The Tulsa World reported a few days ago that the Tulsa Development Authority paid $800,000 for the venerable Route 66 business, the Metro Diner. It was one part of the University of Tulsa’s efforts to buy up property along 11th Street, aka Route 66, to make way for a new entrance to the university.
However, this $800,000 went to the owner of the land on which the Metro Diner sits. TU is still negotiating with the owner of the Metro Diner business, and time may be running short. Several of the businesses already have been removed.
Jim Rowenhorst is the owner of the Metro Diner, which has a 1950s look but actually was built in the early 1980s. Still, it’s a popular stop for many tourists traveling the Mother Road through Tulsa.
Rowenhorst told me that TU has “offered a fraction of what I paid for the business eight years ago. They’re offering very, very little.”
He said he has a possible new site to move the Metro Diner (rumor has it that it’s at 11th and Harvard), but the amount TU is offering won’t come close to covering the costs.
“We’d love to move,” Rowenhorst said, “but they’ve not offered enough money to even consider moving. To give up (this business) is not something we want to do.”
Rowenhorst indicated to me that he’s been given a Sept. 1 date to vacate the property. But he said this is probably unenforceable because he’s in the middle of a 12-year lease with his landlord.
He said he’s also concerned about his longtime employees, who would be affected by a protracted move. “The longtime workers help make the Metro Diner what it is,” he said.
Rowenhorst said that people concerned about the Metro Diner should write Kevan Buck, vice president for business and finance at TU, and politely implore the university to make a more reasonable offer for the restaurant and its relocation costs. Buck’s e-mail contact information can be found here. Snail-mail can go to: Kevan Buck, VP for Business and Finance, University of Tulsa, 600 S. College, Tulsa, OK 74104.
The Metro Diner is to the TU students &
ALL of Tulsa what Eskimo Joes is to Stillwater…………
Please help us save The Metro!!!
Contact the University & ask them to help
& then contact the owner & ask him to PLEASE relocate!!
Aug 2006
Several of my friends and I have been having breakfast at the Metro Diner since it opened in the early eighties. It has for us been a pleasant way to start the day as it is on our daily track. Sometimes it is just toast and coffee and conversation about what is in store for each of us for the day. My comrades and I are all about the same age and grew up when diners like the Metro were fairly common place. What is unique about he Metro is that it has been successful in capturing the spirit of the fifties when life seemed to be a little less hectic for people in my generation. Now we are bombarded on a daily basis of war and disaster at home and around the world. Places like the Metro remain constant and seem to offer refuge from the daily barrage of spine stiffening, gut wrenching news. The quiet simple tunes of Paul Anka, Bobby Darrin, Sonny James, Nat King Cole,Conway Twitty, Sam Cooke and many many others of that era embodied what the Metro Diner has stood for as a good reflection of of a quieter, simpler time and a great way to start the day. I am very pleased with the fact that the University of Tulsa is expanding and is a great asset for the city but please don’t do it at the expense of other institutions that been an important part of keeping life a little quieter and simpler. Give the Metro Diner a new start in life by paying a fair price for not only its tangible assets but the intangibles of a great way to start the day.
Hello to all, my name is Christina and I have lived in Tulsa since 1991. I have spent my life working for people in a sevice oriented mode, for example: People with disabilities people working towords humanitarien projects, People who see the good in others tha may go un noticed by many. On one particuylar evening in October of 1999 I was working yet another double shift for a company that staffs homes of people with disabilities. I was extreemly tired but had just relinquised my shildren to their father for their first visit with him since our terrable 3 year divorse battle and custody fight. I had planned to work from dusk till dawn till my children came home from their visit the following morning. It had been an excruciatingly long 3 days even after working 16 hours to walk into an empty home knowing my 3 children were sleeping in my ex husbands home with out my good night kisses and hugs. As I arrived at the home I was to work at for the next 10 hours, another staff arrived just less then 1 hour into the shift. I stated that I really needed to work the shift, the staff just said sorry its my regular shift I told the supervisor I was just going to be an hour or two late. I was furious! How could I go home to that empty home… I paged the supervisor of that particular house one I did know and admired but had not worked with prior to this evening. When he called me back I was driving home angry, tired and afraid of sitting in my home alone for the first time in 4 years. I told him I needed another shift now! he said I don’t have anything open, I began to yell at him while crying telling him that he was a jerk for promising me 10 hours work and now he owed me 9 hours of pay! He said ok, meet me at Metro diner in 30 min. I was still angry but glad he was going to send me to another house for a shift, so I thought. I arrived looking like and I hadn”t slept for 2 days what make-up I had on was now gone or lingering in places on my face it was never supposed to be. He insistied we get coffee so he could fill me in on the individual I was to work with. I aggreed and even let him buy me dinner, I was famisherd and ate like a starving child from a 3rd world country. He watched me and we talked , he asked me why I was working so much. I told him about my kids and the 3 year long divorce and custody battle, that even tho I won sole custody I had to allow him visiting rights, by the time the whole thing was said and done it was closing time at Metro diner and we had been there close to 5 hours. I know that the above events weren’t started by the Metro but that one day in that one booth was the begining of many for me and that wonderful man, each weekend that I had no kids he would find me a full day shift and take me out to eat afterwards at Metro. Fate or not we always got the same booth and 2 years later he asked me to marry him right there after fried mushrooms and coffee.Metro made that first Date my happy ever after. My oldest son now 18 took his girlfriend to Metro for their first date. I am very saddened that my 2 other boys will not have the same oportunity for such wonderful memories as we did. Relocation would be ok but leaving a great Icon for the rest of our future would be fantist
The last day of operation for the Metro Diner is Sunday November 26, 2006. If you are interested in buying a piece of this great restaurant, there will be an auction of the memorabilia on Tuesday December 12, 2006. The auction will begin at 2:00 PM when the restaurant equipment, tables, chairs, etc will be auctioned off. At 4:00 PM, the auction will begin on all of the decorations- some really great collectibles. Don’t miss this event!
I am trying to figure out if they will be selling any of their shirts at the auction, and if not any ideas where I could get my hands on one?
The Metro Diner has been a very important part of my life. I started working there in Mar. of 04 and quit in aug. of 06 due to my pregnancy. I am so sad that the metro has to close. I made many friends there over the years, and got married while i worked there. there will never be another part of my life that could ever replace those 2 years. But even though the metro has to close doesn’t mean the relationships do. I will always cherish the happy memories, all the regulars and the welcome feeling I always had there. So, with that, thank you Jim and the metro diner for letting me be a part of your life.
A friend and I stopped at the Metro Diner on our Route 66 trip in Oct 2004. Absolutely the best Monte Cristo sandwich I have ever had!
Can we get the recipe? I would rather visit a new Metro Diner next summer… had already planned on taking my wife there on the way from nowhere to nowhere on Route 66!
That is sad. I do hope that they can re-open elsewhere. My wife and I ate there several years ago while driving along old Route 66 for our destination guide at Southpoint.com. It was a busy place then, loved the atmosphere.
My entire family loved Metro Diner’s breakfast, eating there was a frequent tradition. There was no place better for a great meal at a fair price. We loved the decor!
I haven’t heard anything about a new Metro Diner location yet, I hope so, we certainly have a Tulsa void!