Former bank drive-thru, now a nuisance, set to be torn down for eventual museum annex
The Oklahoma City Museum of Art is seeking to tear down a closed bank drive-through to make way for parking and, in the long-term, an annex.
The drive-through was a mid-century modern design addition to downtown when it was built by First National Bank in 1971 and was last used by Bank of America, which last year closed its downtown operation. The drive-through itself was closed and sold in 2012.
John Madden, director of facilities at the museum, filed the demolition application Friday and reported the drive-through at 425 Robert S. Kerr Ave. was already vandalized when it was acquired last year.
'The property is currently a risk to the neighborhood'
Soon after the drive-through was sold by the bank in 2012, the drive-through was broken into and vandals left large holes in the walls while stealing all the property’s copper wiring and piping.
“Museum security staff continually police the area,” Madden said. “Homeless people have set up tents. People are often found sleeping on top of the teller booths and hiding behind the concrete walls. Visitors to the museum and neighborhood tell us they do not feel safe in this area after dark.”
Madden said other problems include trashcans set on fire, graffiti, trash, loitering and parties.
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“The property is currently a risk to the neighborhood,” Madden said. “The longer it sits, the safety and security risk increases.”
Museum director Michael Anderson said he hopes the drive-through will be cleared this winter, adding neighbors also have had problems with vandalism and trespassing at the property. The museum purchased an adjoining parking lot at 415 Robert S. Kerr Ave. in 2010.
The museum provided the city with conceptual drawings of what an annex might look like on the property, but that expansion is still up to a decade away from being attempted, Anderson said.
“We did an initial site plan a few years ago, at the beginning of COVID, to tease out what would be possible in terms of renovation of our current building,” Anderson said. “Those are obsolete. We're not close to doing anything yet. We don’t have a design firm picked out. We haven’t started a campaign yet.”
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The annex, however, is needed, Anderson said. The museum welcomes about 75,000 local, regional, national and international visitors a year and the museum’s collections have doubled since it moved downtown in 2002.
“We wanted to make sure we could expand,” Anderson said. “We are otherwise cornered here. We want to make sure we control our destiny downtown so that when we do expand, it can be downtown and not outside of the downtown core.”
This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Downtown nuisance property to be cleared by OKC Museum of Art
