A new building project was just approved Tuesday and it aims to breathe new life into a largely forgotten area just west of Scissortail Park.
"We're going to see apartments and office buildings restaurants, hopefully some retail lots of different places for people to live and work and play we hope," said Cathy O'Connor, founder of COalign Group.
Four building proposals were presented to the Oklahoma City City Council on Tuesday and approved.
West of Scissortail Park between and SW 3rd and 7th, there will be new buildings and a refurbishment of plenty of historic buildings.
"The ownership group saw an opportunity with all the investment the city was making with the construction of the Oklahoma City Boulevard with relocation of I-40," O'Connor said. "They started acquiring property and now we're at a point where we're starting to see some things come out of the ground."
$16 million in tax increment financing is going to Strawberry Fields to build the infrastructure in the area.
"The water lines, sewer lines, storm sewer in the area is very, very old and inadequate, especially for the level of density that the city would like to see in the area," said O'Connor.
Strawberry Fields owns about 55 acres or 80% of the area and is looking into future expansion.
"There are a lot of people visiting the park, so we really hope we can build off of that energy and use that vitality to support some new uses and development in the area," said O'Connor.
O'Connor said the plan is to have construction start early next year. The goal is to have this area completely redeveloped in the next 10 to 15 years.
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