Around Edmond: The Holidays kickoff in Downtown Edmond November 14th! OKC based restaurants leaving Edmond due to poor performance. City of Edmond advised to build $5 Million dollar pedestrian bridge on Main Street. Heard on Hurd sees second highest attendance in September in 2023!

Hi everyone, hoping all of you are now situated to begin to enjoy the fall season, after a scorching start to the school year, Labor Day and more.

Holidays to kickoff in Downtown Edmond Once Again!

There are some fantastic “small town feel” changes coming to the holiday season in Downtown Edmond and I can’t wait to share them with you. DEBA has stepped up in a big way to give us our small-town Christmas time feel back on November 14, 2023 at 5:30 pm, starting with the inaugural lighting of a new Downtown Edmond 20 ft Christmas tree across from the Edmond Railyard at Festival Marketplace. 

This new event will be the official kickoff to the holidays, and I can’t wait! Thankful to DEBA for doing so, as this area was in desperate need of being Edmond’s holiday anchor in the center of our little community, that was lost when City employees killed the Electric Lights Parade the community so loved and then in 2012 moved the Edmond Ice Rink to North Edmond at Mitch Park.

OKC Based Restaurants leaving Edmond in droves!

Over the last couple of months, we have lost a number of OKC based restaurants that opened 2nd locations in Edmond after Covid hit. A food based magazine just ran an op ed that questions why Edmond citizen’s aren’t eating at these restaurants and prefer to leave and dine in OKC. The most simple answer to that is that most people attach dining out to other forms of entertainment, to which most often is found in OKC.

Edmond is a different retail and restaurant animal, and that is something hard for some to understand after being told that the median average income of most Edmondites is inaccurately $109,000 a year income, when the median average income was found to be by City proffered Housing survey as $55,000 to $76,000.

This material fact causes a poor performance for these restaurants, and the fact of what the average Edmondite makes as annual income eliminates the assumed discretionary income new business owners expect to be available to their businesses.

As well, the lack of workers due to low wages paid and high rent, as well as the new most recent loss of naturally occurring affordable housing in and around Downtown Edmond simply puts the Downtown Edmond area in a precarious position for any restaurant that isn’t already situated in the area, and for those who are situated there, as well.

Perhaps, the City might reconsider its prior discussions of building an Art Performance Civic Center somewhere in Downtown Edmond or Edmond in general that attracts entertainment such as the Civic Center in Downtown OKC. This had been discussed back in 2011 or so, and then the conversation just died. 

$5 Million Dollar Pedestrian Bridge cited as necessary on Main Street just West of Broadway

Joe Tomlinson attended last night’s City Council meeting discussing not only the $44 Million Dollar new City Complex but discussing a new $5 Million Dollar Pedestrian Bridge engineers stated was necessary by the new Oxlley Apartments on Main Street west of Broadway for safety, acknowledging that it has been minimally discussed if this bridge would interfere with a metro wide rail line and then need to be dismantled if the rail line is approved.

What struck me was that there were no members of the Edmond Neighborhood Alliance in attendance at this meeting, nor any public commenters for that matter.  I know it is tiring, but if you do not agree with what is occurring to which I see on many comment threads and discussions on FB groups, you need to keep up with the spending that is happening in City Hall. You can’t just “vote them out” as a solution, because that will be after the use of multi millions is already approved.

Heard On Hurd Sees 2nd Largest Attendance at September 15th Event!

Heard on Hurd saw the coolest weather two weeks ago I can even remember for a summertime/early fall event, and residents were definitely here for it, in spite of this being the 3rd night of the Oklahoma State Fair and other large metro events happening simultaneously. It was fun to see Jennifer Webster and Randy Grau from Citizen’s head up the Citizen’s Bank of Edmond Volunteers, with Randy Grau emceeing the musical events throughout the evening celebrating the Military members of our community! It was an evening of good vibes, high energy and lots of fun. Don’t miss out on the last event for Season 10, on Saturday October 21, 2023 from 6pm to 10pm in Downtown Edmond. If you are new and haven’t been because of the heat, this event will be perfect to attend! [ngg src=”galleries” ids=”8″ display=”basic_slideshow”]

That is it for this Tuesday, check back Friday for this weekend’s Shop Edmond feature as retailers are gearing up for the holidays! 

Take care,

Sherri