Tulsa, OK

[Chazarelli]

I will be commuting from Kansas City to Tulsa Monday-Thursday for the next 4-6 weeks for work.  I am in my 2nd week and have get familiar with the highways and different areas of the city.  Are there any reccomendations on places I must go before I am done?  I have been to their Brookside a couple times already and I am going to a Witchita Wranglers game tonight here in Tulsa.

Any suggestions would be great.

[kuslamb]

I hope you are not really commuting monday through thursday.  Having lived in Tulsa most of my life, I know that the 3.5 hour drive can get old quick.  I assume you are staying monday through thursday and returning to KC on thursday evening or friday morning.

Where are you staying and all that.  Location makes a bit of a difference.  Like KC, Tulsa is pretty spread out.

Also, what kind of work are you doing down there?

[DaveKCMO]

do a walking tour of their art deco buildings downtown (they have more than KC), then take in a show at cain's ballroom (across the railroad tracks from DT). utica square is a great little shopping district (it's no plaza, but is still quaint) and their riverfront has a great trails system for walking/jogging/biking. if you can score a tour of the port of catoosa, it's pretty cool. the philbrook museum has a decent collection and is housed in the home of a former oil baron. there is no significant nightlife to speak of and tulsa is just now starting to get some decent non-chain restaurants.

if you need hotels during your stay, use priceline or hotwire to book the whole week (there isn't much demand in tulsa, so you'll save big time). southwest flies non-stop from KCI to tulsa's very dumpy airport, but the drive is not bad (you can take 75 or 169). you must stop in bartlesville on the way to see the price tower, the only office building designed by frank lloyd wright (and eat at the restaurant).

also, stay as far away from 71st street as possible... it's awful traffic day and night.

[kucer]

like DaveKCMO said...try to hit up Cain's Ballroom for a show if you can.

http://www.cainsballroom.com

i had some fried chicken at this place..it's not Stroud's of course but it's good.  they do the whole "throw the rolls" thing.

http://www.flyinrollchicken.com/716086.html

if you like sushi try "In The Raw" on the hill.. there's a strip joint right up the street too..not that I've been there...or anything.

http://www.enfuego-tulsa.com/index.htm

they also have a pretty trippy waterpark, Big Splash, that is straight out of the 70s, if you're into that...

http://www.bigsplashwaterpark.com

[Spartan65]

There's hotspots and not-so hotspots. For nightlife, generally it's Brookside (the neighborhood along Peoria Ave from about 31st to 51st) or bust. There is a growing nightlife scene in Brady (N side of DT Tulsa) and Cherry Street (a stretch of E 15th from Peoria, eastward). Generally Midtown Tulsa, which is basically everything between Riverside, Sheridan, Downtown, and Skelly Drive (I-44), is going to be the part of Tulsa you want to be in. South of Midtown are the more interesting suburbs with your typical corridors of shopping malls and strip malls. Jenks is a pretty neat little suburb on the river. If you're around the airport, you wouldn't guess by looking, but if you keep going further and further north on 169 you eventually hit large-scale development again in Owasso where there's plenty of restaurants and hotels.

The best T-Town advice that anyone can give you is that you're more than likely going to be in good neighborhoods as long as you stay south of Admiral Drive or I-244. If you're on the south side of Tulsa and you're late for work, I recommend having nothing to do with the intersection of 71st and Yale, colloquially known as 71st and Hell. Though generally-speaking 71st is pretty slow-going from the TV Guide complex at Lewis all the way to the Mingo Valley Expwy. I-44 is supposed to be under reconstruction (my tax dollars hard at work).

The Philbrook is by-far the grandest art museum in the state, but there is also the Gilcrease Museum which boasts the largest collection of American paintings in the World. Everything from classic Americana, to Western, and anything else you might think of when you think of Oklahoma. You can contact DT Tulsa Limited to sign up for the walking tour. There is also the Woolaroc Museum in Bartlesville, connected to Phillips money, of course. While you're in eastern Oklahoma, you might enjoy touring some of the natural resources, like any of the scenic lakes such as Tenkiller Ferry, Grand Lake o' the Cherokees, Skiatook Lake, Keystone Lake, and so on...there's also many scenic hill country drives, even a few mountains. But do avoid Turkey Mountain for the 24/7 Pride festivals that have been known to go on up there.

Utica Square is just great. There you can find many Oklahoma firsts, like the state's first Saks, the state's first Starbuck's, and so on. There's great local restaurants (a little expensive) like the Polo Club, and you'll also be able to find your typical yuppie retail stores like GAP and the like.

