{"id":1252,"date":"2013-10-25T01:28:13","date_gmt":"2013-10-25T06:28:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/?p=1252"},"modified":"2013-10-25T01:28:13","modified_gmt":"2013-10-25T06:28:13","slug":"tulsa-announces-plans-to-build-route-66-museum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/?p=1252","title":{"rendered":"Tulsa Announces Plans to Build Route 66 Museum"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>by Ron Warnick<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The City of Tulsa is requesting proposals from developers to build a long-awaited Route 66 museum and visitors center on the banks of the Arkansas River, reported the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.tulsaworld.com\/news\/local\/proposals-for-route-tourist-center-sought\/article_d5827af2-3cc8-11e3-a146-0019bb30f31a.html\" target=\"_blank\">Tulsa World<\/a>\u00a0today.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The interpretive center and entertainment complex is to be built on city land across the street from the East Meets West bronze sculpture at the intersection of Southwest Boulevard and Riverside.<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>The City is investing $6.5 million in the project, including $1.5 million in Vision 2025 funds and $5 million in third-penny sales tax revenue.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div>\n<blockquote><p>The deadline for submitting RFPs is March 5, 2014.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Mayor Dewey Bartlett made the surprise announcement today during a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/route66news.com\/2013\/10\/14\/cultural-crossroads-tulsa-will-dedicated-oct-24\/\" target=\"_blank\">dedication of the &#8220;Cultural Crossroads&#8221;<\/a>\u00a0of 11th Street (aka Route 66) and Yale Avenue.\u00a0Michael Wallis, author of the best-selling &#8220;Route 66: The Mother Road&#8221; and chairman of the<a href=\"http:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/%E2%80%8E\" target=\"_blank\">Route 66 Alliance<\/a>, said in an email:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>It took the crowd by surprise. I was called forward to the podium and I have never been more pleased to talk to the smiling crowd before me.\u00a0The Alliance will get a permanent home.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>More about the development proposal can be downloaded in PDF form\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cityoftulsa.org\/media\/345267\/Downtown%20Tulsa%20River%20Development%20Opportunity%20Route%2066%20TAC1011.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The museum, \u00a0often described as the Route 66 Experience, is nearly 10 years in the making. The\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/vision2025.info\/\" target=\"_blank\">Vision 2025 sales tax<\/a>\u00a0for county improvements, including Route 66, passed in 2003, and the museum project endured a few setbacks &#8212; namely higher-than-estimated cost, a series of tight city budgets, and a deep recession that started in 2008.<\/p>\n<p>One may question the timing of the announcement, because Bartlett faces re-election next month and could use any sort of good news to boost his chances. But I&#8217;ll take any long-overdue good news about the museum, no matter when it occurs.<\/p>\n<p><em>(An artist\u2019s rendering of Tulsa\u2019s Route 66 museum, circa 2003)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Ron Warnick &nbsp; The City of Tulsa is requesting proposals from developers to build a long-awaited Route 66 museum and visitors center on the banks of the Arkansas River, reported the\u00a0Tulsa World\u00a0today. The interpretive center and entertainment complex is to be built on city land across the street from the East Meets West bronze&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1253,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1252"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1254,"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252\/revisions\/1254"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.route66alliance.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}