Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Downtown Master Plan topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Consultants outline downtown master plan for Jenks, recommend housing, office, boutique hotel and improved river connectivity
Summary
Hunden Partners and Beck Design presented a downtown master-plan feasibility and economic-impact study recommending mixed-use development, increased walkability and riverfront connectivity; consultants projected roughly $770 million in total economic spending over 30 years and identified parking and walkability as priority issues.
Consultants Hunden Partners and Beck Design presented a downtown market analysis and master-plan framework to the Jenks City Council, recommending a mix of housing, office, boutique hotel and improved riverfront connectivity to increase downtown vibrancy and capture more visitor spending.
Lexi Cuff, an analyst with Hunden Partners, said the consulting team analyzed visitation, market demand and comparable downtowns and found room to increase weekday and off-peak activity. Cuff told the council the Oklahoma Aquarium drew more than 300,000 visitors last year and that a stronger link between the aquarium/riverfront and downtown would extend visitor stays and spending.
Hunden’s demand and financial analysis estimated roughly $770 million in total direct, indirect and induced spending over 30 years tied to the priority projects, about $200 million in earnings over that period and roughly 282 full-time-equivalent jobs supported (the study treats construction impacts separately). The consultants estimated the city would receive about $55 million in cumulative city sales, hotel and property tax revenue over 30 years under the recommended program. Consultants described these figures as model-based projections, not guaranteed outcomes.
Recommended priority components included a mix of for-rent and for-sale housing (consultants discussed a product mix roughly in the neighborhood of 25–50 multifamily units plus about 50 townhomes as an illustrative target for initial phases), approximately 50,000 square feet of office space, and a roughly 80-room boutique hotel as a tourism generator. Consultants also identified parking and pedestrian connectivity as immediate operational issues; Hunden’s subcontractor Walter P. Moore completed on-street parking counts and a three-day inventory that consultants said would inform next-step parking strategy. Hunden reported an average of about 10,000 cars per day observed in the downtown study area over a 2024 calendar-year sample (that figure includes local traffic).
Beck Design’s Anthony Miyabe described a phased, flexible “playbook” approach rather than a prescriptive blueprint. He and Hunden showed three streetscape options that progressively trade on-street parking for wider sidewalks, parklets and bulb-outs to improve pedestrian safety and activation; staff and consultants noted the changes could be phased and block-specific rather than applied citywide.
Council members asked about parking counts, the mix of vertical (multi-story) development and projected changes in daily traffic. Consultants said the recommended program could be accommodated in existing vacancies in many cases, reducing the need for full demolition-and-rebuild projects, and that structured or remote parking and shuttle strategies would be part of later-stage engineering and financial modeling.
No formal vote was required; council accepted the presentation and directed staff to continue work with consultants to refine parking, phasing and boundaries for subsequent public engagement and potential development solicitation.