Aside from that, the greatest advice I can give you ... OKC is only an hour and fifteen minutes away. Enjoy.

[Chazarelli]

Thanks for all of the replies, I am going to start doing some of the things mentioned. 

I am not commuting everyday, just Monday mornings and Thursday after work, so essentially I have a one hour lunch break and three nights a week to myself.  I am work for Burns and McDonnell and we are finishing up the work on the Sinclair plant, so I am helping with turnover.  My hotel is at 31st and Memorial, so pretty quick to most areas. 

I was hoping to go to OKC one night after work too so that I could see what all Spartan talk was about, but I guess that is a whole other best. 

I will get a trip report once I am back in Kansas City for good.

Thanks again.

[Spartan65]

Well if you come down to OKC there's sure plenty of things to do. Since you're new in Oklahoma you might like to see the Lyric Theatre's performances of "Oklahoma!" this month at Civic Center Music Hall, the UCO Jazz Lab in Edmond books great jazz shows every night. There's little pocket scenes across the metro, the main hotspots for out-of-town tourists are Western Avenue from 36th to Nichols Hills, and Bricktown (which really comes alive after 10 pm). The brand-new Oklahoma History Museum across Lincoln from the dome is utterly fabulous, and if you want to see something really pretty you should check out the Myriad Gardens (the park in the middle of downtown). The Oklahoma City Museum of Art is no Philbrook or Nelson but it is good, and there's a whole district of museums and tourist attractions mostly around MLK and NE 50th.

Every chain restaurant in the world can be found on Memorial Rd., the NW Expressway, or S. I-240. I would recommend eating somewhere a little more unique. The best restaurant in the city for tourists is Cattlemen's Steakhouse, south of the river. And furthermore Norman, where I go home from downtown every day, is only 30 minutes south of the city. There you can find great night life too, two great museums, and of course the University.

[trailerkid]

Doing a little reading up on Tulsa...

I've never seen a city that size with the types of homes south of its downtown area. The south side of Tulsa is easily comparable to the Ward Parkway/Leawood/Mission Hills area of KC. Very attractive wooded subdivisions with everything ranging from gated estates for barons to country club ranch houses. I don't think you'll find that sort of clustered real estate in any standalone city the size of Tulsa. The way the city is built out, the upscale to super-rich housing seems to almost overwhelm the rest of the city. It looks like someone tacked Leawood/Mission Hills/Ward Parkway on the side of Topeka.

Further, the Brookside area of town is nice example of an LA-style, somewhat trendy retail and restaurant strip. Dallas boasts similar strips, but I haven't seen any done as well--especially without using many national retailers.

[eliphar17]

Doing a little reading up on Tulsa...

I've never seen a city that size with the types of homes south of its downtown area. The south side of Tulsa is easily comparable to the Ward Parkway/Leawood/Mission Hills area of KC. Very attractive wooded subdivisions with everything ranging from gated estates for barons to country club ranch houses. I don't think you'll find that sort of clustered real estate in any standalone city the size of Tulsa. The way the city is built out, the upscale to super-rich housing seems to almost overwhelm the rest of the city. It looks like someone tacked Leawood/Mission Hills/Ward Parkway on the side of Topeka.

Oil money. You'd see an even greater effect in Bartlesville, OK an hour north of there.

[NDTeve]

That happens in a city with little to no middle class.

[Highlander]

I was just in Tulsa.  Why would anyone think there is no middle class there.  They probably have a greater middle class presence in the urban part of the city proportionally than KC and the entire SE side of the city is middle class suburbanish sprawl.  In any event, Tulsa was the first big oil center in the US and, as a result, it has a denser urban core than OKC although Tulsa's downtown is a bit dead now.  Oil no longer has a big presence in Tulsa although several smaller companies still hang around.  They have done some great things with the riverfront along the Arkansas river with a nice boulevard and extensive biking trails.  I saw the new Tulsa arena (BOK arena) when I was there.  It really does not live up to the preconstruction architectural drawings that we saw on the forum here.  It's nice looking, but not a home run (from the outside at least) and it's tucked away in a somewhat desolate corner of downtown.  Hopefully, they have some plans for getting some entertainment venues going around it because while it's not as isolated as Kemper, there is nothing but parking lots and decrepit building in the immediate vicinity.  Overall, I rather  like Tulsa, it has a nice urban core even if downtown is lacking in vibrancy (thier Plaza equivalent, Utica Square is pretty near DT). 

 

[DaveKCMO]

probably meant to be past tense?