too familiar with how these ROW projects work but...if someone owns 140 acres of land, surely they don't have to sell ALL of it right? Route the turnpike along where a fence would be and maybe they lose 4-5 acres but it's not like the OTA is going to specifically route the Kickapoo towards every 100 year old home they can find.

[Rothman]

I'm not too familiar with how these ROW projects work but...if someone owns 140 acres of land, surely they don't have to sell ALL of it right? Route the turnpike along where a fence would be and maybe they lose 4-5 acres but it's not like the OTA is going to specifically route the Kickapoo towards every 100 year old home they can find.

The Power Broker covers the effects highway building had on farms on Long Island.  At least with those small-but-not-so-small farms, the dissection of the properties was harmful.

[rte66man]

Donna McCrory's family has owned, lived on, and farmed more than 140 acres since 1919, but with all the work they've put in, they're now concerned that it will be torn down and cleared away for this particular expansion, a project they've been told could help cut the drive from Tulsa to Dallas by 50 minutes.

"And so for fifty minutes they're going to wipe out the flora and fauna. And the people and the community, the tiny towns,"  she said. "I've seen my family put blood, sweat and tears, literally, to maintain and keep the property and make it our home."

"It's a functioning farm,"  said McCrory of the family's land, which they currently leasing to another farmer in the area.

Collecting those rent checks sure is a lot of work. Why, sometimes I even get a paper cut on the way to the bank!

It is more likely they are leasing out the tillable acreage and living on the homestead. Gotta hand it to the media for doing a half-assed job in reporting.

[Scott5114]

Also there are no "tiny towns" along the path of the turnpike. There's a lot of rural land in OKC and Norman city limits, and unincorporated land in Cleveland County. But that's it.

[swake]

Also there are no "tiny towns" along the path of the turnpike. There's a lot of rural land in OKC and Norman city limits, and unincorporated land in Cleveland County. But that's it.

Why are the cities in central Oklahoma so comically large in area?

[Scott5114]

Oklahoma City chases tax revenue by annexing everything that doesn't move and some things that do. The other cities, seeking to avoid being boxed in by Oklahoma City, in turn annex areas to keep Oklahoma City from having them.

Norman also extends much farther east than population density would suggest it should out of a desire to have Lake Thunderbird, the city's primary water source, in city limits.

[swake]

Oklahoma City chases tax revenue by annexing everything that doesn't move and some things that do. The other cities, seeking to avoid being boxed in by Oklahoma City, in turn annex areas to keep Oklahoma City from having them.

Norman also extends much farther east than population density would suggest it should out of a desire to have Lake Thunderbird, the city's primary water source, in city limits.

That's very odd in comparison to Tulsa area cities that won't annex an area unless they can extend sewer connections, and therefore the billing for water/sewer. Completely different perspectives in the same state.

[Scott5114]

Indeed it is. There are a lot of people in rural Oklahoma City that get the worst of both worlds: city taxes but no city services.

I'm working on a construction project in Blanchard city limits, and it's sort of like that. We have no access to city water and sewer where we're working, but we're still expected to follow Blanchard building codes, file Blanchard building permits, our septic system has to be up to city code,  etc.

[BroadwayExt]

Also there are no "tiny towns" along the path of the turnpike. There's a lot of rural land in OKC and Norman city limits, and unincorporated land in Cleveland County. But that's it.

It actually looks like it will come uncomfortably close to both Franklin and Stella if you consider them to be towns.

[Scott5114]

Also there are no "tiny towns" along the path of the turnpike. There's a lot of rural land in OKC and Norman city limits, and unincorporated land in Cleveland County. But that's it.

It actually looks like it will come uncomfortably close to both Franklin and Stella if you consider them to be towns.

I don't. Franklin is part of Norman and Stella is part of Oklahoma City.

Franklin at least has a sort of built-up area I would consider a neighborhood. It looks like it might have been the beginnings of a town at one point, and then it got annexed by Norman.

Stella doesn't even have that. The label "Stella" on the map seems to correspond to a Conoco and a Dollar General built across the street from each other at SE 149th and Peebly. That's not a town.

In both cases, the turnpike avoids the intersection that these place names are attached to. If anything, the turnpike will help these areas grow by making them more easily accessible and findable. To get to them now requires navigating the warren of section-line roads (some go through, some don't) characterizing eastern Cleveland County. And if the residents don't want to live in a not-actually-town with growth potential...well, they're nothing special as-is, you can find rural areas just like them in at least 70 of Oklahoma's other counties.

[swake]

Indeed it is. There are a lot of people in rural Oklahoma City that get the worst of both worlds: city taxes but no city services.

I'm working on a construction project in Blanchard city limits, and it's sort of like that. We have no access to city water and sewer where we're working, but we're still expected to follow Blanchard building codes, file Blanchard building permits, our septic system has to be up to city code,  etc.

While in the Tulsa area Owasso has just 37k people within the city limits but has 57k people inside the city fence line.

https://www.cityofowasso.com/DocumentCenter/View/416/Fenceline-Map?bidId=

[Scott5114]

What exactly is the "fence line" shown on this map?

[swake]

What exactly is the "fence line" shown on this map?

Tulsa area cities instead of annexing every piece of possible land like the cities around OKC annex a thin "fence" of land surrounding regions where they may in the future wish to annex, keeping other cities from doing so. There are a lot of older, formerly rural subdivisions in Tulsa's suburbs that have septic systems and often use rural water.

