Downtown Tulsa Development Reaches Milestone

There's a milestone to report in downtown construction. A new office building was topped out Monday - and it's also leased out long before it opens.

It's steel and concrete proof the BOK Center has done something for downtown, even though it's taken years to materialize in new development just across the street. The 5 story Northwestern Building reached its peak Monday.

Watch Time-lapse Video of Construction

The building will be a regional headquarters for Northwestern Mutual Financial, filling the top two floors. The bottom two floors will have shops and restaurants. And smaller firms, including Check 6 from Jenks, are moving into this building.

The developer says it's meeting demand for first quality office space downtown.

"Some of the companies who want to be downtown and want Class A, it makes sense for them to be here," said Bob Eggleston, One Place Tulsa developer.

Even though there's empty office space elsewhere downtown, the developer says all the office space under construction is fully leased. He's got more announcements coming on which tenants will go into the buildings.

"And this building is a perfect example of why I can speak so purely about the renaissance of our city," said Tulsa Mayor Dewey Bartlett.

An even larger building is just behind the Northwestern Building - a new 18 story office tower. The overall development will have more than one million square feet of space, including a hotel. That's enough room for 700 people to work on what was only a parking lot before.

"We've been blessed apart from this day with the weather but it's typical it rains on this day, but we're on schedule," Eggleston said.

The first building will open in August and the tower will open next year. The developers call it a $120 million dollar project. The biggest portion, the tower, is set to open next spring.

09/22/2011 Related Story: Ground Broken On New Downtown Office Tower