Rob:  Generating tourism dollars is the hope of an Oklahoma lawmaker who has a dream of turning the Oklahoma oil boom into an iconic landmark that would rival the Eiffel Tower.
Shane Jett:  Basically Oklahoma is the birthplace of petroleum.
Rob:  And Oklahoma lawmaker, Shane Jett, wants to honor that with a one of kind monument.
Shane Jett:  What we’ve envisioned is basically an oil derrick that may be of the 1950s with a crown at the top and the middle deck, and you just blow it up so it’ll actually stretch potentially across the Oklahoma River.  And so you’d have the Oklahoma River, you would create kind of like a bridge mechanism.  It would be a destination point for boats from Devon Energy, the Devon boats that are coming through, a destination point for them coming to and from, and basically a stainless steel ensconced oil derrick blown up to be proportionately about 1100 feet tall.
Rob:  Which is slightly taller than the Eiffel Tower, a point not lost on Representative Jett.
Jett:  One of the reasons it needs to be taller than the Eiffel Tower is because you want tourists to go; and you know, it’s taller than the Eiffel Tower.  That’s part of the marketing of it.
Rob:  Jett says such an iconic landmark would bring tourists to town and with them their pocketbooks.
Jett:  Seattle, in 2005, put together an economic impact study of what the space needle did for the city of Seattle, and it generated over 40-million dollars of revenue, every year; that’s reoccurring revenue.  I spoke with Mayor Cornett, and he said if you get someone to pull off the highway, off of I-40, into Oklahoma City, before they pull back on to leave they’ll spend 250 dollars.
Rob:  And Jett wants to use the water out of the river to recreate those early oil gushers.
Jett:  What we would like to do is put a geyser, using water cannons at the top of the tower, and put it on a time schedule so that people will schedule to come to see Oklahoma City specifically to see this thing go off.  And what we want to do is recreate that, Wow, what an awesome thing of nature.
Rob:  That would pay tribute to more than just our past.
Jett:  Because it commemorates those individuals who met the need of the rest of the world when we were looking for petroleum, and I believe people right here in Oklahoma are innovative enough that they’re going to find whatever fuels are necessary for the future right here in this generation.  So, hopefully it will be a point of inspiration to remind us where we come from, and to refreshingly let us know that there’s more to come.
Rob:  The cost of building such a structure could reach a hundred-million dollars, but Jett believes that cost could be offset by the money the energy tower could generate.