Oklahoma City 101 - All the Metro Basics for those New to OKC

Welcome to Oklahoma City!

Hello there... Are you new to Oklahoma City? Maybe you're here for a visit or simply don't know as much as you should about the metro. Whatever the case may be, I present to you over the next few pages Oklahoma City 101, a quick and easy way for you to get up to speed on all the metro basics. You can sound more like a lifelong resident in no time.

We'll start with helping you get around the metro. Once you get a basic sense of how OKC is put together, you'll find it much easier to take advantage of all it has to offer.

Oklahoma City has a very simple organization actually. If you come from another large metropolitan area, you may be amazed at how logical our layout is, despite the fact that OKC consists of a number of suburbs, nearly engulfed in many cases.

The major streets are generally organized in 4 basic grid quadrants: Northwest, Northeast, Southwest, Southeast. Numbered streets run east/west while named streets generally run north/south. Major streets are located one mile apart for the most part. In particular, downtown/Bricktown don't always subscribe to that organization.

With that in mind, also make sure you get to know the major highways and interstates around the metro. That chart will also give you costs for some of the toll roads. If you'll be doing a lot of driving around OKC, you may want to get a PIKEPASS, which is much easier and a tad cheaper than stopping to pay.

The wide area of Oklahoma City makes driving a necessity for most. So make sure your drivers license is up to date and have a good understanding of the travel distances from spot to spot.

Last but not least, it's probably smart to save on gas costs as often as possible.

Next, we should brush up on the city particulars...