If residents in these subdivisions wish to be annexed into the city, they have to connect to the city water and sewer system. There's a subdivision in Jenks near me like this, it's completely surrounded by newer annexed subdivisions and they have tried to get the city to annex them but can't get enough of the residents to agree to pay to connect to the city sewer system and without that the city refuses.

Owasso and Broken Arrow in particular have a LOT of unannexed subdivisions in their fence lines.

[Scott5114]

Ah, gotcha. I've seen some instances of that in other parts of the state on GIS data and the like, but I wasn't quite sure that it wasn't a glitch in the dataset.

I'm not sure how I feel about the practice. On the one hand, it prevents runaway annexation like you see in the OKC area. On the other hand, residents in a border area could well want to be annexed by City A, but be prohibited from pursuing that path by City B fencing them off.

[hotdogPi]

The actual solution to preventing annexation is to have it New England-style, where almost all the cities and towns are somewhere between 5 mi × 5 mi and 10 mi × 10 mi, borders look more like counties than congressional districts, and even the unincorporated areas in northern New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine exist in the same way that the towns do but are simply unincorporated (and almost empty).

[Scott5114]

The actual solution to preventing annexation is to have it New England-style, where almost all the cities and towns are somewhere between 5 mi × 5 mi and 10 mi × 10 mi, borders look more like counties than congressional districts, and even the unincorporated areas in northern New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine exist in the same way that the towns do but are simply unincorporated (and almost empty).

That wouldn't work in Oklahoma owing to the much lower population density here.

[triplemultiplex]

Not as low as the population density when they set up those civil towns in New England.

[Rothman]

Not as low as the population density when they set up those civil towns in New England.

Which ones are uncivil?

[rte66man]

Yet more opposition to the Norman turnpikes.

https://www.news9.com/story/6226d8eb326fc40735b28863/norman-lawmakers-push-back-against-plans-for-turnpike-expansion-

NORMAN, Oklahoma - Multiple state lawmakers from Norman either questioned or outright opposed a recently publicized plan by the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority to build new highways through the city in Cleveland County. 
The OTA's plan, dubbed ACCESS Oklahoma, would build two highways through Norman. 

Norman Rep. Merleyn Bell on Monday attempted to stop the construction of the highways with a single legislative move. 

Bell, a Democrat, proposed an amendment to HB4088, a bill regarding the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority and unrelated to ACCESS Oklahoma, that would have stripped the OTA of its authority to expand into Norman. 

"This closed-door decision-making process is unacceptable,"  Bell said. The amendment failed to pass. 

"This was a deliberate attempt to stop it,"  said Rep. Jacob Rosecrants, a fellow Democrat from Norman. 

Norman Sen. Mary Boren said she is welcoming a group of people to the capitol on March 23 to protest the OTA plan, which is expected to disrupt hundreds of private properties.

Boren said the public outcry from the plan has been intense. "I wouldn't say that I am organizing a rally, but I can say that I am welcoming a rally,"  she said. 

Boren and Rosecrants said they are concerned with the impact on potentially hundreds of private property owners, who would have to sell their property if it runs through their land.

"This plan should not be implemented,"  Boren said. "It is flawed, it has a lot of controversial and unsubstantiated data and assumptions supporting it."  

Senator and Majority Whip Rob Standridge said he plans to use "my position and my seniority"  to "slow down the conversation"  on construction to review threats to private property owners and environmental factors.

"Is there not a better choice? Did we really look at its impact on citizens, communities? Did we displace an inordinate number of people when we could have chosen a different route that did not?"  Standridge said on a phone call.

A spokesperson for the OTA said the exact placement of the turnpikes, which are slated to run through northern and eastern Norman.

"We have yet to begin the design phase to determine impact. What is shown on the website is broad and not definitive. We aim to further reduce impact as the process unfolds,"  the OTA said.

Tiffany Martinez Vrska, the chief communications officer for the city of Norman said Mayor Breea Clark "has discussed with the city attorney drafting a letter to the OTA that would request delay of moving forward with the turnpike project until environmental studies can be done."  

[Plutonic Panda]

This is to be expected. Another article read as if the Republican legislature brushed this proposed bill off. These legislators opposing it are just playing the part for their pissed off constituents. Hopefully this doesn't impact these projects too much.

[Bobby5280]

The new turnpikes going between Moore and Norman and bypassing around the East side of Norman might actually do a lot more to spur development growth and boost property values. Most of the growth in the OKC metro area has been in the Northern reaches around Edmond and out to the West in Yukon and Mustang. Moore is growing, but it is right along the I-35 corridor. Meanwhile the areas around Midwest City and Del City haven't been growing as fast. The Kickapoo Turnpike improves access to those areas. The Southern extension of the Kickapoo Turnpike will dramatically improve access to the Lake Thunderbird area. That area East of Norman could end up booming.

[Cerlin]

I think I can understand the outrage for some. There was absolutely no community input or talks about where infrastructure was most needed, OTA just said "here's our 15 year plan, we're going to be building a turnpike here, tough luck" . I think a lot of these projects are necessary for the long term growth of the metro area and it's better to get these projects done before population growth makes it impossible. But, there has to be community feedback and environmental studies are really important. Lake Thunderbird is an important watershed and that turnpike does come close to it, so all construction and routing should lessen or ideally eliminate impacts on the lake as to not cause any unnecessary damage for the purpose of better travel times. I know the OTA will conduct those studies but I understand community hesitancy because they hadn't been consulted on the idea of a turnpike moving through there to begin with.