Old silos making mountains out of the cities flatland

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ Freddy Harth's voice reverberated indistinctly through the 90-foot high silos as he revealed remodeling plans for his climbing gym. The massive concrete tubes garbled sound waves

Saturday, September 24th 2005, 11:56 am

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ Freddy Harth's voice reverberated indistinctly through the 90-foot high silos as he revealed remodeling plans for his climbing gym. The massive concrete tubes garbled sound waves after just a few feet.

``There will be a lot of painting. Some new (hand)holds, a better lighting system, new floor materials, new belay system, and I'll add a new roof as I go,'' the owner of OKC Rocks said, pointing to the small circle of light far above. ``Overall, just making it a more user-friendly facility.

``We're taking it from a 'not knowing if it was going to work' facility to a more legitimate gym, something appropriate to the attention it's been getting already from other parts of the country,'' he said.

Harth knew in 1997 exactly how fortunate he was to find an abandoned grain elevator in the middle of a major metropolitan area. The climbing gym standard that enthusiasts expected was warehouse height, about 25 feet or so, he said. Few climbing gyms in the country could match OKC Rocks' wall space.

So Harth relished putting ``sweat equity'' into the project, borrowing low-interest funds from close friends and doing most of the conversion construction himself. He knew it would pay off in the long run.

``I started off gangbusters; I never had any doubts,'' Harth said in his non-echoing office. ``I just needed to survive until the canal opened. I knew this would work well alongside Bricktown. And I haven't had a slow period yet.''

The business is easy enough to spot. Even before the Oklahoma Centennial Commission painted a giant Oklahoma state flag on the north wall (``They thought it was an eyesore,'' Harth acknowledged), the silos jutted into view just south of the Interstate 40 Crosstown bridge.

Reaching OKC Rocks might intimidate a new visitor, however. Although just a stone's throw away from the Bricktown Canal, automobile access is limited and involves driving around to the backside of the U-Haul building and passing under the interstate, followed by a few more turns through undeveloped property.

``It took a year and a half to open it, before I was ready for business,'' he said. ``I had to make it a place for someone to even want to drive to. When I first started working, no one would have wanted to come back here. No way. It looks fantastic now, and it still has a long way to go.''

OKC Rocks' outer shell can be misleading, too. Although the building at first glance appears to be a single structure, it actually is comprised of several separate silos, each of which Harth has converted for climbing. Even the spaces between the silos have handholds and ropes, providing a large amount of surface area and plenty of climbing paths for all skill levels.

In the years following the initial silo conversion, Harth's business overhead has stayed low, he said. The biggest expense has been installing new wall holds to keep the climbing paths fresh for regular visitors. Much of the other necessary climbing gear he had already collected over the years.

OKC Rocks is open seven days a week, with certain nights reserved to attract different customers _ family nights on Fridays, for example, and ladies' nights on Wednesdays. Harth rents climbing shoes, harnesses, chalk bags and belaying devices.

``This is a legitimate business that speaks well of Oklahoma City. There are climbing gyms in every major metropolis in the country. So we have to have this. You get people coming in from other cities, to work at Dell or transfers at Tinker (Air Force Base), and they're used to having access to climbing gyms,'' he said.

``So when they come here and see that we've got one of the top three tallest gyms in the world, they're amazed. It shows we're on the right track.''