After he became president of the Tulsa Housing Authority in 2017, one of the first conversations Aaron Darden had was about a dilapidated neighborhood across the river from downtown.
Steven Dow, then head of the Community Action Project, told Darden about the failed effort to win federal “Choice Neighborhood” grants to rebuild public housing and transform the impoverished area.
The original application was impressive, Darden replied, “but was missing a couple of components.” And he soon decided to try again.
“The work done on the earlier effort was not in vain,” Darden told the Tulsa World. “We piggy-backed off what they had done.”
Phase II of River West, a $170 million re-imagining of the old Eugene Field neighborhood on the west side of the 23rd Street bridge, opened Wednesday, with residents gaining access to a community center gym and other new amenities.
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Since the project began in 2019, several square blocks of dilapidated housing, vacant lots and run-down buildings have been replaced by modern apartments and fashionable townhomes, leaving the neighborhood unrecognizable. Some residents receive housing subsidies, while others pay market-rate rents, avoiding the “concentration of poverty” that the old — and now demolished — housing projects created, officials said.
Construction continues on new streets, a park and four additional phases of housing, with the work not expected to be completely finished until summer 2024.
Then Tulsa will have “a vibrant, mixed-income neighborhood that is thriving,” Darden said. “We want to build a neighborhood that people will want to move to regardless of income, because it’s the kind of neighborhood where people want to live.”
Ultimately, the development will include 460 housing units spread across a walkable neighborhood with a grocery store and 5-acre park.
“It’s definitely a lot nicer,” said Monica Guinn, a resident who temporarily moved away from River West while her previous apartment was demolished and replaced with new units. “Before, everything was old and needed a lot of work done to it. Now everything is new.”
Video: Tulsa faithful observe Ash Wednesday
Trinity Episcopal Church offered ashes to go as well as three traditional Ash Wednesday services.
